# Is it fair that people with no karma can vote on RFCs? - Thread: https://externals.io/message/77359 - Original archive: https://news-web.php.net/php.internals/77359 - Started by Andrea Faulds on 2014-09-20T01:29:08+00:00 - Messages: 49 - Page 1 of 2: messages 1 to 25 (25 per page, add `?page=N` to the URL) - Next page: https://externals.io/message/77359.md?page=2 - Reply by email to internals@lists.php.net - More for agents: search with https://externals.io/search.md?q={query} · JSON API at https://externals.io/api · documentation at https://externals.io/llms.txt --- ## #77359 — Andrea Faulds — 2014-09-20T01:29:08+00:00 URL: https://externals.io/message/77359#77359 Hi! Perhaps I’m being unfair and overthinking things, but I wonder if it is really fair for people who have no karma, i.e. not contributors to the documentation, extensions, php-src or anything else, to have the ability to vote on RFCs? I’d never suggest people without internals karma can’t vote. I think doc and peck contributors are as valued as any other contributors. However, people with no karma whatsoever (a blank people.php.net page) voting irks me. Thoughts? -- Andrea Faulds http://ajf.me/ --- ## #77361 — Leigh — 2014-09-20T02:16:21+00:00 URL: https://externals.io/message/77359#77361 · In reply to: #77359 > Hi! > > Perhaps I’m being unfair and overthinking things, but I wonder if it is really fair for people who have no karma, i.e. not contributors to the documentation, extensions, php-src or anything else, to have the ability to vote on RFCs? > > I’d never suggest people without internals karma can’t vote. I think doc and peck contributors are as valued as any other contributors. However, people with no karma whatsoever (a blank people.php.net page) voting irks me. > > Thoughts? > -- > Andrea Faulds > http://ajf.me/ > Hey Andrea, I think you know my personal opinion here. I want the people who are in a position to control the state of the language to be people who actively contribute to the language. Anyone who actively works towards a better PHP (regardless of whether their proposals are accepted or rejected) should be able to have an opinion on what is accepted or not. People who contribute one translation a year, a bug report once, a pecl extension 10 years ago and _nothing_ since then,... I don't understand why these people get to vote on the future of the language that the rest of us "investors" use every day. I think everyone with the ability to vote should have to communicate their reasons behind their yes/no publicly on this mailing list for it to be valid. If you cannot describe in your own words why a proposal should or should not be accepted, why should your opinion be valid? Interest in the language should be recent and relevant. It's difficult to police "legacy contributors", but if they are not interested enough to type a few lines..... the answer is clear. Say no to non-contributors. Cheers, Leigh. --- ## #77362 — Kalle Sommer Nielsen — 2014-09-20T02:25:39+00:00 URL: https://externals.io/message/77359#77362 · In reply to: #77359 2014-09-20 3:29 GMT+02:00 Andrea Faulds : > Hi! > > Perhaps I’m being unfair and overthinking things, but I wonder if it is really fair for people who have no karma, i.e. not contributors to the documentation, extensions, php-src or anything else, to have the ability to vote on RFCs? > > I’d never suggest people without internals karma can’t vote. I think doc and peck contributors are as valued as any other contributors. However, people with no karma whatsoever (a blank people.php.net page) voting irks me. > > Thoughts? I'm with you on this one, huge +1 for the separation on who can vote and changing the voting rfc. -- regards, Kalle Sommer Nielsen kalle@php.net --- ## #77363 — Kris Craig — 2014-09-20T02:32:15+00:00 URL: https://externals.io/message/77359#77363 · In reply to: #77362 > 2014-09-20 3:29 GMT+02:00 Andrea Faulds : > > […] > really fair for people who have no karma, i.e. not contributors to the > documentation, extensions, php-src or anything else, to have the ability to > vote on RFCs? > > […] > and peck contributors are as valued as any other contributors. However, > people with no karma whatsoever (a blank people.php.net page) voting irks > me. > > […] > > I'm with you on this one, huge +1 for the separation on who can vote > and changing the voting rfc. > > > -- > regards, > > Kalle Sommer Nielsen > kalle@php.net > > -- > > > > The one problem with this is it doesn't take into account those who contribute to PHP in other ways, such as administering tests, contributing RFCs, etc. I'm not necessarily against this, but if you want to garner wide enough support, you might want to make the language a little more inclusive. Just my two cents. --Kris --- ## #77364 — Kalle Sommer Nielsen — 2014-09-20T03:13:14+00:00 URL: https://externals.io/message/77359#77364 · In reply to: #77363 Hi Kris 2014-09-20 4:32 GMT+02:00 Kris Craig : > The one problem with this is it doesn't take into account those who > contribute to PHP in other ways, such as administering tests, contributing > RFCs, etc. I'm not necessarily against this, but if you want to garner wide > enough support, you might want to make the language a little more inclusive. Those who is an active contributor of the project should have the voting rights, take Dan Brown, who does not contribute to php-src, but is one of the main guys, if not THE guy behind the mirrors communication and network infrastructure. People like that who is a contributor should ofcourse be allowed, but people who despite they "represent" a project written in PHP and does not take a part of the actual development of PHP or maintenance of PHP.net and related services, e.g. framework authors should not imo. -- regards, Kalle Sommer Nielsen kalle@php.net --- ## #77365 — Gwynne Raskind — 2014-09-20T03:13:30+00:00 URL: https://externals.io/message/77359#77365 · In reply to: #77363 > > > […] > The one problem with this is it doesn't take into account those who > contribute to PHP in other ways, such as administering tests, contributing > RFCs, etc. I'm not necessarily against this, but if you want to garner > wide enough support, you might want to make the language a little more > inclusive. > > Just my two cents. > > --Kris I would also argue that contributions are not always a measure of the value of a person’s opinion. I haven’t made what would be considered “significant” contributions to PHP itself in a few years now, but I remain a very active user of the language, and I keep an eye on where it’s going. When I vote on language features, I’m casting that vote as someone who 1) has a clear set of reasons in mind for why a feature would or wouldn’t be useful, and 2) is always looking for a reason to be able to devote my time again. I agree that voting should be kept out of the hands of people who’ve never made any effort to show they give a darn about the language and its future. But I would say, be careful about equating “small" contributions with “unimportant”, “uninteresting”, or “nonexistent" ones. As Kris pointed out, the ways in which someone contributes aren’t always obvious. Leigh speaks of people who contribute “one translation a year” - that’s still more than many ever have done or ever will do. There are many who simply don’t have the time to take away from their lives to do more, but remain invested in the language and its community. That being said, I am absolutely in favor of excluding people who don’t make at least *some* effort. I’m strongly +1 for people explaining their reasons for a vote, or even doing so much as saying “I’d prefer not to explain my reasons”. I’m even more strongly +1 for people having to at least shown some level of interest before being allowed to influence PHP’s future. I would just like to be sure that the bar is not set so high that it excludes opinions from people whose only failing is not being seen by the community. Full disclosure: This is absolutely a self-serving opinion. All of my significant contributions are years old (dating back to 5.3), I’ve been all but invisible in the internals community since, and I am certainly someone who has limited time to spend on contributing to the language. But I like to think my thoughts are still worth something. If the requirement for that is that I explain why I voted how I did on an RFC, I’m glad - even eager - to do so. If the requirement for that is that I contribute at least one nontrivial documentation edit or source code commit per month, or something similar, I think the point has been missed. -- Gwynne Raskind --- ## #77366 — Pierre Joye — 2014-09-20T05:06:23+00:00 URL: https://externals.io/message/77359#77366 · In reply to: #77359 Hi, > > Hi! > > Perhaps I’m being unfair and overthinking things, but I wonder if it is really fair for people who have no karma, i.e. not contributors to the documentation, extensions, php-src or anything else, to have the ability to vote on RFCs? > > I’d never suggest people without internals karma can’t vote. I think doc and peck contributors are as valued as any other contributors. However, people with no karma whatsoever (a blank people.php.net page) voting irks me. > > Thoughts? I am not sure what brings you here but the idea of community votes was one of the top thing when we introduced the voting RFC. Thinking that we do not care what symfony, composer, zend framework, lavahel (if they like to), drupal lead developers think about what we plan to do then we will go back to a very dark time. We may improve how it is done. But killing communities voices is a very bad idea. It is also important to keep in mind the RFCs, blocking ppl were not them. Or ppl having strong opinions for one way or another, me or other, were not part of these communities voices. So I do not think the impact of their votes is that large anyway. Cheers, Pierre --- ## #77367 — Sara Golemon — 2014-09-20T05:11:11+00:00 URL: https://externals.io/message/77359#77367 · In reply to: #77359 > > Perhaps I’m being unfair and overthinking things, Yes, you are. > but I wonder if it is really fair for people who have no karma, i.e. not contributors to the documentation, extensions, php-src or anything else, to have the ability to vote on RFCs? Yes, it is. -Sara --- ## #77375 — Rowan Collins — 2014-09-20T11:51:44+00:00 URL: https://externals.io/message/77359#77375 > That most of my spare time is still being taken up > living with the consequences of changes in PHP is water under the bridge > now [...] PLEASE can we get > back to a level playing field and use PHP7 as a base to get something > stable and fully compatible with modern requirements. Only put stuff in > PHP5 now that is NEEDED so we can finally catch up! Please refrain from turning every conversation into an excuse to jump on your soapbox about the direction PHP is going. Your general points have surely been raised and debated many times over by now, and there is no language change discussed in this thread for you to make specific points for or against. I have no right - and no desire - to rob you of your voice, but am sure your energy could be better directed to more specific goals. -- Rowan Collins [IMSoP] --- ## #77376 — Andrea Faulds — 2014-09-20T12:07:43+00:00 URL: https://externals.io/message/77359#77376 · In reply to: #77366 > > > I am not sure what brings you here but the idea of community votes was one > of the top thing when we introduced the voting RFC. I should've made clear I'm not opposed to community reps voting either. People who have made enough contributions to earn either karma or community rep status should be allowed to vote. My problem is people with neither. -- Andrea Faulds http://ajf.me/ --- ## #77377 — Pierre Joye — 2014-09-20T12:14:21+00:00 URL: https://externals.io/message/77359#77377 · In reply to: #77376 > > > > […] one > > […] > > I should've made clear I'm not opposed to community reps voting either. People who have made enough contributions to earn either karma or community rep status should be allowed to vote. My problem is people with neither. For example? --- ## #77378 — Ferenc Kovacs — 2014-09-20T12:54:19+00:00 URL: https://externals.io/message/77359#77378 · In reply to: #77377 2014.09.20. 14:14 ezt írta ("Pierre Joye" ): > > > > […] > one > > […] > People who have made enough contributions to earn either karma or community > rep status should be allowed to vote. My problem is people with neither. > > For example? I personally have seen a couple of cases where we (mostly Rasmus) approves outstanding php.net accounts but there are no follow up, so for example the proposed pecl package is not created nor any karma is granted. For the record: currently it is possible for a pecl ext developer to not have php.net account (pecl.php.net has its own user db and some exts aren't hosted on our svn/git infrastructure) which means that they won't have voting karma by default. I think it would make sense to review and cross-check the accounts and maybe remove those which were never used. We also have to keep in mind, that there could be users without any karma, but other contributions like sorting out bugs or event/notes moderation, etc. Afair the voting rfc required previous contribution not just an existing php.net account, but as I mentioned there are a bunch of ways to contribute other than having commits in one of the repos so there is no easy way to check that programatically. Ps: sorry for the typos, sending from my phone. --- ## #77379 — Andrea Faulds — 2014-09-20T13:02:24+00:00 URL: https://externals.io/message/77359#77379 · In reply to: #77378 > > > Afair the voting rfc required previous contribution not just an existing > php.net account, but as I mentioned there are a bunch of ways to contribute > other than having commits in one of the repos so there is no easy way to > check that programatically. > > Ps: sorry for the typos, sending from my phone. Perhaps we could make the system only allow people with karma to vote, but add an additional flag we can set on karmaless accounts to say they can vote, for the limited number of accounts for which this is necessary? I think this could work. -- Andrea Faulds http://ajf.me/ --- ## #77382 — johannes@schlueters.de — 2014-09-20T14:37:03+00:00 URL: https://externals.io/message/77359#77382 · In reply to: #77361 > > I think everyone with the ability to vote should have to communicate > their reasons behind their yes/no publicly on this mailing list for it > to be valid. If you cannot describe in your own words why a proposal > should or should not be accepted, why should your opinion be valid? > That's one of the reasons why I consider voting as default way wrong. It might be a way to solve ties if a consensus can't be reached. It is unclear what a "no" means. Might be a related to the patch the design, a misunderstanding or due to a critical issue ... in the end a vote creates "losers" with little feedback. But well, I'm saying this from day one of the voting. johannes --- ## #77384 — Leigh — 2014-09-20T14:49:48+00:00 URL: https://externals.io/message/77359#77384 · In reply to: #77382 > > It is unclear what a "no" means. Might be a related to the patch the > design, a misunderstanding or due to a critical issue ... in the end a > vote creates "losers" with little feedback. > > But well, I'm saying this from day one of the voting. > > johannes > This is my opinion exactly Some people who vote no are involved in the internals discussion, and that's great. But some people vote no without a word. How do we know they even understand the impact of their vote? Without their feedback how can the proposal be improved? Even if they say "I'm voting no because of all of the reasons stated by Person X", that's enough to know that more than one person doesn't like a specific aspect, and makes it a higher priority for improvement. --- ## #77386 — Peter Cowburn — 2014-09-20T15:09:18+00:00 URL: https://externals.io/message/77359#77386 · In reply to: #77384 > On 20 September 2014 15:37, Johannes Schlüter > wrote: > > […] > > This is my opinion exactly > > Some people who vote no are involved in the internals discussion, and > that's great. But some people vote no without a word. How do we know > they even understand the impact of their vote? Without their feedback > how can the proposal be improved? > > Even if they say "I'm voting no because of all of the reasons stated > by Person X", that's enough to know that more than one person doesn't > like a specific aspect, and makes it a higher priority for > improvement. > > This is exactly the case for the “Yes” voters too. I’d be for having some avenue (um... internals, or… is that the perfect place?) for giving two cents [voluntarily] about a voter’s decision or indeed lack thereof. Ideally, the atmosphere would be open *and inviting* (the latter appears to be a problem here) where a pitchfork-weilding mob won’t descend on anyone who happened to make a vote, one way or the other. In the past we’ve had people editing wiki articles (not RFCs) with their own thoughts as attributed annotations. This has obvious issues, but it would be a) in writing, and b) directly associated with the RFC, and c) *not* a conversation. --- ## #77409 — Lester Caine — 2014-09-21T07:13:09+00:00 URL: https://externals.io/message/77359#77409 · In reply to: #77375 > > > […] > > Please refrain from turning every conversation into an excuse to jump on > your soapbox about the direction PHP is going. Your general points have > surely been raised and debated many times over by now, and there is no > language change discussed in this thread for you to make specific points > for or against. > > I have no right - and no desire - to rob you of your voice, but am sure > your energy could be better directed to more specific goals. Given that the bulk of users ARE still stuck with PHP5.2 or 5.3, and the BULK of the movement in usages is from 5.2 to 5.4, I would say that THIS is a much bigger vote for maintaining some stability. It is also a big indicator that who actually votes on the RFC's is somewhat academic! There is not a high demand for much of the tinkering going on, and I see little pressure in the field to take them up. Any heavily used framework has to maintain compatibility with PHP5.3 currently. ( And who is using PHP5.7 live? ) My own current roadmap is to get everything over to PHP5.4 and then look at where the core is by which time I hope my next step will be to PHP7 skipping anything being discussed for 5.x now anyway. http://w3techs.com/technologies/history_details/pl-php/5 http://w3techs.com/technologies/details/pl-php/5/all -- Lester Caine - G8HFL ----------------------------- Contact - http://lsces.co.uk/wiki/?page=contact L.S.Caine Electronic Services - http://lsces.co.uk EnquirySolve - http://enquirysolve.com/ Model Engineers Digital Workshop - http://medw.co.uk Rainbow Digital Media - http://rainbowdigitalmedia.co.uk --- ## #77456 — Derick Rethans — 2014-09-22T11:32:34+00:00 URL: https://externals.io/message/77359#77456 · In reply to: #77359 > Perhaps I’m being unfair and overthinking things, but I wonder if it > is really fair for people who have no karma, i.e. not contributors to > the documentation, extensions, php-src or anything else, to have the > ability to vote on RFCs? > > I’d never suggest people without internals karma can’t vote. I think > doc and peck contributors are as valued as any other contributors. > However, people with no karma whatsoever (a blank people.php.net page) > voting irks me. I think people's votes should only count if they have karma to the section of the code that the RFC/feature/whatever relates to. cheers, Derick --- ## #77457 — Derick Rethans — 2014-09-22T11:35:19+00:00 URL: https://externals.io/message/77359#77457 · In reply to: #77382 > > > […] > That's one of the reasons why I consider voting as default way wrong. > It might be a way to solve ties if a consensus can't be reached. That's another good point, that I stand behind. I think f.e. the integer semantics RFC was contentious enough to warrant further discussion and see what could make other people to say "yes" as well. The current RFC process does not state anything about reflecting comments on the ML to have to be addressed before the RFC can even be put to vote. And I think, valid (technical) objects should be required to be addressed. > It is unclear what a "no" means. Might be a related to the patch the > design, a misunderstanding or due to a critical issue ... in the end > a vote creates "losers" with little feedback. > > But well, I'm saying this from day one of the voting. Yes. I am in that camp too. cheers, Derick --- ## #77460 — Andrea Faulds — 2014-09-22T12:10:09+00:00 URL: https://externals.io/message/77359#77460 · In reply to: #77456 > > > > […] > > I think people's votes should only count if they have karma to the > section of the code that the RFC/feature/whatever relates to. Is that really fair? If we break BC, plenty of userland developers might be affected and they should have a right to chime in. -- Andrea Faulds http://ajf.me/ --- ## #77461 — Andrey Andreev — 2014-09-22T12:16:40+00:00 URL: https://externals.io/message/77359#77461 · In reply to: #77460 > > > > > […] > > Is that really fair? If we break BC, plenty of userland developers might be affected and they should have a right to chime in. That would be quite unfair, not just because of BC breaks and/or userland developers' votes (there aren't many, afaik). Practically every language change would be decided by only a handful of people, while it should be important that many votes are gathered for important decisions. Cheers, Andrey. --- ## #77463 — Derick Rethans — 2014-09-22T13:28:32+00:00 URL: https://externals.io/message/77359#77463 · In reply to: #77460 > > > > […] > > Is that really fair? If we break BC, plenty of userland developers > might be affected and they should have a right to chime in. Breaking BC should never happen anyway. cheers, Derick --- ## #77464 — Derick Rethans — 2014-09-22T13:29:30+00:00 URL: https://externals.io/message/77359#77464 · In reply to: #77461 > > > […] > > That would be quite unfair, not just because of BC breaks and/or > userland developers' votes (there aren't many, afaik). > Practically every language change would be decided by only a handful > of people, while it should be important that many votes are gathered > for important decisions. There is a big difference between votes, and voices. Voices should definitely be listened too. Derick --- ## #77467 — Pierre Joye — 2014-09-22T13:39:58+00:00 URL: https://externals.io/message/77359#77467 · In reply to: #77464 > > > > > […] > > There is a big difference between votes, and voices. Voices should > definitely be listened too. We agree on listening. Only not on how we listen. > Derick --- ## #77468 — Rafael Kassner — 2014-09-22T14:21:29+00:00 URL: https://externals.io/message/77359#77468 · In reply to: #77467 IMHO, denying non-karma people to vote is like to making PHP a company's product, or, in another words, "you use what we built and shut up", because only listening people won't allow to accept/deny a particular RFC, only votes do. People surely don't comment (myself included) why they are choosing some particular option on a RFC, but they are making their opinion count, and I think this kind of "democracy power" shouldn't be voided. Using separated voting count isn't an option? Like only internal changes are voted only by people with karma and features/changes/small BC breaks that affects userland are allowed to anyone. This way I believe is easy to say if either internals and community agrees with the proposed change and community people are making their opinion count. > > > […] > > We agree on listening. Only not on how we listen. > > > […] --- Next page: https://externals.io/message/77359.md?page=2