Re: New maintainer

[Eli Zaretskii]

> From: "John Wiegley" <address@hidden>
> Date: Thu, 08 Oct 2015 17:14:02 -0700
> 
> >>>>> Karl Fogel <address@hidden> writes:
> 
> > So if at this point you were to say that, as far as being an Emacs
> > maintainer goes, you understand and are willing to abide by the priorities
> > Richard has articulated, even though you disagree with them, that would
> > settle an important question. Or if you don't think you can abide by them,
> > in your work as maintainer, that would be useful to know too (though it
> > would probably result in you not being the maintainer).
> 
> I'm pretty sure that if it came up in a significant way, I wouldn't be able to
> stand by it. The insistence on Bazaar over Git, for example, caused me to stop
> contributing to Emacs a few years back. And I've been unhappy about the DSO
> situation since around 1999. Very glad to see these two getting resolved!

It's too bad, IMO, that you evidently assign so much importance to
issues with which you disagree.  Cooperation is about finding the
areas of agreement, which are certainly vast in this case, and using
them for the common good, rather than poking at the few disagreements.

> What I wonder is whether Richard and I could reach a compromise if it happens
> while we're working together. I'm not saying everything has to go my way; but
> if I see something that needs to happen for the sake of users, would we be
> able to find an alternate path?

It's a question no one will be able to answer in advance.  These
issues are decided on a case by case basis, depending on the balance
of advantages and disadvantages in each specific case.  Sometimes your
suggestion could be accepted even without a compromise, sometimes
there could be a compromise, and sometimes no compromise will be
possible.

You will have to decide up front whether a possibility of no
compromise in some situations is something you will be able to live
with.  This is something that IMO sheds light not only on your
relations with Richard and the FSF, but also on your relations with
other contributors here, because such situations will arise there as
well.

> If that timeframe is too long for a decision, I'm willing to help out Emacs
> until it becomes a real problem. There are plenty of areas where no
> disagreement exists at all.

Exactly.  And my question is: why not concentrate on those areas, and
simply "bypass" (a.k.a. "ignore") the rest?