I'm already gone

I'm already gone

[Roland McGrath]

Hello, friends!

You might have noticed that I haven't been present on the list or
perhaps answered your direct email in several months.  I'm sorry I've
been away so long without a word, but I'm not coming back any time soon.
There's no big news with me.  I've just found that I've drifted away and
today I'm acknowledging what's already happened.

This summer marks 30 years since I began writing the GNU C Library.
(That's two thirds of my lifespan so far.)  It's long enough.

So, I'm hereby declaring myself maintainer emeritus and withdrawing from
direct involvement in the project.  These past several months, if not
the last few years, have proven that you don't need me any more.

You'll make good decisions, as you've already made good decisions.
You'll actually get around to implementing some of the things I've been
suggesting or meaning to do (or saying I would do) for years, as you've
already made progress on some of those ideas in recent months.  If I
stayed around to give advice, you'd ignore my advice to be more paranoid
and more cautious, plow ahead anyway, ship it, and then have to redress
the problem when the practical issues manifested, as you've already done
and had to do. :-)  All in all, I have no doubt at all that the job
you're doing now and will do in the future maintaining glibc is better
than I ever did that job myself and at least as good as my presence in
the project might ever make it.

Over these 30 years, a few others have contributed individually more
than I did and the rest of you have contributed collectively far more
than I ever could have.  I'm eternally grateful to everyone who has been
or is now involved in nurturing, improving, shaping, and supporting this
creation.  I won't name any names since that would always give many more
short shrift.  But I'm especially grateful to the small handful of folks
who contributed in the early days when so much was so different than it
is today; to the diehard few who've hung on through all the changes and
tribulations over the many years; and to those, old and new, who have
come together in recent years to breathe new life into the project and
steer us towards becoming the vital community that the project and its
users have always deserved.  I'm proud of what we've been able to build
and deliver to our users.  But I'm more proud to have collaborated with
all of you.

I've unsubscribed from libc-alpha.  (I still wish I'd renamed the
mailing list before it grew past five members and me maintaining the
list by hand!)  I'll be dropping off of more free software mailing lists
for things I haven't done anything about in months or years, and
otherwise disentangling myself from administrative responsibilities that
I haven't really been fulfulling for a long time now.

If there's something I promised you in the past I'd do or something you
had an expectation of me replying to, I'm sorry about that.  I won't be
following up on any of those things.  Anything in the project I'm still
supposedly the maintainer or primary point of contact for, I've already
abandoned in practice and I'm now officially leaving to whoever has been
taking up my slack.  I'm glad to be of as much help as I think I can be
in any transitions of responsibility that need to happen.  Of course
you'll always be able contact me personally on subjects related to the
project when I can be uniquely useful.  Experience has shown that I've
most likely already forgotten the details, so I wouldn't have high
expectations about how much help I'll actually be.  But I'm still here.

Lastly, I'm not planning on travelling to Prague for this year's Cauldron.
I regret I won't see you all there.  Maybe you'll look me up next time you
are passing through the Bay Area.


So long, Thanks, and Happy Hacking,
Roland

Re: I'm already gone

[Joseph Myers]

Thank you for all your work on glibc!  I presume you'll remove yourself as 
a default CC: on any of the admin, buildbot, hurd, manual, ports 
(obsolescent) components in glibc should you no longer wish to be a 
default CC there.

I'd like to nominate Samuel Thibault and Thomas Schwinge, if willing, as 
Hurd port maintainers (which implies full authority to commit any of the 
backlogged Hurd-specific changes that clearly cannot affect non-Hurd 
ports, without waiting for any prior review, at least for now including 
during release freezes, subject to the usual coding standards and always 
having the option to request review of a particular patch if that seems 
useful or the patch possibly controversial).  (Committed patches should 
still be posted to libc-alpha, and of course the community may raise 
issues post-commit which should then be addressed.)

-- 
Joseph S. Myers
joseph@codesourcery.com

Re: I'm already gone

[Carlos O'Donell]

On 07/07/2017 11:06 AM, Joseph Myers wrote:
> Thank you for all your work on glibc!  I presume you'll remove yourself as 
> a default CC: on any of the admin, buildbot, hurd, manual, ports 
> (obsolescent) components in glibc should you no longer wish to be a 
> default CC there.

I can help with that if you need any help.

> I'd like to nominate Samuel Thibault and Thomas Schwinge, if willing, as 
> Hurd port maintainers (which implies full authority to commit any of the 
> backlogged Hurd-specific changes that clearly cannot affect non-Hurd 
> ports, without waiting for any prior review, at least for now including 
> during release freezes, subject to the usual coding standards and always 
> having the option to request review of a particular patch if that seems 
> useful or the patch possibly controversial).  (Committed patches should 
> still be posted to libc-alpha, and of course the community may raise 
> issues post-commit which should then be addressed.)

I second that nomination, it would be great to see Samuel and Thomas bring
the GNU/Hurd port to the point where it builds on master.

-- 
Cheers,
Carlos.

Re: I'm already gone

[Carlos O'Donell]

On 07/07/2017 03:21 AM, Roland McGrath wrote:
> This summer marks 30 years since I began writing the GNU C Library.
> (That's two thirds of my lifespan so far.)  It's long enough.

Thank you for all of your work and effort over those 30 years! You 
are certainly one of the reasons I joined the project, and your
mentoring and support have been immensely helpful.

I will miss your well written prose and insightful opinions on
software design :-)

-- 
Cheers,
Carlos.

Re: I'm already gone

[Paul Eggert]

Carlos O'Donell wrote:
> I will miss your well written prose and insightful opinions on
> software design :-)

Shoot, I still remember incisive stuff Roland wrote me privately in the 1980s. 
Thanks for all the fish, Roland!

Re: I'm already gone

[Roland McGrath]

Yes, I've removed myself from the default CCs in bugzilla.  That's one
thing I did know how to do.
There might be some other places I'm plugged in where I don't know off
hand how to unplug.
If you notice my name/address still attached to something, please let
me know and/or unplug me yourself.

I heartily endorse Thomas and Samuel as Hurd libc maintainers.
Thomas is already the default CC recipient for the bugzilla component
(the sole one, now that I've been removed).


Thanks,
Roland

Re: I'm already gone

[Samuel Thibault]

Hello,

Carlos O'Donell, on ven. 07 juil. 2017 11:40:26 -0400, wrote:
> On 07/07/2017 11:06 AM, Joseph Myers wrote:
> > I'd like to nominate Samuel Thibault and Thomas Schwinge, if willing, as 
> > Hurd port maintainers (which implies full authority to commit any of the 
> > backlogged Hurd-specific changes that clearly cannot affect non-Hurd 
> > ports, without waiting for any prior review, at least for now including 
> > during release freezes, subject to the usual coding standards and always 
> > having the option to request review of a particular patch if that seems 
> > useful or the patch possibly controversial).  (Committed patches should 
> > still be posted to libc-alpha, and of course the community may raise 
> > issues post-commit which should then be addressed.)
> 
> I second that nomination, it would be great to see Samuel and Thomas bring
> the GNU/Hurd port to the point where it builds on master.

I'll be happy to do it.

I now just need to find the time to do it :)

Samuel

Re: I'm already gone

[Paul Eggert]

On 07/11/2017 05:17 PM, Samuel Thibault wrote:
> I now just need to find the time to do it
Thanks for volunteering, and I hope you can find the time too. I updated 
the wiki's MAINTAINERS page to add your and Thomas's name as Hurd 
maintainers, and to remove Roland's name from that page.