On Fri, Oct 29, 2010 at 8:22 PM, Aaron J. Seigo <aseigo@kde.org> wrote:

hi everyone...

i hope you won't mind one more bit of unsolicited input on the recent fork in
this community. feel free to ignore any or all of it, of course :)

======

personally, i find it unfortunate and sad that it has come to this, simply
because it is never nice to see splits in any community, especially ones that
we are a part of. sometimes things get to the point where it is the only
workable solution left, and after discussing various relevant issues with a
few different people in koffice over the last year i can understand how that
may be the case here. still, it's unfortunate.

such circumstances do present an opportunity to grow and strengthen, however.
i am hopeful that is what will happen here.

koffice iteslf is not a strategically significant component for KDE. that may
sound harsh, but i believe it to be true today. the user base is small, years
of releases did not culminate into a (market-)significant product over the
same time span in which 2.0-4.0 of the KDE SC was develped and released, etc.

it has provided some great value for KDE, however: it has helped strengthen
kdelibs, it has brought KDE some very positive light and recognition via key
involvement with ODF and some apps like Krita and Kexi have had their well
deserved moments of shining in the press. and of course those of us who use
KOffice applications are deeply grateful for it.

however, the truth is that without KOffice, KDE itself would continue on
without a huge shift in direction or even a huge hit on brand values. ergo, it
isn't (today) strategically significant. but it could be.

many of you here are working directly towards that and making immense strides
to making KOffice applications very signficant, be it Kexi's continue movement
forward (and the communication around that movement! so key!) or the office
document veiwer for mobile or various other efforts underway. there is a huge
amount of work being done on KOffice these days, as evidenced by the commit
logs and the review requests that appear on the list. i do believe that one
day KOffice can be a very signficant technology group for KDE from a strategic
POV.

being in this "in between" state means that KOffice has the space to make
significant shifts without risking too much value in the process. if this had
to happen, now is a "good" time.

it probably also means that as this happens, a significant effort will be
required to turn KOffice into what it could be. this can't be news to anyone
involved with KOffice :) this isn't a technical challenge, though, but a
predominantly social one.

those of you most intimately involved with KOffice have the challenging task
of gelling a recently fractous group oriented in a useful direction. there are
issues of tone and quality of communication on the mailing list, commitment to
certain kinds of ettiquette and shared expectations in goals, marrying the
needs of disinterested commercial contributors (e.g. 3rd party contractors)
with interested commercial participants (e.g. those building companies and/or
products around KOffice software) with community contribution.

having met many (most? all?) of you in person over the years, i truly believe
that each and every one of you are decent people with good hearts and great
commitment. the technical abilities in this group also speak for themselves
and are not to be a source of concern. without these things, it's unlikely
that KOffice could succeed, but fortunately it has this solid foundation to
build upon.

however, i am greatly concerned about the future of KOffice due to one
outstanding issue:

KOffice has not had a track record of consistent, productive leadership. imho,
this continues to this day.

leadership is a skill, separate from other social skills and certainly
separate from technical ones. leadership brings people together, helps enforce
social contracts and norms and protects that community from outside poison
when necessary. it is proactive when it can be, humble when it needs to be and
thinks about the overall system of people involved when making decisions.
leadership searches for consensus and makes hard decisions when called for
that reflect the values inherent to that community. leadership is not forced
on others, it is made available and attracts people to it.

this is why it takes effort and deterination to develop leadership as a skill.
it's also why it is the kind of asset that makes or breaks many projects,
communities and human endeavours.

i've been trying to become a marginally proficient leader for much of my adult
life, and i still have so far to go .. it's not a trivial skill, but even in
small amounts it can have profound effect.

so while KOffice has many great people involved with it and a lot of very
exciting activity, i'm not sure that there is a demonstrated level of profound
leadership within the community here. and without that, KOffice will imho
remain at risk of these kinds of problems festering and being created.

if the "natural leaders" in KOffice have not already, i would very much
encourage you to get books on the topic, find literature on leadership on
line, maybe even find and enroll in leadership training courses.

knowing that some of you are already investing significantly in KOffice in
other ways, this would be another kind of investment to consider making to
protect your existing and future monetary and effort based investments.

just my 0.02. :)