Re: Future of RAIDFrame

In message <40007D14.6090205_at_freebsd.org>, Scott Long writes:
>All,
>
>I started RAIDframe three years ago with the hope of bringing a proven
>and extensible RAID stack to FreeBSD.  Unfortunately, while it was made
>to work pretty well on 4.x, it has never been viable on 5.x; it never
>survived the introduction of GEOM and removal of the old disk layer.
>[...]
>I have a Work-In-Progress for converting and integrating it into GEOM
>on my home Perforce server.  It hasn't been touched in several months
>and I really don't see myself being able to finish alone it in the near
>future.  Since it's been hanging over my head for so long, I'm very,
>very close to just removing it and moving on.

I can't help thinking about how small the central group of developers
in FreeBSD is, and considering that you also carry the armoured
release-engineer hat, I am fully able to understand why you have
not been able to pull RF along in addition to all the other stuff.

As much as I would hate to see RF and Vinum disappar from our
source tree, maybe what we need to do is to kick them both into
"training-camp" in p4 while you and Greg look the other way.

In the p4 tree, we can easier add new talent to our developer force
and I am pretty sure that some sort of merry band of developers
would form around both RF and vinum there.

I am not convinced that they may be able to pull off the task, but
the fact that somebody at least tries should give us better chances
than having RF stuck in your TODO queue, and vinum stuck in Gregs,
while everybody else waits more or less paitiently.

If they manage to make it work in p4, pulling it back into CVS is
a small matter of repo work (AFAIK).

Because we might as well be honest and face it:  Neither you nor
Greg has much chance of finding the significant amount of time
that you need.

I know this can be seen as you and Greg throwing in the towel, but
I urge you to try to see it like saw my Junior Kernel Hacker list:
Throwing a good meaty bone to pick which I myself couldn't eat
anyway.

I'd say lets kick them both into perforce and let whoever wants
their hands have a go at them.

Poul-Henning

-- 
Poul-Henning Kamp       | UNIX since Zilog Zeus 3.20
phk_at_FreeBSD.ORG         | TCP/IP since RFC 956
FreeBSD committer       | BSD since 4.3-tahoe    
Never attribute to malice what can adequately be explained by incompetence.