OpenJDK Governing Board Minutes: 2017/11/30

The OpenJDK Governing Board met via conference call on Thursday, 30 November 2017 at 16:00 UTC with the following agenda:

  1. Vulnerability Group
  2. Faster release cadence
  3. Any other business

Four Board members were present: Georges Saab, Andrew Haley, Doug Lea, and Mark Reinhold.

The intent of these minutes is to capture the conversational flow of the Board's discussion and also to record decisions. If you are interested only in the latter then search for the word "AGREED" throughout the text.

1. Vulnerability Group

Mark began the meeting by saying that the status of the Vulnerability Group was unchanged. When the proposal was published, a small modification was suggested to allow members of the Vulnerability Group to communicate with the submitter following standard industry practice. Strictly speaking, this was not allowed in the License/NDA. Oracle Legal needed to make this minor update, but unfortunately the responsible attorney was very busy. Once the required change was made, the License/NDA would be circulated to the Governing Board (GB) then to the Community for feedback. Georges requested that the changes be highlighted to ease review. Mark replied that he would send an annotated version.

After the final version of the License/NDA is accepted there would be a Call For Votes to create the Group. The eligible voters were already aware of the expected proposal. Practical details were being worked out so that the Group could function immediately.

Andrew encouraged Oracle to work towards quick Group creation since it would ease Red Hat's maintenance of OpenJDK Project JDK 7 Updates. Mark assured him that it was a priority.

2. Faster release cadence

Mark reported that the faster release cadence proposal was fairly well-received. People close to OpenJDK and others in the broader Community seemed content, if not excited. Transitional changes to support the faster release cadence were in progress.

Doug said that several people were puzzled that the GB did not have authority over such things. He believed that the GB could intervene if something violated the Bylaws. Mark agreed with that assessment. Andrew also agreed, adding that there was a distinction between what the GB could enforce or decide and what they could discuss. He continued saying that the GB was responsible for the overall health of the OpenJDK Community.

Andrew thought that the Community's biggest concern was that it appeared that there was insufficient overlap between JDK releases being maintained and the next one. He understood that non-Oracle contributors would maintain older releases; however many people wanted something more official. Mark said that in general the answer was the same for any open source community, support would depend on the participants. He cautioned that Oracle's commercial offerings should not be confused with OpenJDK. Mark had not figured out how to best communicate this since, as the OpenJDK Lead, he could not make commitments for potential participants; however a statement of intent was possible. Andrew suggested a joint statement from those currently maintaining older releases. Doug thought that a statement indicating good will would be appreciated. Mark suggested that releasing the joint statement before the winter break was possible.

3. Any other business

Andrew asked whether the usual GB meeting at FOSDEM 2018 would occur. Mark confirmed that he and Georges would attend and the meeting was expected. Doug regretted that his attendance would not be possible since the conference occurred during the first week of classes. On behalf of the GB, Mark will submit a proposal for the GB session. Arrangements will be made for Doug to attend the session virtually.

Mark announced that the submission forest project which had a closed beta last summer would be available soon. The new system allows non-Oracle developers to build, test, and integrate their changes into a release. Users of this repository would receive an e-mail describing test results. In the event of failure, an Oracle employee would need to be consulted to access internal data. It is considered an interim solution. The long-term goal is an open build and test solution. Doug asked whether this implied that TCK tests would also be open. Mark responded that opening the TCK was a completely different topic.

At this point, the Board adjourned.