Stupid mistake
Readers of this blog are aware of my quest to find out what is going on in JSR 277. JSR 277 is a crucially important for the OSGi Alliance because it can either destroy much of our work over the past 8 years or increase its value. I was denied membership by SUN, and promises to keep me updated on a regular basis have not been fulfilled. Last week, Stanley Ho, the EG lead, finally "updated" me after several mails begging for information:
So far, we have gathered the requirements from the expert group, and we are still in the process of determining how to proceed based on those requirements. We intend to release drafts after we have a concrete and complete proposal, so people who are interested on this JSR but not on the EG can provide their feedbacks.
Which is about as useful as a sore toe; experienced people know that once a concrete proposal is formulated, it is almost impossible to change key decisions. Requirements are the most important phase because they scope the possible solutions. If you cannot influence the requirements, the best you can hope for is helping them find typos. So, if you think I am grumpy, you are probably right. This is where my stupid mistake came into play.
Last week Liz Kiener from the JCP PMO mailed a message to the jcp-experts@jcp.org mailing list to which I seem to be a member. She was kindly asking for articles and I decided to reply with an idea for an article that I know many people would interest: The (unnecessary) closed nature of many EGs, particularly the JSR 277 EG. I really do not understand why JCP EGs have to work in secrecy. Secrecy in the end always leads to bad things, and in this case I really do not see the need for this. Why would an EG not get the input from a larger audience? The only reason I can think of is that the proposals are already defined, the process is just necessary to give it an aura of fairness. (I told you I was grumpy about this).
Anyway, when the "I am Out of the office" mails started to come it dawned on me that "Reply All" was maybe not that smart for a mailing lists. The only defense I have is that I had no idea that you the jcp-experts@jcp.org list is open! This obviously opens interesting perspectives, one of my main complaints is that there is no JCP mailing list to discus among EG members and interested parties how the JCP should evolve. I realize the tremendous effort SUN has done to make Java a success, but I also think that when Java was introduced in the market it was never positioned as a proprietary product. Because of positioning it as an open product, lots of people and companies participated in the development of Java to make it successful. In the beginning, control by SUN was deemed necessary to keep Java together. This control is no longer necessary, instead of opening up and loosening the control, SUN holds the reins more tight, and not always with the community interest at heart.
Today I got a mail from Stephen McConnell. He also seems interested about JSR 277 and would like to have a wider discussion. He found an obscure and well hidden mailing list dedicated to JSR 277. If you are interested to see if we can get some more information and provide feedback to this very important JSR, please join this mailing list and make yourself known.
posted by Peter @ Monday, February 13, 2006
