[VOTE] LibreOffice Online - repository and translations

Hello,

1. to freeze (not delete) the "online" repository at TDF's git, for the time being

1b. to switch the https://github.com/libreoffice/online mirror to instead mirror the Collabora repo, for the time being, and make sure we catch pull requests there, e.g. via the mentoring alias on TDF side

2. to freeze (not delete) the translations for online in Weblate, for the time being

The decision will then also be announced and shared with the various community mailing lists, to keep all the projects in the loop.

The Board of Directors at the time of voting consists of 7 seat holders without deputies. In order to be quorate, the vote needs to have 1/2 of the Board of Directors members, which gives 4.

A total of 7 Board of Directors members have participated in the vote.

The vote is quorate.

A quorum could be reached with a simple majority of 4 votes.

Result of vote: 3 approvals, 3 disapprovals, 1 abstain.
One deputy approves, one deputy disapproves.

As the vote is a tied vote, § 9 IV of the statutes come to effect. The Chairperson has the deciding vote, and voted +1 to the proposal.
Therefore:

Decision: The request has been accepted.
This message is to be archived by the BoD members and their deputies.

Florian

I believe the result is suboptimal but at least it provides us with a
new level of urgency to find some alternatives.

Having Collabora stated its position by removing the comments that COOL
is a LibreOffice project we now know that they consider the project as
something completely separate from TDF so we have no duty to promote a
third party project.
We should now remove all references to CODE or COOL as by promoting them
we would promote a commercial entity which is now not contributing
anymore to LOOL.
The way the fork has been made shows that the "leaving the doors open"
comment is once again a strategy to take time to kill the LOOL project
making Collabora, an external commercial entity, the only organisation
managing the project.

LOOL is a "LibreOffice project" which surely lost one of its major
contributor but this shouldn't stop TDF and its community from moving
forward with an On-Line platform.

As I said a few times LOOL and now COOL, being mostly maintained by a
single commercial organisation, are a big risk for TDF and its community
as at any moment in time they could change their focus in a way that can
be detrimental for the community, they could fail commercially and leave
us with unsupported code or they may be taken over by another commercial
organisation which may shut down the project.

TDF should not repeat the same mistakes so it should look for new
partners for the LOOL project and possibly for alternative technologies
but this time having a clear and structured relationship with the
contributors and surely invest to have multiple maintainers of the project.

In the meantime we should communicate to the outside world the fact that
COOL is not LOOL and that we will implement new tools to make it easier
for new contributors to LOOL to work on the code and with the clear
intent, if it wasn't already clear, to make LOOL available for free to
use by anyone and that we will make it as simple as possible to
implement it.

We surely should be leaving the doors open to Collabora if they wish to
propose a new way to cooperate , which should be fair and balanced and
applied in the same way to all members of the ecosystem, but in the
meantime members of TDF's BoD that wish the best for TDF and the
community instead of their personal gains should move forward as fast as
possible to fix the long standing issues that created this situation.

Paolo

Interestingly, https://www.documentfoundation.org/governance/board/
doesn't say who the chair is :slight_smile:

Page has been updated, apologies

Hi Florian,

Result of vote: 3 approvals, 3 disapprovals, 1 abstain.
One deputy approves, one deputy disapproves.

As the vote is a tied vote, § 9 IV of the statutes come to effect. The
Chairperson has the deciding vote, and voted +1 to the proposal.
Therefore:

Decision: The request has been accepted.
This message is to be archived by the BoD members and their deputies.

AFAICT this outcome stems from the fact there it was a yes/no type of
vote, so yays “for a short-term period” (quoting Lothar, but there were
other BoD members with that understanding) were counted alongside
enthusiastic yays.

Given the short-term period isn't binding, in practice the vote might be
interpreted as a definitive +1. Could the BoD clarify the short-term
period and maybe even commit to revisit the vote say, before the end of
their term?

Cheers,

Hi Guilhem,

thanks for your differentiated view! And let me stress again at least from my side, this is a temporary freeze, meanwhile to engage for new or old code contributors, so that we are able to have or to maintain at least a “secure” code base for TDFs LOOL.

I already have started some activities for this purpose (as it is also an independent issue from frozen or not) and I urge everybody to help here (board, team, members, community, others) to meet this temporary period, so yes from my side, this is the plan in my pov.

Thanks again, Guilhem, all the best,
Lothar

Am 02.12.2020 um 15:58 schrieb Guilhem Moulin:

Hi Florian,

On Wed, 02 Dec 2020 at 12:23:22 +0100, Florian Effenberger wrote:

Result of vote: 3 approvals, 3 disapprovals, 1 abstain.
One deputy approves, one deputy disapproves.

As the vote is a tied vote, § 9 IV of the statutes come to effect. The
Chairperson has the deciding vote, and voted +1 to the proposal.
Therefore:

Decision: The request has been accepted.
This message is to be archived by the BoD members and their deputies.

AFAICT this outcome stems from the fact there it was a yes/no type of
vote, so yays “for a short-term period” (quoting Lothar, but there were
other BoD members with that understanding) were counted alongside
enthusiastic yays.

Given the short-term period isn't binding, in practice the vote might be
interpreted as a definitive +1.  Could the BoD clarify the short-term
period and maybe even commit to revisit the vote say, before the end of
their term?

Cheers,

Hey Guilhem,

Guilhem Moulin wrote:

Could the BoD clarify the short-term period and maybe even commit to
revisit the vote say, before the end of their term?

Though I cannot speak for the entire board, the above is my
understanding at least (I'd say this needs revisiting the latest in
early summer 2021).

The proposal was made to buy us time to sort things out, not as a
permanent setup.

Cheers,

-- Thorsten

I consider that contributions to COOL, should not taken into consideration for TDF membership.

Hi all,

Hello,

1. to freeze (not delete) the "online" repository at TDF's git, for
the time being

1b. to switch the https://github.com/libreoffice/online mirror to
instead mirror the Collabora repo, for the time being, and make sure
we catch pull requests there, e.g. via the mentoring alias on TDF side

2. to freeze (not delete) the translations for online in Weblate, for
the time being

The decision will then also be announced and shared with the various
community mailing lists, to keep all the projects in the loop.

The Board of Directors at the time of voting consists of 7 seat
holders without deputies. In order to be quorate, the vote needs to
have 1/2 of the Board of Directors members, which gives 4.

A total of 7 Board of Directors members have participated in the vote.

The vote is quorate.

A quorum could be reached with a simple majority of 4 votes.

Result of vote: 3 approvals, 3 disapprovals, 1 abstain.
One deputy approves, one deputy disapproves.

As the vote is a tied vote, § 9 IV of the statutes come to effect. The
Chairperson has the deciding vote, and voted +1 to the proposal.

as far as I know the statutes doesn't speak about a second vote of the
Chairperson here. The vote of the Chairperson is only deciding in such case.

Thus it counted only 3 approvals and not 4. The necessary approvals are
not reached and the request has not been accepted.

In addition: as far as I know two members of the board have a CoI on
this topic. But only one board member abstained from voting (correct
behavior). The second approved the proposal, instead of abstaining. This
could be seen as a violation of his duties as a member of the board or
his loyalty for TDF. Thus his vote had to been rejected (and not counted
in).

Conclusion: for both reasons the request has not approved, but rejected.

Regards,
Andreas

Hi Daniel,

I consider that contributions to COOL, should not taken into
consideration for TDF membership.

  I'm sure the membership committee will take all of these things into
consideration as they deliberate. If that is their decision, perhaps it
is no bad thing to re-shape our membership over the next year.

  It does however make it even more vital to get a mentor hired, unless
we want a rather smaller proportion of coders as members.

  From the COOL perspective, our position is unchanged: We respect and
recognize the contribution of all the developers of LibreOffice and will
honor that in equivalent access: commit, translation etc. on our side.

  Regards,

    Michael.

The Board of Directors at the time of voting consists of 7 seat
holders without deputies. In order to be quorate, the vote needs to
have 1/2 of the Board of Directors members, which gives 4.

A total of 7 Board of Directors members have participated in the vote.

The vote is quorate.

A quorum could be reached with a simple majority of 4 votes.

Result of vote: 3 approvals, 3 disapprovals, 1 abstain.
One deputy approves, one deputy disapproves.

As the vote is a tied vote, § 9 IV of the statutes come to
effect. The Chairperson has the deciding vote, and voted +1 to the
proposal.

as far as I know the statutes doesn't speak about a second vote of
the Chairperson here. The vote of the Chairperson is only deciding
in such case.

I don't understand what you mean by "only deciding". Clearly, the
statutes (Satzung) intend for the Chairperson (Vorsitzender) or his
Deputy (Stellvertreter)) to act as a tie-break. Else the sentence

In the event of a tied vote, the chairman, or as a substitute the
vice chairman, has the deciding vote.

Bei Stimmengleichheit gibt die Stimme des Vorsitzenden, ersatzweise
seines Stellvertreters den Ausschlag.

Is wholly without effect, as it can never have any effect in
practice. Can you please give a scenario where the fact that, in your
interpretation and understanding of the Statutes, the vote of
Chairperson being "deciding" leads to a decision that would not have
been reached without the "deciding" quality of the vote?

Thus it counted only 3 approvals and not 4. The necessary approvals
are not reached and the request has not been accepted.

To make my question above more precise, the "deciding vote" of the
Chairperson applies only in case of "Stimmengleichheit" which I would
define (somewhat redundantly) as:

  Gleichheit der Zahl der für zwei oder mehr zur Wahl stehenden
  Alternativen, die in dieser Wahl eine (identische) Stimmenzahl haben
  bekommen die höher als die Stimmenzahl der anderen Alternativen ist,
  abgegebenen Stimmen

or in English

  Equality of the number of votes cast for two or more alternatives
  that have gotten a(n) (identical) number of votes in this election
  that is higher than the number of votes for the other alternatives.

So what does "only deciding" mean? To take a decision without the vote
being "deciding", it needs to be "mit einfacher Mehrheit", which
Wikipedia (https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mehrheit#Einfache_Mehrheit)
defines as having strictly more votes than all other options together
(cumulatively), not counting abstention as another option.

If the vote got to "Stimmengleichheit", necessarily there is no
"einfache Mehrheit", so the intention is that the Chairperson vote
lead to a decision, and that the winning alternative does _not_ have
"einfache Mehrheit". So in my analysis, you cannot reject the decision
of the vote for not having "einfache Mehrheit", much less for not
having "absolute Mehrheit" (absolute majority), which is what I
understand by your "only 3 approvals and not 4". (In the vote at
hand, having 6 non-abstaining votes, einfache and absolute Mehrheit
have the same meaning in terms of number of votes).

Please do explain.

In addition: as far as I know two members of the board have a CoI on
this topic. But only one board member abstained from voting (correct
behavior). The second approved the proposal, instead of
abstaining. This could be seen as a violation of his duties as a
member of the board or his loyalty for TDF. Thus his vote had to
been rejected (and not counted in).

If you intend to reject a vote based on this, "could be seen as X" is
not enough. Either you assert it _is_ X, or no consequence can come
out of it. Additionally, rejecting a vote can only happen on the basis
of pre-established formal rules.

You are entitled to think poorly of people that behaved otherwise than
you think is proper, you are entitled to campaign for their not being
reelected, but you cannot exclude their vote other than based on
written rules that predate the vote.

On the subject of conflict of interest, the choice made by the
Statutes is _not_ to exclude "conflict of interest" votes, but to
limit those to _one_ _third_. You may think that is a poor choice, you
certainly can campaign for a *future* change of the statutes on this
point, but you cannot remove votes expressed in accordance with, and
within, the limits of the statutes, and other established rules, as
they stood during the vote.

If CoI votes were to be excluded, why would the composition of the
board be limited to one third from the same company? If CoI votes were
excluded, we can have e.g. 70% (five members out of seven) board
members from the same company, and on each conflict-of-interest vote,
the votes of the five are excluded (or rather, they don't vote), and
the remaining two board members vote among themselves. To me, this is
an indication that the limit of one-third is intended as _another_
solution to the CoI problem than "exclude CoI votes", not cumulative
to it. (Again, it doesn't mean I think it is a good choice.)

More precisely:

  Gleichheit der Zahl der für zwei oder mehr zur Wahl stehenden
  Alternativen, die in dieser Wahl eine (identische) Stimmenzahl haben
  bekommen die höher als die Stimmenzahl von jede andere Alternative
  ist, abgegebenen Stimmen.

  Equality of the number of votes cast for two or more alternatives
  that have gotten a(n) (identical) number of votes in this election
  that is higher than the number of votes for any other alternative.

This leaves completely open and unspecified what happens when:

- A0 has 3 votes
- A1 has 2 votes
- A2 has 2 vote (or A2 has 1 vote and A3 has 1 vote)

We don't have "einfache Mehrheit", but we also don't have
"Stimmengleichheit", so

- A0 is not passed
- certainly none of A1, A2 or A3 should pass!
- the "deciding vote" sentence doesn't come into application

So... we have no decision?

I wonder if the intention of the Statutes was not plurality (one of
the possible meanings of "simple majority" in English, according to
Wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simple_majority) rather than
"einfache Mehrheit", and it is just a bug in translation / drafting.
This would make more sense, and would make the Statutes more
coherent.

Hi Lionel,

Lionel Élie Mamane wrote:

>> The Board of Directors at the time of voting consists of 7 seat
>> holders without deputies. In order to be quorate, the vote needs to
>> have 1/2 of the Board of Directors members, which gives 4.

> as far as I know the statutes doesn't speak about a second vote of
> the Chairperson here. The vote of the Chairperson is only deciding
> in such case.

I don't understand what you mean by "only deciding". Clearly, the
statutes (Satzung) intend for the Chairperson (Vorsitzender) or his
Deputy (Stellvertreter)) to act as a tie-break. Else the sentence

In the event of a tied vote, the chairman, or as a substitute the
vice chairman, has the deciding vote.

Bei Stimmengleichheit gibt die Stimme des Vorsitzenden, ersatzweise
seines Stellvertreters den Ausschlag.

Is wholly without effect, as it can never have any effect in
practice. Can you please give a scenario where the fact that, in your
interpretation and understanding of the Statutes, the vote of
Chairperson being "deciding" leads to a decision that would not have
been reached without the "deciding" quality of the vote?

Yeah, I believe that was a misunderstanding. The quorum requirements
where clearly met; after that simple majority of those present, plus
tie-breaking rule applies. In a word, no need for a formal 4 votes in
favour.

Cheers,

-- Thorsten

They whole coi is pretty technical matter if you ask me.
And there is they difference between etiquette/moral responsibility (they they community feeling represented).
So you might technically be able to vote, but refraining/absence maybe better to prevent becoming a paria within the community
So there might not be a strict legal obligation. So pretty gray area what people can do/not do.
Also there is they question who decides about COI and  about they 'sanctioning' of a breach.

1) The Board of Directors prevents possible conflicts of interest within the foundation.

-> Task directed to Board of Directors. Not saying what to do if they BoD internally maybe comprised..

2) It ensures therefore that a maximum of one third of the members of the Board of Directors, the Membership Committee and the Advisory Board are employed at the same firm, organization or entity or one of its affiliate organizations.
A practical rule to prevent coi in the most obvious case

3) It can exclude one member of the body each month until the conflict of interest is eliminated or a new election of the body is initiated.
-> How does to BoD decide if they are themselves comprised?

It looks they statutes assume BoD being the gate keeper not expected to be trouble themselves.

You're right about they 1/3. Except its talking about maximum.. So it could theoretical be lower?
However at some point we land at elections and such. The members did appoint they BoD.

Anyhow, they squabble of coI kind of side-kick. However, people must be aware of they multi-head dilemma.
Which can cause problems. As hard to believe someone has opinion from his company perspective and holding totally different opinion at TDF

It also comes down what TDF represents. Is it in core a code hub/platform, or has it a mission be itself.
So is distribution of a free LibreOffice binary Office Suite to main goal of TDF or code sharing/infra and
they LibreOffice software for free kind of side-kick.
They position of BoD members in a code hub/platform is bit different from a TDF community with own goals and purpose,
which cannibalizing on they market of eco-system partners. There is more air/room to argue more in you're own interest,
if TDF being intended as code/infra hub/platform. . As it's about sharing infra and such. Not about building a competitor.
In that case they coi more or less vanishes from argumentative perspective.
They TDF community might desire something differently, but that's whole different topic/story. Not in line with reality.

It's a all obviously matter of presentation of facts c.q. story telling. Which also includes to whole product/project topic :slight_smile:
They fuzz is created because they project creates a product. And product has market share/ brand (LibreOffice).
So idea gets a hold of product equals project (identifying project based on product). Which entails arguing more from product vision.
This maybe misconceiving the intended purpose of founding fathers.

There are surely more vision flying around in the community compared to what can actually be true.  People are simply not on the same page.
This makes communication/decision making really really hard. Especially if you ask input from they community.
We are living in different bubbles (paradigm's/reality's)  with totally - contra-dictional - expectations.

Regards,
Telesto

Hello,

on the membership status, this is something definitely up to the membership committee. This is an independent body of TDF, responsible for approval of members and responsible to oversee the BoD, and we all should definitely leave it to them how to handle the situation, and also give them a bit of time to look at the status quo.

Keep in mind the decision on the repository is TEMPORARY, it is not a permanent one.

Florian

Hello,

on the vote count, let me explain the mechanism:

We have three votes in support (Thorsten, Lothar, Cor) and we have three votes not in support (Emiliano, Daniel, Franklin). Michael abstained.
One deputy (Nicolas) is in support, one deputy (Paolo) is not in support. The deputy votes, however, are not counted "technically".

That means we have three votes in favor, three votes not in favor, and one abstention.

As summarized in the vote tally, that means we have a tie. As per § 9 IV of the statutes, in this case, the vote of the chairperson (if they are absent from the vote, which they weren't however, it would be the deputy chairperson) is the deciding one.

That does not mean the chairperson has a second vote - as summarized, the vote is and stays 3 vs. 3. "4" was not mentioned.

As the chairperson, Lothar, voted in favor, this is the vote that is deciding, and as such, the request has been approved.

Florian

For how long is the freeze? The most exact information I could get was "until we figure things out", which appears to be a bit vague. :slight_smile:

I attempted reading through the minutes to get a "why" on the freeze. Am I correct in gleaning this was proposed because LOOL isn't maintained/this is viewed as a Collabora-only product?

Hi,

[...]
Keep in mind the decision on the repository is TEMPORARY, it is not a
permanent one.

For how long is the freeze? The most exact information I could get was
"until we figure things out", which appears to be a bit vague. :slight_smile:

I'm also interested to know the answer to this question.

Cheers,

Ping?

Hi Brett,

Coincidentally finding this question - sorry for the delay.

Guilhem should know I think, but for your reference: our Attic Policy clearly describes how that works.

The first reason indeed, as per policy. The fact that Collabora decided to move online development to a different place, and the reasons behind that, are discussed widely at various places, most recent during the 2023 BoD elections. Clearly that is related to the topic, but not a reason for the decision.

Hope this helps,
Cor