Istio Technical Oversight Committee, 31 Jan 2022

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From YouTube: Technical Oversight Committee 2022/01/31

Description

Istio's Technical Oversight Committee for January 31st, 2022.
Topics:
- Structure of Working Groups and overall organization

A

A

Let's hang in here.

A

Okay, I guess we can skip over the docks.

A

Eric here eric, do you want to talk about the product security working group thing.

B

Eric you are muted.

B

You are speaking.

C

Do you hear me now, yes, yep? Okay, um so I think the only thing I had on the list was um product security working group. I was looking for somebody to replace greg from an ibm standpoint, so I was just going to nominate andrea ahmad to take that role.

C

um I guess that just needs to be approved by the the toc.

B

Yeah, so I guess a few weeks ago I did something similar. I think the feedback from the toc was seeking approval from the product security work group lead, which is jacob and oliver, so you can try. Do you have their approval.

C

Yes, um I talked with jacob um on friday, I think- um or maybe it was even thursday and he had said that yeah they approved and that I should put it on the toc agenda.

B

Okay, that sounds good yeah.

C

So I guess what I can I guess we can look. I think, there's a thing in the community. I can just create a pr and um we'll get their approval on there and then tlc can approve it.

A

C

All right, thank you very much.

A

Any other breaking topics.

A

um I know that there was that discussion. uh Doug brought up about uh need for working group leads uh in extensions and telemetry, and also we need working with leads for test and release.

A

I think it's probably prudent for us to consider the structure of the working groups kind of holistically. Given you know the the number of leads turnover and also uh decreased participation in some of the working groups.

A

um I don't know if people have thoughts about uh you know what might be a better organizational structure for us.

A

You know- maybe we should just instead of having distinct working groups. Maybe we should have you know kind of two topical working group meeting working meetings a week right where any of these technical subjects could be discussed and we adjust the size or the the number of hours spent in those meetings to meet the demand for anything typical right and maybe do some consolidation of that with toc. That might be one option right, so we just have bigger working meetings with more subject matter.

A

I'd be interested in hearing people's thoughts.

D

That sounds reasonable to me.

D

B

I mean we haven't had.

D

You know fully loaded schedules in many months um having them split out just kind of take some more time on calendars.

A

Yeah, I think those are.

B

Toc members yeah, I mean the toc meeting- has been pretty light to you, so it might be interesting to have woke up slash dlc. I think twice a week, probably a good, reasonable starting point, and then we can go from there to see if that's the right frequency.

B

Maybe one is more for cross-plot class working group type of topic. One is more for a little bit more narrow, focused topic. Just thinking about here.

D

B

Do notice sometimes when I attend it's, your working group and I notice like a presentation being repetitively in socialize in different working groups.

B

Maybe for those it would be just good just to review them within the tlc meeting.

E

Do you know why they're being reviewed in different groups, I.

F

B

I mean it's different angle right because sometimes the people show up like the environment will grow. Sometimes they are focusing on more on their angle and networking looking for more focus on their perspective.

F

Does that possibly mean that the working groups are misaligned, then, if we're having things come up in different areas, or is it just a community like not knowing which working group to go to with their proposal.

A

I I think it's both I mean clearly, consolidation would help with this topic right.

B

Yeah mitch, do you have something.

G

Oh, I just wanted to point out that uh of recent working group meetings. Some of the most successful are apac friendly meetings. uh We those seem to be very well attended, so it might be valuable to give, as we have more and more apac contributors this year than last year, it's been a growing trend to give them access to the toc. I know it's fairly difficult for one of our apac contributors to say act as a release, lead or a release manager because of the timing of the toc meeting.

G

So if we're going to have multiple meetings per week, perhaps you know one per month or something like that in an apac friendly time would help help those contributors.

A

I think that's a good point.

A

uh What would be an apac friendly slot.

G

Usually we do 7 pm on a weeknight, wednesdays or thursdays.

G

And that's pacific time. Sorry recognize not. Everyone lives where I live.

B

I was just going to ask 7 p.m: yeah I mean 10 p.m. I feel ideally not too bad. Like the networking work group meeting, I think it's midnight for me, which I can never join, but it's good to hear. You know the apec meeting is gaining momentum and I do notice. I think we have increasing the contributor base, particularly from people in china,.

G

Yeah, even in just the last few months, we have four or five new maintainers from the apec time zone.

A

So so far, I'm not hearing anybody strongly argue in favor of maintaining the existing structure, but I I want to make sure that this idea gets some time to percolate out, particularly with other working group.

A

Leads, but as a straw, man, I think what we could right so that suggestion of you know two one-hour working meetings a week and then we adjust the schedule um to see if we need more or less bandwidth.

A

And we don't have to necessarily change any roles um we can still have working group leads and toc members, although I think you know from a kind of decision-making and process standpoint. It probably would be sensible to have some consolidation there as well, but we don't necessarily have to take that on.

A

In the short term, we can just have tracts of content within those working meetings and maintain the working good leads, because they have specific responsibilities around execution and delivery and roadmap, and things like that.

A

But I think over time it probably makes sense to look at a little bit of consolidation there as well from that just an efficiency and decision making standpoint.

F

I think, though, if you're going to consolidate the working groups, which you want at least the existing leads to be in whatever the new working groups look like and start there right, because presumably go ahead.

A

You know, I think the first thing would just be.

A

You know we make the working groups a logical construct and not a schedule right, and so, if there are two one-hour meetings a week which people show up at, uh there are topics that are environments. Networking right and um the leads for those areas still have responsibility, but they're, not independently scheduling.

A

I think the only one that has to be independent is anything related to cve disclosure right that has to stay separate.

F

Well, I guess, if we're like consolidating based on function, then, wouldn't that mean the road maps get consolidated as well. Yeah.

A

Maybe I mean I'm almost reticent to make you know lots of changes at once.

F

But I I guess it's I guess when I see it like, if you want to just like share meeting time, that's one thing, but if you're going to like reorganize.

D

F

Groups then, to me that means that you know each reorganize, the road maps as well. Why would you have a working group that has three different responsibilities: each with a different roadmap? That just seems like more work for everybody.

F

Assuming that the reason for this is, you know, because of participation.

A

Yeah I mean we could look to consolidate.

A

The functional responsibility as well.

A

I'm not entirely sure what that would look like and certainly open to suggestions.

A

You know we could just merge the toc function in the working group. Lead function.

A

Right so we just have people who are responsible for making decisions in a particular area, and if there is uh an important decision that affects project wide, then you know the leads collect, like whatever the air quote leads are have to agree right. So we just merge those two roles.

A

Right that would be that we would eliminate one one level of decision making hierarchy right.

F

I guess maybe it would be helpful if we just specified the problem we're trying to solve.

A

I think there's there's there's two right: if we have participation, issues and working groups, then we're consolid.

A

Sorry, my headphones are acting up.

A

And then obviously.

A

You know participation is also going to lead to issues with you know a lack of an available lead to make a decision in a particular area.

A

A

Your music custom.

H

So, given the current status of history with you know so many users and the expectation of stability and all that, I think the biggest danger is for working groups to not synchronize and to you know, kind of create problems by by uh you know getting out of sync and it change.

H

So I think it's a good idea to consolidate as much as possible to increase communication and to you know, recognize that we cannot make sudden changes, and most of I mean that was the reason participation is low, because we are not planning to make any major change that I mean that will affect stability, so I'm all for consolidating as much as possible.

A

Lynn, do you have an opinion here.

B

I was thinking- maybe we should uh offline to some of the people who are interested in working on a consolidation plan- maybe a review next week or do we want to make the change or discuss right at this meeting.

A

Oh no, we can. We can.

B

I think you've.

G

B

A

I think we have to acknowledge that we need to do something about this right.

B

Yes, definitely.

A

And we have been doing some incremental things, but I think we need to look at doing something about this. A bit more holistically.

A

A

Well, how about we start a dock outlining some options? uh Sure with all the toc members on the group leads, and then we can review it at next week's dfc meeting.

A

And it should smell.

B

Steering as well yeah.

A

Totally: okay, let's do that uh and yes, if people have feedback, please ping or.

A

You know well we'll go through a review process with this anyway, but it's it's it's getting pretty clear that we should do something about this.

A

Okay, are there any other topics.

A

Okey-Dokey well have a great week. Everybody.

H

Thanks everyone.

A

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