SC confidentiality

[Geoff Keating <geoffk at geoffk dot org>]

> From: Mark Mitchell <mark@codesourcery.com>
> Date: Tue, 21 Nov 2000 15:06:26 -0800

> >>>>> "Geoff" == Geoff Keating <geoffk@geoffk.org> writes:
> 
>     Geoff> Are there records of such debates anywhere?  Minutes of
>     Geoff> meetings, mailing list archives, etc.?
> 
> Not to my knowledge.
> 
> I believe that in general the details of SC discussions are considered
> confidential in order to encourage frank exchanges of ideas among the
> SC members.  I could be wrong about that, but that's how I've always
> treated other people's SC postings.  If I'm right, that would make
> releasing any such archives inappropriate.

I would strongly argue that this is a bad practise.

* The job of the SC is to help the maintainers by setting policy for
  the future development of gcc.  This will be much easier for the
  maintainers if the reasons behind the policy decisions can be
  explained and the arguments considered when making those decisions
  are available.

* The members of the SC are representing various facets of the
  community of GCC users.  Unless their positions are public,
  the community can give no feedback on whether those positions
  are actually shared by the community.

* This is particularly important given the possibilty of a conflict of
  interest, since many of the SC members are also affiliated with
  various companies which have their own interests in the development
  of GCC.  A closed discussion allows allegations to be made and
  heard, even by those with obvious biases, which would be laughed at
  if the discussion were open.

Of course, prior discussions which were made in the belief that they
were confidential should not be disclosed, but for the future I urge
the SC to make its discussion open.

-- 
- Geoffrey Keating <geoffk@geoffk.org>