[Twg] Ideas for consideration

[Hamilton, Pam]

Dear OpenSFS Execs,

The Support Working Group has had discussions regarding the board's request to show rapid progress by getting a support RFP and development RFP out ASAP. We have two other ideas which can show progress immediately that we'd like the board to consider.

First, we could start with a community-developed OpenSFS Lustre release as a bootstrapping step. We'd propose that we target a release based on Oracle's 2.1 release (which is currently in development), for roughly half way through 2011. Our collaborative effort to test and stabilize 2.1 would add legitimacy to that release, and encourage the community to begin migrating to the Lustre 2 branch.  Note that a final OpenSFS release/development/support model can and likely will be quite different from this "birthing" step, but will hopefully be able to fully leverage any infrastructure deployed to support it.

We could proceed almost immediately by performing the following steps:

1)  Create a branch named "2.0.59.0-opensfs" on github, which is based at Oracle's 2.0.59.0 tag.  This is a "pre-release" version on the branch that will be tagged 2.1 by Oracle in the next few months.

We can easily create a new branch with all of our patches applied to it each time Oracle adds a new tag, or when convenient for us.  I.E., when Oracle tags 2.0.60.0, we create 2.0.60.0-opensfs, which contains all of our patches from the 2.0.59.0-opensfs, rebased onto the 2.0.60.0 tag.
Eventually, 2.1.0 will be tagged, and we perform a rebase onto it named 2.1.0-opensfs.

2)  We create a "opensfs-devel" mailing list, where Lustre developers and testers can communicate and coordinate their efforts.

3)  When we discover bugs, we can initially use github's built-in issue tracking, or just use bugzilla.lustre.org, and agree to make all OpenSFS bugs dependants of a master OpenSFS tracking bug.  The developers can work out the details amongst themselves on opensfs-devel.

We have a volunteer who is willing to be the initial gatekeeper for the OpenSFS 2.1 release if there are no objections, or unless better candidates volunteer. Whoever the gatekeeper is needs to maintain the fairly rigorous processes developed at Oracle to maintain quality and reliability in both development and production branches.

Another idea which could be launched quickly is to put out an RFP to do an investigation into Btrfs and its use as a possible backend file system for Lustre. This wouldn't involve any code development. The primary deliverable for this contract would be a report.

Both of the above ideas could be executed is the VERY short term and buy ourselves more time to work out the details of an RFP for release development and support. It's the details and the questions they raise which make drafting a support RFP difficult and the reason we were going to have a face-to-face meeting. Questions like the following:

*         What is the dollar amount OpenSFS expects to spend for such a contract?

*         What timeframe does the contract cover, one year, two years, or ???

*         Where will the money come from to pay for the contract? Dues? Or additional funds from members?

We can still get started on a draft, if the board is willing to answer the above questions and any others we have as we proceed. We are also willing to make up our own answers to such questions knowing that the board has the final say. Guidance would be appreciated but we'd also like our ideas given consideration.

Regards,
Pam

___________________________________
Pam Hamilton
Lawrence Livermore National Lab
P.O. Box 808, L-556
Livermore, CA  94551-9900
E-Mail:  pgh at llnl.gov
Phone:  925-423-1332          Fax:  925-423-8719
___________________________________


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