Re: Collaborative Ruby Language Specification

Hi --

On Mon, 29 Jan 2007, John Lam (CLR) wrote:

> On Mon, 29 Jan 2007, [e-mail] wrote:
>
>> Hi --
>>
>> On Mon, 29 Jan 2007, John Lam (CLR) wrote:
>>
>>>>> I'm not sure what there is to be non-neutral about :-)
>>>
>>> Here's the problem: there are going to be multiple implementations
>>> of Ruby in the wild. And for those who run in other VMs, there will
>>> be compatibility problems. It's up to the spec to make
>>> determinations about what are 'important' incompatibilities vs.
>>> 'unimportant' incompatibilities. For example, which Ruby C libraries
>>> will be deemed to be 'unimportant' and not something that must be
>>> ported to a 3rd party VM in order for that language to be called
>>> 'Ruby'.
>>>
>>> So, it's in the best interests of the community to have a neutral
>>> 3rd party be the 'owner' of the spec, otherwise there may be the
>>> perception of, let's say, some large company trying to steer the
>>> specification to run Ruby better on its own VM. These are issues
>>> that I'd like to get out in the open and have a resolution that
>>> everyone is comfortable with, and as early as possible in the
>>> process.
>>
>> If it's a matter of the applicability of the name Ruby, then Matz is
>> the first and last arbitrator.
>
> I should add: I'm not unwilling for Ruby Central to get involved in
> some way, but I'd want to be clear that it wasn't at the level of
> actually making decisions about what was or was not Ruby, since that's
> Matz's prerogative (unless he delegates it, of course).
>
> (And I probably meant "arbiter" :-)
>
> I'm sorry - I didn't mean that Ruby Central would make final
> technical decisions - that's clearly Matz's job. However, there are
> lots of administrative and sponsorship issues where it makes sense
> for a neutral organization to drive it. Witness the Python Software
> Foundation and how they drive their process.
>
> There are also issues about IP rights assignment of contributors to
> the *specification*. This is why there are long, formal processes
> around any real standardization, with lots of scary legal terms and
> agreements thrown into the mix. I suspect that such a large effort
> would be beyond the scope of what we're all trying to do here.

I think that's right, if you mean things like ISO certification (or
whatever it's called).

> Back to the original point: rather than creating a 'Ruby Software
> Foundation', might it make better sense to drive spec work through
> Ruby Central?

If a non-profit Ruby foundation is to be involved, then I'd say it
makes sense to use our existing one, though there are a number of
questions about both whether it's necessary, and about resources.
And, as Charles says, "Owner?" :-)  So it's not time to decide
anything, but I'll certainly lend a Ruby Central ear, along with my
Ruby developer ear, to the discussion as it proceeds.


David

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