Re: Shutting down qa.guix?

[Simon Tournier <zimon.toutoune@gmail.com>]

Hi,

On sam., 09 déc. 2023 at 11:54, Ludovic Courtès <ludo@gnu.org> wrote:

> I think this underlines a collective failure to get our act together.

I do not consider a collective failure considering the payment for the
service.  About the maintenance of such service, that’s another
question, IMHO. :-)


> Anyway, would it be possible for you to transfer billing of the hardware
> (Hetzner?) to Guix Foundation?  Does Guix Foundation know what it would
> cost them?

Just to put context about these questions for transferring billing:

 1. The initial discussion happened on the private mailing list
    guix-sysadmin.  Board of Guix Foundation had been CC on July 6th.

 2. Chris provided billing information on July 14th.  Then Andreas
    answered that it is sustainable for Guix Foundation, potentially
    with the help of Guix Spending Committee.

 3. On July 13th, the Solidary Administration Council of Guix Foundation
    had been solicited; as specified by Guix Foundation statutes.

 4. On September 12th, the SAC voted yes about supporting the financial
    cost of QA.  Moreover, since it is a recurrent cost, some means for
    collecting money had also been discussed.

 5. Then what has been unexpected is the energy that the Board of Guix
    Foundation invested in resolving an unrelated but blocking situation
    with our bank.  It probably slowed down all the operational part.

Well, from my understanding of the Guix Foundation side, all is ready
for transferring the current billing and, again from my understanding of
the situation, what is missing is the effective operational transfer.
Now, some relationships with our bank are smoothed… somehow. :-)


> The “spending committee” (Tobias, Ricardo, and myself), which oversees
> expenditure from the funds held at the FSF, can also be in the loop to
> provide additional financial support.

Since it is recurrent cost, yes it would nice to discuss between Guix
Foundation’s SAC and Spending Committee how to secure the financial
support of a recurrent cost.


> PS: You’ve done amazing work over the years.  As a contributor, I find
>     it super reassuring to know that you’re always available and
>     focused, committed to improving patch workflows for many years.
>     It’s been a long road already and I admire this level of commitment
>     and hard work.

I still remember the first time we met with Chris, it was back on
December 2018, right before Reproducible Build Summit in Paris.  Chris
already presented what could be done for improving the patch workflows.
It’s inspiring to see such commitment and hard work over the years.

Cheers,
simon