CAB Makeup

Pilot Conversation: 1/27/05 to 1/31/05
CAB Makeup 
 -- Original Message --
 Subject: [Opensolaris-discuss] CAB Makeup
 Date: Fri, 28 Jan 2005 17:45:57 +1000
 From: Robert Lunnon <bobl@optushome.com.au>
 Reply-To: bobl@optushome.com.au
 To: opensolaris-discuss@opensolaris.org
 A lousy day at work has led me to think of this post ...
 We should all be considering the makeup of the CAB in terms of what's best for
 the Project. I already broached the subject of  internationalisation.
 Choosing a panel of only 5 people with the right attributes will be
 exceedingly hard but here's what I see we need

1. Innovation, not only someone who likes to progress technical innovation but
    Innovation should extend to the way the whole opensolaris works and interacts
    with it's developer  and customer marketplaces. Innovation should be prized
    as the rare commodity it is.
    2. Configuration Management & Compatibility, often this is seen as a
    conservative opposing force to Innovation, but it need not be. This is about
    ensuring that things like the long term stability of the ABI and legacy
    modules are not compromised. Imagine if a change to ld.so prevented loading
    of any executable pre opensolaris. For example I think we should take a long
    hard look at the ddi to make driver porting easier from other OSes, but this
    needs to be designed in a way that doesn't affect legacy driver
    compatibility. I think its abbsolutely essential to get this right first time
    since long-term ddi stability will pave the way to the creation of a large
    driver base due to minimal maintenance requirements and avoid Linux like
    version/distro dependence.
    3. Business acumen. I believe this needs to exist both in the community and
    the Sun CAB participants. The project needs to be business friendly and have
    some strategic direction as well as technical (tactical) direction. There's
    no point in inventing a better mousetrap if there are no mice to catch. It's
    quite hard though to maintain strategic direction in an open project since
    participants are free to ignore the strategy. The management skills do exist
    however,  to bring  a community along a strategically planned path without
    undue prescriptive measures.
    4. Publicity and Media savvy.  OpenSolaris will hopefully attract quite a lot
    of media coverage and this needs to be managed deftly.
    5. Community Mindedness, OpenSolaris is intended to be a community so it's
    very important there is no bias or dogmatism at the CAB level. The CAB should
    be able to  continually demonstrate respect for differing opinions. For
    example decisions should be based on fact rather than opinion where possible
    and the CAB should give reasons for (adverse) decisions rather than issue
    proclamations like some (better left unnamed) projects.
    Bob
    -- Original Message --
    Subject: [Fwd: Re: [Opensolaris-discuss] CAB Makeup]
    Date: Fri, 28 Jan 2005 16:20:09 +0800
    From: Jeremy Teo <Jeremy.Teo@sun.com>
    Reply-To: Jeremy.Teo@sun.com
    To: opensolaris-discuss@opensolaris.org
    [Warning: First Post to this mailing list]
    Hi all,
    >> We should all be considering the makeup of the CAB in terms of what's
    best for
    >> the Project. I already broached the subject of  internationalisation.
    >> Choosing a panel of only 5 people with the right attributes will be
    >> exceedingly hard but here's what I see we need
    I think one thing we all don't want (to state the obvious) is to have so
    many people on the CAB such that we end up suffering from "design by
    committee".
    On the other hand, internationalization is an admirable ideal, and we
    should aim to have a CAB that represents the international community.
    I firmly believe that for a open source project to work, steady and
    robust work must be done. The XFree86 fiasco is a good example of how
    politics and design by committee has set back development by goodness
    knows how long.
    Of course forking is always a last resort, given the CDDL allows this.
    But at this stage, no one can't really fork Open Solaris until a
    solution to the eucumbered binaries issue is found (eventually).
    >> 2. Configuration Management & Compatibility, often this is seen as a
    >> conservative opposing force to Innovation, but it need not be. This is
    about
    >> ensuring that things like the long term stability of the ABI and legacy
    >> modules are not compromised. Imagine if a change to ld.so prevented
    loading
    >> of any executable pre opensolaris. For example I think we should take
    a long
    >> hard look at the ddi to make driver porting easier from other OSes,
    but this
    >> needs to be designed in a way that doesn't affect legacy driver
    >> compatibility. I think its abbsolutely essential to get this right
    first time
    >> since long-term ddi stability will pave the way to the creation of a
    large
    >> driver base due to minimal maintenance requirements and avoid Linux like
    >> version/distro dependence.
    Agreed on this. To state the obvious, we should start off on the right
    foot with a decent DDI/DKI interface, one that we can live with for very
    long, rather than having to rewrite it every other kernel release
    because our original design was flawed. (Reference to Linux). I'm don't
    know if we can do this, but it is definitely worth shooting for.
    Ultimately, technical merits and not politics/opinion should drive the
    decision of the CAB regarding all matters.
    I am unsure about how the CAB will make decisions regarding issues in
    future: Is that to be decided? Will it be something along the lines of
2. CAB proposes decisions, and outlines reasons behind it
    2. Community members vote on it.
    3. Decision is passed or failed.
    Perhaps I'm jumping the gun here, but just thinking out loud.
    Regards,
    Jeremy.
    -- Original Message --
    Subject: Re: [Opensolaris-discuss] CAB Makeup
    Date: Fri, 28 Jan 2005 01:02:55 -0800
    From: Ben Rockwood <benr@cuddletech.com>
    To: bobl@optushome.com.au
    CC: opensolaris-discuss@opensolaris.org
    References: <200501281745.57130.bobl@optushome.com.au>
    I won't dwell, but just some quick thoughts.
    Robert Lunnon wrote:
    >A lousy day at work has led me to think of this post ...
    >
    >We should all be considering the makeup of the CAB in terms of what's best for
    >the Project. I already broached the subject of  internationalisation.
    >Choosing a panel of only 5 people with the right attributes will be
    >exceedingly hard but here's what I see we need
    >
    >1. Innovation, not only someone who likes to progress technical innovation but
    >Innovation should extend to the way the whole opensolaris works and interacts
    >with it's developer  and customer marketplaces. Innovation should be prized
    >as the rare commodity it is.
    >  
    >
    Agreed.  This is largely the purpose of the project and something that
    the CAB will undoubtably
    want to foster.  I doubt anyone would argue there.  However, innovation
    will come
    or not based on the community involvement, drive, and skill level; while
    the CAB can focus,
    invite it, and help nourish it, the CAB itself can only put in place and
    hopefully manage that
    enviroment.
    >2. Configuration Management & Compatibility, often this is seen as a
    >conservative opposing force to Innovation, but it need not be. This is about
    >ensuring that things like the long term stability of the ABI and legacy
    >modules are not compromised. Imagine if a change to ld.so prevented loading
    >of any executable pre opensolaris. For example I think we should take a long
    >hard look at the ddi to make driver porting easier from other OSes, but this
    >needs to be designed in a way that doesn't affect legacy driver
    >compatibility. I think its abbsolutely essential to get this right first time
    >since long-term ddi stability will pave the way to the creation of a large
    >driver base due to minimal maintenance requirements and avoid Linux like
    >version/distro dependence.
    >  
    >
    True, but this is something that is probly largely out of the hands of
    the CAB; there are enough
    driving forces to do the "the right thing"(tm) for all concerned on all
    sides of the table
    that I doubt CAB will need to address major breaks in compatablity.  
    Solaris is legendary for
    it and I think we all consider that an asset we don't want to loose open
    source or not.
    >3. Business acumen. I believe this needs to exist both in the community and
    >the Sun CAB participants. The project needs to be business friendly and have
    >some strategic direction as well as technical (tactical) direction. There's
    >no point in inventing a better mousetrap if there are no mice to catch. It's
    >quite hard though to maintain strategic direction in an open project since
    >participants are free to ignore the strategy. The management skills do exist
    >however,  to bring  a community along a strategically planned path without
    >undue prescriptive measures.
    >  
    >
    Business concousness is important, but I think having a CAB focused on
    whats right for the community
    and OpenSolaris as a whole, for it's own sake, is the driving factor.  
    Making OpenSolaris  a continueing
    better choice than the other variety of OS's out there, increasing
    capability, and putting in and managing
    a solid framework by which to foster these advances is what the CAB
    really needs to focus on.
    >4. Publicity and Media savvy.  OpenSolaris will hopefully attract quite a lot
    >of media coverage and this needs to be managed deftly.
    >  
    >
    I think this is the responsablity of all of the community.  It has been
    for the last couple months, is today, and
    will be a major issue of importance moving forward.  Obviously
    interviews with "John Doe, Member of the OpenSolaris CAB"
    will hold some weight and thus the CAB members need to be open as
    elevated representatives of the entire
    community, but then thats just part of the job.
    >5. Community Mindedness, OpenSolaris is intended to be a community so it's
    >very important there is no bias or dogmatism at the CAB level. The CAB should
    >be able to  continually demonstrate respect for differing opinions. For
    >example decisions should be based on fact rather than opinion where possible
    >and the CAB should give reasons for (adverse) decisions rather than issue
    >proclamations like some (better left unnamed) projects.
    >  
    >
    And here lies the beauty of the CAB.  It'll be interesting to see just
    how much "power" the CAB
    will have, and how they choose to use it.  Early on it will a learning
    experience for all concerned, I
    think we'd agree.  But by nature the CAB can't dictate to the community,
    only serve it's best interests.
    A riot breaking out in the group won't be good for anyone, and even
    though forks are "possible" by
    terms of the license I don't think anyone wants to see break away
    developement for some time to come
    (minus embedded projects, PPC, etc, where it's appropriate).
    The responsiblity of those elected to the CAB will be heavy indeed.  I'm
    tempted to ask if anyone really
    thinks their up to it for a whole year (your not gettin' paid remember),
    it's going to be alot of work and
    time and thought to do whats right; but then by definition these members
    will be doing what we all feel
    is the best direction, they simply need to choose of the opinions which
    is right.
    I really think Sun did a good job on finding a nice size for the CAB.  2
    in, 2 out is great... this 5th slot is
    giving me nightmares, but I trust the judgement of those that can decide
    this, they've exceeded our expectations
    largely thus far and I don't see them stopping one bit.  There are
    obvious things to get worried about, like
    do we want 2 Sun employees that are in the same building on the CAB
    where they can discuss out of channels,
    or ensure that both community members aren't in the US, or making sure
    that.... or that.... or that....... on and on and on.
    I've stopped worrying about it and think the best thing we can do is
    simply ensure that the 2 people we can
    elect are the right people for the job, reguardless of any other
    concern.  The first year is going to be cricital and
    there is no presidence by which to judge the future or work details of
    the job, and no one will know, but finding people
    who are skilled, talented, and experienced are good, and finding people
    that are passionate, dedicated, and
    excited are even better... the trick is to strike that balance between
    all the factors.
    Just a rememinder, those wishing to be nominated that haven't been heard
    much from yet should probly make
    themselves known and intentions clear so we can get all these
    discussions in as soon as possible.  I've already
    made my recommendations but I know some folks may want the job and
    haven't spoken up yet.  Don't
    neglect to step up and just go for it.  Choice is a good thing.
    benr.
    >Bob
    -- Original Message --
    Subject: Re: [Opensolaris-discuss] CAB Makeup
    Date: Fri, 28 Jan 2005 22:13:19 +1100
    From: Shanon Loveridge <sloveridge@gmail.com>
    Reply-To: shanon@tinytech.net
    To: os-discuss <opensolaris-discuss@opensolaris.org>
    On Fri, 28 Jan 2005 01:02:55 -0800, Ben Rockwood <benr@cuddletech.com> wrote:
    > Just a rememinder, those wishing to be nominated that haven't been heard
    > much from yet should probly make
    > themselves known and intentions clear so we can get all these
    > discussions in as soon as possible.  I've already
    > made my recommendations but I know some folks may want the job and
    > haven't spoken up yet.  Don't
    > neglect to step up and just go for it.  Choice is a good thing.
    Speaking of which can someone post a list of the people that have been
    nominated? As I believe I saw a couple early on but can't find who.
    I would also like to nominate Ben Rockwood (If he has not already been
    nominated). He has clearly devoted, and continues to devote, much of
    his time and energy to Solaris. I am sure he would be the first to say
    he is not an expert system programmer but his passion and dedication
    would be an asset in attracting new people and inspiring them to
    contribute. I can personally say that he had a profound effect on my
    interest in Solaris many years ago.
    Shanon
    --
    Blog -> http://sloveridge.blogspot.com/
       -- Achieve Your Full Potential --
    -- Original Message --
    Subject: Re: [Opensolaris-discuss] CAB Makeup
    Date: Fri, 28 Jan 2005 08:48:54 -0800 (PST)
    From: Rich Teer <rich.teer@rite-group.com>
    To: Ben Rockwood <benr@cuddletech.com>
    CC: opensolaris-discuss@opensolaris.org
    On Fri, 28 Jan 2005, Ben Rockwood wrote:
    > I really think Sun did a good job on finding a nice size for the CAB.  2
    Agreed; I think the inital form of the CAB is a good one.  But remember
    that the CAB will apparently be allowed to change the mack-up it if deems
    this to be necessary.
    > obvious things to get worried about, like
    > do we want 2 Sun employees that are in the same building on the CAB
    > where they can discuss out of channels,
    Well, that can happen between any two people, no matter where they
    are (private email, phone calls), so I wouldn't worry about that.
    My guess is that Andy Tucker will be one of Sun's CAB members.
    --
    Rich Teer, SCNA, SCSA, author of "Solaris Systems Programming"
    President,
    Rite Online Inc.
    Voice: +1 (250) 979-1638
    URL: http://www.rite-group.com/rich
    -- Original Message --
    Subject: Re: [Opensolaris-discuss] CAB Makeup
    Date: Fri, 28 Jan 2005 17:57:38 +0100
    From: Joerg Schilling <schilling@fokus.fraunhofer.de>
    To: rich.teer@rite-group.com, benr@cuddletech.com
    CC: opensolaris-discuss@opensolaris.org
    Rich Teer <rich.teer@rite-group.com> wrote:
    > My guess is that Andy Tucker will be one of Sun's CAB members.
    I hope so!
    Jörg
    --
     EMail:joerg@schily.isdn.cs.tu-berlin.de (home) Jörg Schilling D-13353 Berlin
           js@cs.tu-berlin.de        (uni)  If you don't have iso-8859-1
           schilling@fokus.fraunhofer.de    (work) chars I am J"org Schilling
     URL:  http://www.fokus.fraunhofer.de/usr/schilling ftp://ftp.berlios.de/pub/schily
    -- Original Message --
    Subject: Re: [Opensolaris-discuss] CAB Makeup
    Date: Fri, 28 Jan 2005 09:13:19 -0800 (PST)
    From: Rich Teer <rich.teer@rite-group.com>
    To: shanon@tinytech.net
    CC: os-discuss <opensolaris-discuss@opensolaris.org>
    On Fri, 28 Jan 2005, Shanon Loveridge wrote:
    > Speaking of which can someone post a list of the people that have been
    > nominated? As I believe I saw a couple early on but can't find who.
    The only ones I recall seeing here are me, Jörg, and now Ben.
    --
    Rich Teer, SCNA, SCSA, author of "Solaris Systems Programming"
    President,
    Rite Online Inc.
    Voice: +1 (250) 979-1638
    URL: http://www.rite-group.com/rich
    -- Original Message --
    Subject: Re: [Opensolaris-discuss] CAB Makeup
    Date: Fri, 28 Jan 2005 12:18:25 -0500
    From: Chris Morgan <cm@mihalis.net>
    To: Rich Teer <rich.teer@rite-group.com>
    CC: opensolaris-discuss@opensolaris.org
    On Jan 28, 2005, at 11:48 AM, Rich Teer wrote:
    > On Fri, 28 Jan 2005, Ben Rockwood wrote:
    >
    >> I really think Sun did a good job on finding a nice size for the CAB.
    >>  2
    >
    > Agreed; I think the inital form of the CAB is a good one.  But remember
    > that the CAB will apparently be allowed to change the mack-up it if
    > deems
    > this to be necessary.
    The 5th member is interesting. Hand-picked by Sun, so some might say
    Sun has a built-in majority. On the other hand, it's hand-picked from
    the open source community, so that person might well disagree with Sun
    on a particular issue where (for the sake argument) the two Sun
    employees were on one side of an issue and the two other were on the
    other side. So this fifth person could be able to swing an issue either
    way in the case of a disagreement. I just ran through some possible
    candidates in my mind and it's really intriguing - there are such a lot
    of super-strong personalities out there in the open source community -
    thinking of practically any of them having de factor power of
    arbitration is good armchair sport. Think of it - Perens? Stallman?
    ESR? Theo De Raadt? RIchard Kenner? Jamie Zawinski? Larry Wall? Brian
    Behlendorf? Paul Vixie? Eric Allman?
    No, I have my doubts about all of those (some of the big names of open
    source)...
    Or Masayuki Murayama? Robin Kay? (people known to have produced drivers
    and generally helped things along).
    I guess coding skills would be of relatively lesser importance than
    people skills, leadership, vision... fascinating.
    Chris
    --
   http://homepage.mac.com/mihalis68/PhotoAlbum23.html
        Halloween photos published 10/31/04
    -- Original Message --
    Subject: Re: [Opensolaris-discuss] CAB Makeup
    Date: Fri, 28 Jan 2005 11:56:36 -0600
    From: Raquel Velasco and Bill Buck <bbrv@genesi.lu>
    To: Chris Morgan <cm@mihalis.net>
    CC: opensolaris-discuss@opensolaris.org
    WHOA!
    On Jan 28, 2005, at 11:18 AM, Chris Morgan wrote:
    > Theo De Raadt?
    You are joking right?  Mr. Hand-Over-Your-Proprietary-Docs or get
    flamed.  :-/

>This selection should be carefully considered.  Case in point: Debian
 developers are still considered "hippies" by some more established IT
 organizations, even though Bdale Garbee (once its Leader) is now the HP
 CTO Linux.

>Whoever is picked should not taint or bias the overall effort.  We
 suggest that the selection come from a newer breed of open source
 developers who have read the relevant Social Contract and understand
 it.  We'd go for a European who is known in GNU/Linux circles.  Sun
 already sponsors Debian.  There are probably some good contacts there.  
 However, in our opinion and experience, Gentoo has a more responsive
 and better organization.  They are the up and comer and in their Weekly
 Newsletter they came out fairly strong for Gentoo/OpenSolaris already.  
 Why not Pieter?

>Beware of the appearance of too much North American influence.  
 Alternatively, there are a number of Australian's like Benjamin
 Herrenschmidt (Debian Kernel) - he works for IBM - or Colin Charles
 (Fedora Core) that could be tapped.
 We can make other specific suggestions for people in the communities
 referenced.
 R&B
 -- Original Message --
 Subject: Re: [Opensolaris-discuss] CAB Makeup
 Date: Fri, 28 Jan 2005 10:47:13 -0800
 From: Alan DuBoff <Alan.DuBoff@sun.com>
 Reply-To: Alan DuBoff <Alan.DuBoff@sun.com>
 Organization: Solaris x86 Engineering
 To: Rich Teer <rich.teer@rite-group.com>
 CC: os-discuss <opensolaris-discuss@opensolaris.org>
 On Friday 28 January 2005 09:13 am, Rich Teer wrote:
 > The only ones I recall seeing here are me, Jörg, and now Ben.
 Yes, but Jim mentioned he had a process that would be outlined, and it wasn't
 clear that nominations would be the process he would use.
 I think Ben just started such a process.
 --
 Alan DuBoff - Sun Microsystems
 Solaris x86 Engineering
 -- Original Message --
 Subject: Re: [Opensolaris-discuss] CAB Makeup
 Date: Fri, 28 Jan 2005 10:49:13 -0800
 From: Alan DuBoff <Alan.DuBoff@sun.com>
 Reply-To: Alan DuBoff <Alan.DuBoff@sun.com>
 Organization: Solaris x86 Engineering
 To: Chris Morgan <cm@mihalis.net>
 CC: opensolaris-discuss@opensolaris.org
 On Friday 28 January 2005 09:18 am, Chris Morgan wrote:
 > Or Masayuki Murayama? Robin Kay? (people known to have produced drivers
 > and generally helped things along).
 Chris,
 Has Robin Kay produced Solaris drivers? If so, is there a web page they're at?
 --
 Alan DuBoff - Sun Microsystems
 Solaris x86 Engineering
 -- Original Message --
 Subject: Re: [Opensolaris-discuss] CAB Makeup
 Date: Fri, 28 Jan 2005 15:18:41 -0500
 From: Chris Morgan <cm@mihalis.net>
 To: Alan DuBoff <Alan.DuBoff@sun.com>
 CC: opensolaris-discuss@opensolaris.org
 On Jan 28, 2005, at 1:49 PM, Alan DuBoff wrote:
 > On Friday 28 January 2005 09:18 am, Chris Morgan wrote:
 >> Or Masayuki Murayama? Robin Kay? (people known to have produced
 >> drivers
 >> and generally helped things along).
 >
 > Chris,
 >
 > Has Robin Kay produced Solaris drivers? If so, is there a web page
 > they're at?
 Not precisely a driver, but take a look at http://www.gekkou.co.uk/ he
 did something for pgx64 allowing smoother DVD playback by taking
 advantage of the hardware scaling IIRC.
 Chris
 --
http://homepage.mac.com/mihalis68/PhotoAlbum23.html
     Halloween photos published 10/31/04
 -- Original Message --
 Subject: Re: [Opensolaris-discuss] CAB Makeup
 Date: Fri, 28 Jan 2005 15:32:38 -0500
 From: Chris Morgan <cm@mihalis.net>
 To: Raquel Velasco and Bill Buck <bbrv@genesi.lu>
 CC: opensolaris-discuss@opensolaris.org
 On Jan 28, 2005, at 12:56 PM, Raquel Velasco and Bill Buck wrote:
 > WHOA!
 >
 > On Jan 28, 2005, at 11:18 AM, Chris Morgan wrote:
 >
 >> Theo De Raadt?
 >
 > You are joking right?  Mr. Hand-Over-Your-Proprietary-Docs or get
 > flamed.  :-/
 Actually it should have been clear from my email that it was more
 thinking aloud about the 5 man CAB structure than a specific suggestion
 of anyone.   I can clarify further and say I am not suggesting Theo
 invited onto the CAB, after all he has his own open source Unix to
 direct.
 Nevertheless, the above is an overly limited summary : he is absolutely
 relentless on the free software principles of his project. This is
 good. He speaks his mind. This is also good. He's technically very
 strong, and he occasionally gives credit where credit is due, e.g. even
 when complaining about lack of public documentation for UltraSPARC-III,
 he did mention that he was interested because it was, at the time -
 pre-Opteron -  the fastest processor with the NX bit support. But his
 people skills are, allegedly, somewhat lacking
 Personally I think I was more on Theo's side than Sun's re: US-III
 programming documentation. Proprietary processors is fine by me. Open
 architecture processors are also fine, and preferable. Claiming the
 latter but selling the former is probably my least favourite route.
 Chris
 --
http://homepage.mac.com/mihalis68/PhotoAlbum23.html
     Halloween photos published 10/31/04
 -- Original Message --
 Subject: Re: [Opensolaris-discuss] CAB Makeup
 Date: Fri, 28 Jan 2005 13:08:09 -0800
 From: Alan DuBoff <Alan.DuBoff@sun.com>
 Reply-To: Alan DuBoff <Alan.DuBoff@sun.com>
 Organization: Solaris x86 Engineering
 To: Chris Morgan <cm@mihalis.net>
 CC: opensolaris-discuss@opensolaris.org
 On Friday 28 January 2005 12:18 pm, Chris Morgan wrote:
 > Not precisely a driver, but take a look at http://www.gekkou.co.uk/ he
 > did something for pgx64 allowing smoother DVD playback by taking
 > advantage of the hardware scaling IIRC.
 Ok, I just wanted to make sure if there is something we should get on the list
 of components to bring into Solaris WOS. It looks too specific to a given
 adapter, and would be best for this technology to be across all supported
 adapters if possible. In this case it might not be.
 I know he's helpful in the community.
 --
 Alan DuBoff - Sun Microsystems
 Solaris x86 Engineering
 -- Original Message --
 Subject: Re: [Opensolaris-discuss] CAB Makeup
 Date: Mon, 31 Jan 2005 12:03:58 +0100
 From: Joerg Schilling <schilling@fokus.fraunhofer.de>
 To: rich.teer@rite-group.com, cm@mihalis.net
 CC: opensolaris-discuss@opensolaris.org
 Chris Morgan <cm@mihalis.net> wrote:
 > way in the case of a disagreement. I just ran through some possible
 > candidates in my mind and it's really intriguing - there are such a lot
 > of super-strong personalities out there in the open source community -
 > thinking of practically any of them having de factor power of
 > arbitration is good armchair sport. Think of it - Perens? Stallman?
 > ESR? Theo De Raadt? RIchard Kenner? Jamie Zawinski? Larry Wall? Brian
 > Behlendorf? Paul Vixie? Eric Allman?
 ...
 > Or Masayuki Murayama? Robin Kay? (people known to have produced drivers
 > and generally helped things along).
 >
 > I guess coding skills would be of relatively lesser importance than
 > people skills, leadership, vision... fascinating.
 I am not sure about that.
 It depends on what the CAB will do, but if it will decide on the future
 directions of Solaris and (in a micro cosmos) what contribution from outside
 Sun will make it into OpenSolaris, the people in the CAB should know enough
 about Solaris internals.
 But at least I would expect a slight interest in Solaris and for this reason,
 people like Stallman won't make sense to me.
 Jörg