Sequoyah/Termination Review

Prepared by Eric Cloninger

Sequoyah Lead

September, 2012

Communication Channel: http://dev.eclipse.org/mhonarc/lists/sequoyah-dev/maillist.html

History

The Tools for Mobile Linux (TML) project was chartered in the spring of 2007 as a sub-project of DSDP. The purpose of the project was to create OEM-neutral development tools for supporting development of embedded Linux applications for Mobile devices. The Mobile Tools for Java (MTJ) project was also formed in DSDP, inheriting from the earlier EclipseME project.

When DSDP was dissolved, Sequoyah was formed to contain TML and MTJ. Sequoyah was placed in the Tools top-level project. Contributions to Sequoyah have primarily been from Motorola employees as committers, with external contributions from MontaVista, GSoC, and individuals.

Motorola will not be providing support for Sequoyah past September 2012. Attempts to generate interest on mailing lists (sequoyah-dev, sequoyah-android-dev, tools-pmc, cross-project) have not brought any replies, so the best action is to terminate the project.

Regarding the MTJ sub-project

The Sequoyah project has been little interaction with MTJ since 2010, [1][2] although recent source commits have been made to the MTJ git repository and Nokia is commercializing the project for their Series 40 Web Tools. The MTJ Project itself needs some attention:

• Project metadata is out of date
• Project landing page contains inaccurate information
• MTJ wiki does not tell developers how to participate in project

It is the advice of the the Sequoyah project that MTJ be moved into Tools and continues as a stand-alone project for the immediate future. Attempts should be made to communicate with the MTJ maintainers to see what their plans are for the future.

[1] http://dev.eclipse.org/mhonarc/lists/sequoyah-dev/msg00412.html

[2] http://dev.eclipse.org/mhonarc/lists/sequoyah-dev/msg00295.html

Goal(s) of the termination review

1. Identify potential new leadership of the project.
2. Identify a new home for the remnants of MTJ, most likely the Tools top-level project.
3. Identify alternate locations for any Sequoyah source code that may be usable elsewhere
   1. The Eclipse Communication Framework suggested their interest in the VNC component  
   2. The Babel project may be interested in the work done in 2011 by GSoC student (Lucas Tiago Castro Jesus) on the localization files editor for Eclipse plugins
4. Determine a time frame to archive source code and web materials

Termination Actions

1. Directories archived and removed from git
2. Open Bugzilla bugs marked “won't fix” and the component archived or marked read-only.
3. Website and wiki pages archived.
4. Open CQ items withdrawn.
5. Corporate committer accounts for Motorola employees will be revoked. Eric Cloninger and Daniel Pastore will re-apply as individual members in order to continue testing the Eclipse for Mobile package.