Merge pull request #317 from SethTisue/minutes-030

October advisory board minutes

minutes/_posts/2023-10-17-october-17-2023.md

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+layout: contact
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+# Minutes of the 30th meeting of the Scala Center, Q3 2023
+
+Minutes are [archived](https://scala.epfl.ch/records.html) on the
+Scala Center website.
+
+## Summary
+
+The following agenda was distributed to attendees:
+[agenda](https://github.com/scalacenter/advisoryboard/blob/main/agendas/030-2023-q3.md).
+
+Center activities for the past quarter focused on Scala 3 compiler
+performance, a specification for match types, scala3-migrate, sbt,
+Scastie, and Scala Days in Madrid.
+
+Details are below and in the Center's activity report:
+
+* [report](https://scala.epfl.ch/records/2023-Q3-activity-report.html)
+
+No new proposals were received this quarter.
+
+Other business discussed included Scala 2, the role of the community
+representatives, Scala Days, the Scala blog, and officer elections.
+
+## Date, Time and Location
+
+The meeting took place virtually on Tuesday, October 17, 2023 at
+15:00 (UTC).
+
+Minutes were taken by Seth Tisue (secretary).
+
+## Attendees
+
+Officers:
+
+* Chris Kipp (chairperson)
+  * also board member, representing Lunatech
+* Darja Jovanovic (executive director), EPFL
+* Sébastien Doeraene (interim technical director), EPFL
+* Seth Tisue (secretary), Lightbend
+  * also board member, representing Lightbend, subbing for Lukas Rytz
+
+Board members:
+
+* Daniela Sfregola, Morgan Stanley
+* Paweł Marks, VirtusLab (subbing for Krzysztof Romanowski)
+* Noel Markham, Xebia Functional (subbing for Maureen Elsberry)
+* Claire McGinty, Spotify
+* Lukas Rytz, Lightbend
+* Eugene Yokota, community representative
+
+Paweł introduced himself, as it was his first time attending.
+He is best known to the community as the Scala 3 release officer.
+
+## Technical report
+
+Seb, as interim technical director, summarized Scala Center activities
+since the last meeting.  He presented from these brief slides, which
+concisely show what the Center is working on:
+
+* [slides](./2023-10-17-seb.pdf)
+
+His remarks were based on the Center's more detailed Q3
+quarterly activity report:
+
+* [report](https://scala.epfl.ch/records/2023-Q3-activity-report.html)
+
+And the Center's Q4 roadmap:
+
+* [roadmap](https://scala.epfl.ch/records/2023-Q4-roadmap.html)
+
+The following notes do not repeat the content of the report and
+roadmap, but only supplement them.
+
+Eugene suggested that the Center do more to make sure that these
+activities and plans are known to the community, including to "CTO
+level" people. Even quite short blog posts can be beneficial for this,
+he suggested. Seb and Darja both agreed that there should be more
+publicity outside of the Scala contributors forum, though it's
+challenging with the current smaller team. Darja also reminded the
+board that posts on the Scala blog don't always need to originate from
+the Center. Depending on the subject matter, posts from member
+companies and from the wider community are welcome.
+
+Chris asked if the Center looks at download numbers and uses that
+information to help decide what to work on. Seb said yes, they do.
+
+Eugene asked about the work on improved stack traces: is it for Scala
+3 only? Seb said it works on Scala 2 as well, but the improvements are
+more dramatic on Scala 3, because TASTy can be used. Seth mentioned
+that the team at Lightbend is considering helping to bring this work
+to Scala 2 users.
+
+## Management report
+
+Darja presented this section.
+
+Scala Days Madrid was a Q3 highlight. Center staff gave three talks
+and sat on two panels. The Center had a booth for outreach and
+fundraising. In addition to co-organizing the conference itself (with
+Xebia Functional), the Center also co-organized associated events like
+ScalaBridge, the Scala open source spree, an all-day tooling summit,
+an in-person SIP meeting, and an advisory board (and SIP) dinner.
+
+Scala Days allows the Center to raise awareness of the Center, meet
+the community, receive feedback, gather fundraising leads, and
+encourage community activity such as meetups.
+
+Staff changes at the Center this quarter: Chris's Lunatech-sponsored
+stint at the Center has ended. Guillaume Martres has taken a job in
+industry, though he will stay involved with Scala 3 compiler work
+part-time. These interns completed their stints: Lucas Nouguier, Ayman
+Lamyaghri, Shiv Verkaran. Sylvie Buchard has left the Center, after
+many years of part-time service; the Center has hired Valerie Meillaud
+to replace her (also part-time).
+
+The rest of Darja's remarks were about budget and fundraising. She
+outlined the Center's fundraising strategy and presented worst-case
+and best-case budget scenarios, depending on funding. The Center will
+likely finish the year in the red, but it's not clear yet by how
+much. In order to grow the team again, new member companies are
+needed. Membership regulation changes are under consideration.  Some
+other sources of funds are also being explored. She noted that the
+financial climate is currently difficult industry-wide.
+
+A board member asked about accepting direct donations from
+individuals. Darja said these will be accepted through the "Scala
+shop", when it opens.
+
+A board member asked about Scala 2 vs Scala 3. Could the Center's
+focus on Scala 3 be a negative for fundraising, as many companies are
+still on Scala 2? Some discussion ensued. Note that some of the
+Center's work already spans both versions, and that proposals
+involving Scala 2 are welcome. In its fundraising efforts, the Center
+could remind prospective members of this.
+
+## Scala 2 report
+
+This was presented by Lukas.
+
+Since the last meeting, Scala 2.13.12 was released, with the most
+notable change being support for quickfixes (aka "actionable
+diagnostics"). They are supported in Metals and support is coming soon
+in IntelliJ. The compiler can also directly apply the fixes it
+suggests. Another notable change is that `-Xsource:3` errors can be
+downgraded to warnings or silenced entirely. The release also supports
+JDK 21, which is an LTS release.
+
+The following forum threads are open for discussing the contents
+and timing of the next releases:
+
+* [Scala 2.13.13](https://contributors.scala-lang.org/t/scala-2-13-13-release-planning/6315)
+* [Scala 2.12.19](https://contributors.scala-lang.org/t/scala-2-12-19-release-planning/6216)
+
+Chris asked about quickfixes versus Scalafix. When is it appropriate
+for fixes to be compiler-based versus Scalafix-based? Lukas
+acknowledged that there is overlap, but he noted that Scalafix is
+user-extensible.
+
+## Community report
+
+Eugene said the community has largely been "peaceful". There are
+encouraging signs of local meetups coming back to life in London,
+Tokyo, and elsewhere. The Northeast Scala Symposium has restarted and
+will be virtual this year.  However, there is community concern about
+the Scala job market, especially considering that the job market
+industry-wide is currently challenging, given recent layoffs at many
+companies, including major Scala users such as Twitter. It is
+difficult to distinguish the climate for Scala job seekers
+specifically from the job market generally.
+
+He mentioned strong ongoing community-based interest in Bazel and
+improvements to its Scala support.
+
+Chris asked about the role of the community representative(s). Are
+they intended to represent the open-source community specifically, or
+the Scala community more generally? Are we doing enough to encourage
+proposals to be submitted through this channel? Eugene said he is
+interested in hearing input from everyone, but he sees his own role as
+representing open source primarily, since companies are free (and
+encouraged) to join the board instead. He also said that since the
+Center's engineers can't themselves do everything the community wants,
+perhaps the Center could organize working groups to help the community
+to self-organize to accomplish certain goals.
+
+Several board members mentioned how crucial it is for Scala's success
+(including Scala 3's success specifically) that IntelliJ's Scala
+support be high qualtiy.
+
+Chris invited board members to share feedback about Scala Days Madrid.
+One board member said they were pleasantly surprised by how many new
+and diverse faces were present and reminded us (to general agreement)
+that it's important to keep the conference a good experience for
+newcomers as well as veterans.
+
+Darja invited the board to help produce content for the Scala blog.
+Posts don't always have to be written by Center staff. She also
+mentioned the idea of using the blog to alert the community to news
+and posts sourced elsewhere. A board member asked about news sites
+such as The Scala Times and This Week in Scala; could those be carried
+on the Scala blog? Darja said she'd think about whether there's a path
+for something like that, to help get more Scala news out to more
+people. Two board members mentioned the possibility of using the blog
+to let the community about new libraries. And it was noted that some
+of the Center's activities get publicized on the contributors' forum
+only but might be of wider interest.
+
+## Elections
+
+For chairperson, Chris Kipp indicated his willingness to continue as
+chair and was re-elected unanimously. (Chairs are not expected to
+serve for longer than one year, but a willing chair is welcome to
+serve for longer. The chair not need be a voting board member.)
+
+Also re-elected without any other nominations being made were Martin
+Odersky (technical advisor) and Seth Tisue (secretary).
+
+## Conclusion
+
+Because of December holidays, a likely time for the next meeting is
+early or mid January. Chris said he'll try to schedule all of the
+2024 meetings soon, rather than wait and schedule them a quarter
+at a time.

records.md

@@ -36,6 +36,7 @@ in the [Projects page]({% link projects.md %}).
 
 ### Board meeting minutes
 
+- [October 17, 2023 - Thirtieth SC Advisory Board Meeting](/minutes/2023/10/17/october-17-2023.html)
 - [July 26, 2023 - Twenty-Ninth SC Advisory Board Meeting](/minutes/2023/07/26/july-26-2023.html)
 - [April 27, 2023 - Twenty-Eighth SC Advisory Board Meeting](/minutes/2023/04/27/april-27-2023.html)
 - [January 16, 2023 - Twenty-Seventh SC Advisory Board Meeting](/minutes/2023/01/16/january-16-2023.html)