+1 on the overall proposal. I think these guidelines make sense for reducing confusion and respecting contributors’ work.
One scenario I'd also like to discuss is when there's a discussion thread with a proposal document but no FLIP created yet - so it's still in the early discussion phase. In practice, this can happen often (for example, *this thread <https://lists.apache.org/thread/pg8k70lxmxnvrmft2vs57cj6hxgp4hh8>*), and these “proto-FLIPs” can also become dormant. Perhaps we can adopt a similar approach: - If there’s been no activity on such a discussion for a long time (e.g. 3–6 months), and the proposal still makes sense, committers or contributors (anyone interested in the proposal) can follow up to see if the author plans to formalize it as a FLIP. - If there’s no response after a ping, we could consider the thread “closed,” and others can create a new thread to continue the topic if they’re interested. Or, if there has been offline discussion with the author to clarify the proposal’s status - and they don’t want to continue the follow-up - someone else can update the old discussion thread accordingly. That way, future contributors know it’s not an active proposal but can still revive it if needed. This might help keep the mailing list cleaner and avoid repeated “Did this go anywhere?” questions in the future. Best, Weiqing On Tue, May 27, 2025 at 8:57 PM Becket Qin <becket....@gmail.com> wrote: > Hi Folks, > > In a recent discussion of reviving FLIP-313, I realized that we do not have > an established convention in handling dormant FLIPs (FLIPs without > interaction for months, even years) or FLIPs addressing the same issues. > > To give a more concrete context, let's take a look at the example case of > FLIP-313 and FLIP-498. > May 23, 2023 - the discussion of FLIP-313 > <https://lists.apache.org/thread/7vk1799ryvrz4lsm5254q64ctm89mx2l> was > started. > Jun 13, 2023 - the vote thread > <https://lists.apache.org/thread/7g5n2vshosom2dj9bp7x4n01okrnx4xx> was > started. However, somehow there was no vote casted. And there have been no > activities on that FLIP since then. > Jan 2, 2025 - the discussion of FLIP-498 > <https://lists.apache.org/thread/kgbpj96b4lw1c39gq5p0j0t8b1ssm368> was > started. It tries to address the exact same problem of FLIP-313, with a > difference that it proposes config-based options instead of hint-based > options. > Jan 31, 2025 - the vote of FLIP-498 > <https://lists.apache.org/thread/hckpyl24oqdqvfcrhfkjx2j37dtbyfg7> was > concluded with acceptance. > > In a retrospective, I feel that there are a few things worth discussing, > and my thoughts are following. > > *1. What we should do if a vote is open for long (e.g. over a month) > without conclusion (accepted or rejected)? * > I think we can > - treat that vote thread as discarded. > - The FLIP itself will be back to the under discussion status. > > Periodically, we (the committers) can sweep the dormant FLIPs and see if > they should be abandoned. Note that not all the dormant FLIPs should be > abandoned. If the proposal still makes sense from technical perspective, or > the targeted issue is still valid, we can keep the FLIP open until someone > else picks it up. The decision is still based on the case by case > judgement. For example, in this particular case, FLIP-313 seems still > relevant. Hence, we may want to keep it open. > > If we decide to abandon a dormant FLIP, as a courtesy, we should reply in > the discussion thread to ping the contributor. If there is no response > after a week, we can abandon the FLIP. An abandoned FLIP should have its > status properly updated, so that there is no confusion. > > *2. What should we do when a new FLIP overlaps with a dormant open FLIP?* > If both FLIPs are targeting the same problem. Preferably, we should revive > the earlier FLIP, and close the new one as duplicate. This helps keep a > serialized history of the discussion and avoid the confusion caused by > multiple FLIPs with the same targeted issue. > In case we found there is a significant difference between the new FLIP and > the old one, we can let the new FLIP subsume the old FLIP. If so, > - again as a courtesy, we should ping the contributor in the discussion > thread of the old FLIP. > - include the subsumption as a part of the new FLIP vote, and update the > status of the old FLIP accordingly. For example, in this particular case, > if FLIP-313 is subsumed by FLIP-498, we need to update the FLIP-313 status > to reflect that when FLIP-498 passes. > > > The goal of the proposed convention is to make sure 1) we respect the work > from all the Flink contributors, and 2) avoid confusions on the FLIP status > as much as possible. > Once we have the convention agreed, we can add them to the FLIP process > page. > > Thoughts and feedback are welcome. > > Thanks, > > Jiangjie (Becket) Qin >
