Yesterday morning, the Docker project leadership announced a proposal for a Docker Governance Advisory Board (or DGAB), as a next step towards a fully open governance model for Docker. To find out more information around this news, I spoke with Ben Golub, CEO of Docker, to get the specifics.
VMblog: Why did Docker decide
to establish the Open Governance Advisory Board at this time?
Ben Golub: Over the past
year and months since launching, the Docker project has stood by its open
source roots and maintained a high-level of transparency. With that approach in
mind, we decided that further steps should be taken to ensure the contributions
to the project are well-versed and merit-based. We are creating the Open
Governance Advisory Board to establish an open forum that includes debate,
proposals and feedback regarding the Docker project.
VMblog: What role will the
board play within the company?
Golub: The creation of the board marks are progression towards a full open governance model. As for
responsibilities, the board will provide insight and feedback to Docker project
leadership in areas such as project roadmap, policies and procedures around
contribution, the long term governance structure of the Docker project and core
criteria for Docker-compliant products. In short, the board will enhance
Docker's values of openness and transparency. It is also important to note that
the board will not replace existing mechanisms for public participation.
VMblog: Who will be on the
board and how will members be appointed?
Golub: Board members will be selected via a nomination process that
will remain open until the end of May, and the board will be announced in June
at DockerCon. A total of 15 members will make up the board - including three
maintainers, four individual seats, four user seats and four corporate seats.
By structuring it this way, we are able to have representation from big
vendors, users and smaller companies as well.
VMblog: How have partners and
the community-at-large reacted to the news?
Golub: Red Hat, IBM and Rackspace have all publically expressed support
and enthusiasm over the creation of the Open Governance Advisory Board. Our
partners and users understand the importance of transparency, seeing that it
leads to greater trust and confidence in the project. As an example of our
approach, over 95 percent of contributors are not even employees at Docker. The
board builds on this, by increasing the community's involvement in the development
of the Docker project and making it truly inclusive.
VMblog: Can you give us your
perspective on why containerization is having such a major impact on the
developer landscape?
Golub: Organizations are now facing the challenge of complex and
constantly changing applications. To add to the challenges,
the applications are being deployed to an increasing number of different
servers. Containerization addresses these concerns by providing an isolated,
light-weight solution that runs on the host's operating system. As an
alternative to virtualization, containers deliver the flexibility sys-admins
and developers require as they will run
consistently and virtually anywhere.
VMblog: The Docker project
continues to gain traction as an essential tool for DevOps, PaaS and cloud
environments. What can we expect to see from Docker in the coming months?
Golub: The coming months will be very eventful. Between
the first annual DockerCon and the upcoming release of Docker 1.0, there is
plenty to look forward to. We are incredibly grateful to the entire community
for their contributions, and are thrilled to start the selection process for
the Open Governance Advisory Board.
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Thanks again to Ben Golub, CEO of Docker, for taking time out to speak with VMblog.com.