passing torches to Austin and Cherry

[Russ Cox]

Hi all,

Starting September 1, Austin Clements will be taking over as the tech lead of Go: both the Go team at Google and the overall Go project. Austin is currently the tech lead for what we sometimes call the “Go core”, which encompasses compiler toolchain, runtime, and releases. Cherry Mui will be stepping up to lead those areas.

I am not leaving the Go project, but I think the time is right for a change.

It’s important to remember that tech lead—like any position of leadership—is a service role, not an honorary title. I have been leading the Go project for over 12 years, serving all of you, and trying to create the right conditions for all of you to do your best work. Large projects like Go absolutely benefit from stable leadership, but they can also benefit from leadership changes. New leaders bring new strengths and fresh perspectives. For Go, I think 12+ years of one leader is enough stability; it’s time for someone new to serve in this role. In particular, I don’t believe that the “BDFL” (benevolent dictator for life) model is healthy for a person or a project. It doesn’t create space for new leaders. It’s a single point of failure. It doesn’t give the project room to grow. I think Python benefited greatly from Guido stepping down in 2018 and letting other people lead, and I’ve had in the back of my mind for many years that we should have a Go leadership change eventually.

If you haven’t worked on the compiler toolchain or runtime, you may not know Austin or Cherry well. Austin has been working on Go at Google since 2014, Cherry since 2016. Their judgment is superb and their knowledge of Go and the systems it runs on both broad and deep. When I have general design questions or need to better understand details of the compiler, linker, or runtime, I turn to them. I’m very excited that we have such great new leaders available for this change. I have full confidence in Austin and Cherry stepping up, as well as in Roland Shoemaker continuing to lead Go security and Rob Findley and Hana Kim continuing to lead Go tools and IDE support.

I am going to consciously step back from decision making and create space for Austin and the others to step forward, but I am not disappearing. I will still be available to talk about Go designs, review CLs, answer obscure history questions, and generally help and support you all in whatever way I can. I will still file issues and send CLs from time to time, I have been working on a few potential new standard libraries, I will still advocate for Go across the industry, and I will be speaking about Go at GoLab in Italy in November.

I will be shifting my focus to work more on Gaby and Oscar, trying to make useful contributions in the Go issue tracker to help all of you work more productively. I am hopeful that work on Oscar will uncover ways to help open source maintainers that will be adopted by other projects, just like some of Go’s best ideas have been adopted by other projects. At the highest level, my goals for Oscar are to build something useful, learn something new, and chart a path for other projects. These are the same broad goals I’ve always had for our work on Go, so in that sense Oscar feels like a natural continuation.

I am incredibly proud of the work we have all accomplished together, and I am confident in the leaders both on the Go team at Google and in the Go community. You are all doing remarkable work, and I know you will continue to do that.

The exact details of this transition are yet to be decided. Part of the point of this mail is to ensure that we can discuss those details publicly. Austin and I are both committed to making the change seem like a non-event except for the Go project becoming stronger and better. Again, I’m not leaving Go and will still be around and participating as an individual contributor.

Please always feel free to continue to reach out whenever you need anything. And my thanks and congratulations to Austin and Cherry for stepping into their new roles.

Best,
Russ

[Daniel Martí]

Hi Russ,

Thanks for all of your work and dedication. Looking back at the biggest changes and milestones in the project in the past ten years, like modules and generics, it's clear that you played a key part in ensuring their long-term success.

I've only met Austin and Cherry a couple of times but I definitely agree that they are great choices going forward.

I hope you enjoy your well deserved time as an individual contributor - I think we're all looking forward to what you'll be able to contribute with the new role.

Speaking of the transition and its details - would this be a good opportunity to restart the compiler and runtime meeting notes thread, which I always found pretty useful to skim through? I'd also love to see the compiler and runtime office hours calls come back :)

Rob Findley and the rest of the tools folks already do a great job at being transparent with the community via Slack and our regular golang-tools calls - the runtime and compiler planning and decision making is a little opaque in comparison at the moment. 

Thanks again, and stick around!

<https://go.dev/s/oscar>, trying to make useful contributions in the Go
issue tracker to help all of you work more productively. I am hopeful that
work on Oscar will uncover ways to help open source maintainers that will
be adopted by other projects, just like some of Go’s best ideas have been
adopted by other projects. At the highest level, my goals for Oscar are to
build something useful, learn something new, and chart a path for other
projects. These are the same broad goals I’ve always had for our work on
Go, so in that sense Oscar feels like a natural continuation.

I am incredibly proud of the work we have all accomplished together, and I
am confident in the leaders both on the Go team at Google and in the Go
community. You are all doing remarkable work, and I know you will continue
to do that.

The exact details of this transition are yet to be decided. Part of the
point of this mail is to ensure that we can discuss those details publicly.
Austin and I are both committed to making the change seem like a non-event
except for the Go project becoming stronger and better. Again, I’m not
leaving Go and will still be around and participating as an individual
contributor.

Please always feel free to continue to reach out whenever you need
anything. And my thanks and congratulations to Austin and Cherry for
stepping into their new roles.


Best,
Russ

[Robert Engels]

Thanks Russ. Go wouldn’t be what it is without your efforts. Always classy and respectful - which is a skill unto itself. 

On Aug 1, 2024, at 5:49 PM, 'Daniel Martí' via golang-dev <golan...@googlegroups.com> wrote:



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[cuong.m...@gmail.com]

Hi Russ,

Thanks for all your works for making Go becomes what it is today. I hope you will enjoy your time and having fun as an IC.

Congrats Austin and Cherry, I'm looking forward to see your excelent works with your new roles.

See you online!

Cheers,

Cuong

[Andrey Bokhanko]

Thanks you Russ for all the efforts and contributions!

Congratulations to Austin and Cherry!

пятница, 2 августа 2024 г. в 01:49:54 UTC+3, Daniel Martí:

Speaking of the transition and its details - would this be a good opportunity to restart the compiler and runtime meeting notes thread, which I always found pretty useful to skim through? I'd also love to see the compiler and runtime office hours calls come back :)

+1 :-)

Yours,

Andrey

===

Advanced Software Technology Lab

Huawei

[George Adams]

Russ,

On behalf of the Go team at Microsoft, I want to thank you for your incredible leadership over the past 12+ years. Your work has laid a strong foundation for Go, and we’re grateful for everything you’ve done.

Congratulations to Austin and Cherry on their new roles! We’re excited to see where they’ll take the Go project and are confident they’ll do a fantastic job.

It’s great to hear you’ll still be involved. Your work on Gaby and Oscar sounds intriguing, and we’re looking forward to its impact on the community.

The Microsoft Go team is here to support and collaborate with you all. Cheers to the future of Go!

Best,

George Adams

~ Go Group Manager, Microsoft

[Bartłomiej Płotka]

Thanks Russ for all the incredible work 💪🏽 

Oskar project looks epic, can't wait to use the solution like that in all our OSS repos at Google and beyond!

Kind Regards,
Bartek Plotka @bwplotka

[Josh Bleecher Snyder]

+2

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[Cherry Mui]

On Thursday, August 1, 2024 at 6:49:54 PM UTC-4 Daniel Martí wrote:

Hi Russ,

Thanks for all of your work and dedication. Looking back at the biggest changes and milestones in the project in the past ten years, like modules and generics, it's clear that you played a key part in ensuring their long-term success.

I've only met Austin and Cherry a couple of times but I definitely agree that they are great choices going forward.

I hope you enjoy your well deserved time as an individual contributor - I think we're all looking forward to what you'll be able to contribute with the new role.

Speaking of the transition and its details - would this be a good opportunity to restart the compiler and runtime meeting notes thread, which I always found pretty useful to skim through? I'd also love to see the compiler and runtime office hours calls come back :)

Thank you for bringing this up! I think the meeting notes and the office hours are great opportunities for transparency and engagement between the compiler/runtime team at Google and the community, and we want to keep them going. We'll post an update on the mailing list when we have the next office hour scheduled.

Thanks,

Cherry

[eric lagergren]

Thanks for all you’ve done for Go. Your leadership and engineering has been top notch.

A small anecdote: I learned to program about 10 years ago, starting with Go. Choosing Go was pretty much an accident, but I’m very glad I did. For 10 years now you’ve been a great role model both as a leader and an engineer. You are always very thoughtful and informative. The Go community is as well, and that doesn’t happen by accident.

Thank you!

[John Matthew]

I'm not a GO user but love the language and all that you and the team have done, not just for languages but for the Internet in general.  Not sure how many projects wouldn't have been written if not for GO, amazing stuff.

Look forward to new minds looking to the Future.

Thank you for all your hard work Russ.

On Thursday, August 1, 2024 at 11:40:26 AM UTC-7 Russ Cox wrote:

[shuang cui]

Go has become a very mainstream language, giving software development a new look. 

Thanks for your leadership of the Go team over the past 12 years, and for your patient comments and guidance on my proposals and PRs.

Best wishes for the future, and hope to see you in the community again.

[shuang cui]

Go has become a very mainstream language, giving software development a new look. 

Thanks for your leadership of the Go team over the past 12 years, and for your patient comments and guidance on our proposals and PRs.

Best wishes for the future, and hope to see you in the community again.

[Haifeng Liu]

Thanks Russ for all your efforts and leadership of Go over the past 12 years!  I started to adopt Go exactly 12 years ago, and my teams have built lots of production systems in Go. Best wishes for your next project! 

[Julien Breux]

Hi Russ,

A big, deep thank you Russ for everything you've brought to Go and its community.

I'm very happy to know that you're staying in the Go ecosystem with Oscar.

Congrats to Austin and Cherry too!

– Best,
Julien (@julienbreux)

[Glenn Lewis]

Thank you, Russ, for all your dedication and work to make Go the amazing programming language that it is.

I can truly say that in my long career, you have been one of the most excellent engineers I have ever had the pleasure of working with and I wish you the very best in all your endeavors.

-- Glenn Lewis

[Nahwin Rajan]

Thank you, Russ.

Go won't be the where it is without your dedication and conviction.

[Sathyanarayanan Thilakan]

Thanks Russ for all your contributions the past 12 years.

Regards,

Sathya