Sam Ruby points to an excellent definition of the bikeshed metaphor. He also offers insight as to how bikeshed discussions are solved at Apache:
The way that these disputes tend to get resolved in Apache is that somebody steps up to the plate and builds the darn thing as best as they can and solicits input in the form of “patches” (tangible suggestions in the form of working code). The original code provided is generally not important – it tends to get refactored away anyway into oblivion. What is important is that it focuses discussion into the form of constructive and tangible input.
In this case, I have done exactly that. List and source. Patches welcome.