gtg-contributors team mailing list archive

[Luca Invernizzi <invernizzi.l@xxxxxxxxx>]

Quick mail:
I've cleaned up GTG blueprint. I don't think that that is a good place
for discussing (there is only a "whiteboard" were everybody writes in
the same textbox, which will be really messy). It's a good place for
specifications, though, with lots of possibility to link people, bugs,
branches....



On Mon, Feb 8, 2010 at 12:28 AM, Bertrand Rousseau
<bertrand.rousseau@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> Hi everyone,
>
> Needless to say, GTG know quite a good growth in success. I don't have
> actual numbers, but the numbers of bug reports, contributors, merge
> requests shows... This is great, and it sure warms my heart, even more
> when I know that one year ago we had just what looked like a prototype
> application to share. But this is also a problem since all this
> activity is quite overwhelming, and it's becoming hard to keep
> everything in control. For Lionel and I, it means a lot of  catch-up
> and debate, and that very often lessen our possibility to directly
> contribute to code, or to hack new things.
>
> In the past days, some of us had several discussions about the current
> state of the GTG community, etc. We requested the advice of some other
> developers, to get a feedback and some advices on how to handle that
> issue. We had some pretty interesting feedback, and I'm writing this
> mail today to start the discussion and hopefully to decide some new
> way of working with our community.
>
> Those following suggestion keept my attention (feel free to add yours
> in your response):
>
>  - have a roadmap: we definitely have to agree on the several
> development steps we want to reach. A roadmap is the perfect solution
> for that: it allows to lay down our intention as developers, and it
> allows to give priorities to them. That way, it keeps a group of
> developers focused on the "next big thing" to do. This roadmap should
> be public, so that everyone know our priorities, and motivated
> contributors can start working on less prior tasks, that way, it keeps
> the contributed work useful. I think having a "Roadmap" page on our
> wiki is the way to go.
>
>  - have some kind of guidelines/"manifesto": we should try to lay down
> some core thoughts and perspective about the way we think GTG ought to
> be developed. That way, that would help developers, triagers and
> contributors to know that their contribution will likely be accepted.
> Knowing beforehand that it goes against our views, having those
> guidelines would avoid energy-sinks like endless debate on feature X
> or Y if it's an inappropriate contribution. Once again, our wiki page
> is perfect for that.
>
>  - a place to discuss ideas and mid-term plans: we also need to debate
> on some design *before* it reach actual code, or - at least - merge
> request. It's important to have a tool that allows to test solutions,
> without the burden and the pressure of integrating too quickly
> experimental code. I guess we could try using launchpad blueprints for
> that, since they should be a convenient way of discussing design issue
> at a relatively higher level than bug reports. For instance, they
> would be perfect for Lionel's backends proposal.
>
>  - a place to integrate cutting edge/prototype code:  Having some kind
> of experimental branch could help too. Maybe we could move towards
> this scheme: a "stable" branch (i.e.: 0.2 right now), with minor
> revisions integrating critical bug patches, an "instable" branch
> (i.e.: 0.3 right now) integrating more new features, but already
> discussed ones, and an experimental branch (not present right now)
> that would have a very low-filtering level, and allow for on-the-edge
> testing.
>
> So these are my ideas so far, please don't hesitate to share your
> point of view about it. So far, this would imply those decisions:
>
>  - create and write a roadmap page on GNOME live GTG page
>  - create and write a guideline page on GNOME live GTG page
>  - start discussing some midterm work (from the roadmap) on launchpad blueprints
>  - create an extra "experimental" branch on launchpad + create and
> write a mail + a page on how development work in GTG
>
> Have a nice day!
>
> --
> Bertrand Rousseau
>
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