Thunderbird Weekly Status meeting: Tuesday March 16th, 2010
Mark Banner
See https://wiki.mozilla.org/Thunderbird/StatusMeetings/2010-03-16 for
details, and please add anything you wish to discuss to the agenda.
Over the next few weeks we're going to try reorganising the meeting page
to try and simplify and better present the information. Please pass any
feedback via replying to this post in mozilla.dev.apps.thunderbird.
Standard8
Dan Mosedale
by how much more useful and engaging the revamped project-wide meeting
has been recently, and I'm hoping we can do something similar.
The two issues I do see around both our meeting and the page are:
1) a moderate amount of the meeting is effectively equivalent to people
reading aloud what they've already written on the wiki page, which is
neither a good use of people's time nor particularly engaging to listen to.
and
2) too many sections of the page contain extremely large amounts of
detail, resulting in things that are important to everyone as well as to
smaller subsets of people being lost in the noise.
I suspect a bunch of us have some ideas here, but before we drill into
them in detail, I think it would be useful to nail down what problems
we're trying to solve.
How do folks feel about 1) and 2) as statements of the most important
problems to solve here?
Dan
Mark Banner
> On 3/15/10 2:25 PM, Mark Banner wrote:
>> [Followups aimed to mozilla.dev.apps.thunderbird]
>>
>> See https://wiki.mozilla.org/Thunderbird/StatusMeetings/2010-03-16 for
>> details, and please add anything you wish to discuss to the agenda.
>>
>> Over the next few weeks we're going to try reorganising the meeting
>> page to try and simplify and better present the information. Please
>> pass any feedback via replying to this post in
>> mozilla.dev.apps.thunderbird.
> I've been doing some thinking about this of late. I'm very encouraged by
> how much more useful and engaging the revamped project-wide meeting has
> been recently, and I'm hoping we can do something similar.
>
> The two issues I do see around both our meeting and the page are:
>
> 1) a moderate amount of the meeting is effectively equivalent to people
> reading aloud what they've already written on the wiki page, which is
> neither a good use of people's time nor particularly engaging to listen to.
> 2) too many sections of the page contain extremely large amounts of
> detail, resulting in things that are important to everyone as well as to
> smaller subsets of people being lost in the noise.
>
> I suspect a bunch of us have some ideas here, but before we drill into
> them in detail, I think it would be useful to nail down what problems
> we're trying to solve.
>
> How do folks feel about 1) and 2) as statements of the most important
> problems to solve here?
I think you're on about the right lines. I tried phrasing it in
different ways to say where we want to get to, but I think your summary
is good.
Mark.
Martin Jernberg
> _______________________________________________
> dev-apps-thunderbird mailing list
> dev-apps-t...@lists.mozilla.org
> https://lists.mozilla.org/listinfo/dev-apps-thunderbird
>
Robert Kaiser
> I'm very encouraged by
> how much more useful and engaging the revamped project-wide meeting has
> been recently, and I'm hoping we can do something similar.
Maybe this is so good because it's grown completely uninteresting for me
now.
> 1) a moderate amount of the meeting is effectively equivalent to people
> reading aloud what they've already written on the wiki page, which is
> neither a good use of people's time nor particularly engaging to listen to.
I would never read this myself if I wasn't dialing in, and actually, if
I miss a meeting, I never look into the notes and don't get any notice
of what happens there. Just as you might not get any notice about
SeaMonkey happenings any more since we don't go through personal status
any more in the meeting.
Robert Kaiser
Dan Mosedale
> Dan Mosedale wrote:
>> I'm very encouraged by
>> how much more useful and engaging the revamped project-wide meeting has
>> been recently, and I'm hoping we can do something similar.
>
> Maybe this is so good because it's grown completely uninteresting for
> me now.
>> 1) a moderate amount of the meeting is effectively equivalent to people
>> reading aloud what they've already written on the wiki page, which is
>> neither a good use of people's time nor particularly engaging to
>> listen to.
>
> I would never read this myself if I wasn't dialing in, and actually,
> if I miss a meeting, I never look into the notes and don't get any
> notice of what happens there. Just as you might not get any notice
> about SeaMonkey happenings any more since we don't go through personal
> status any more in the meeting.
I do try to skim the status updates that people make. What's not clear
to me from what you've written above is whether there is
Thunderbird-related info that you want to keep up on but don't because
of the current format. Is there?
Dan
Robert Kaiser
> On 3/16/10 5:17 AM, Robert Kaiser wrote:
>> Dan Mosedale wrote:
>>> I'm very encouraged by
>>> how much more useful and engaging the revamped project-wide meeting has
>>> been recently, and I'm hoping we can do something similar.
>>
>> Maybe this is so good because it's grown completely uninteresting for
>> me now.
> Can you unpack what you mean by that?
Maybe the changes that make it sound good for you are the same why it is
now pretty uninteresting for me - like, I don't get much information
there anymore that are of any value to me.
I'm interested in status of the Mozilla project, which I get less and
less there.
> I do try to skim the status updates that people make. What's not clear
> to me from what you've written above is whether there is
> Thunderbird-related info that you want to keep up on but don't because
> of the current format. Is there?
I just think that it's probably hard for you to filter out what affects
Thunderbird or not in updates like mine, and I don't have a good venue
any more to point you to things in the meeting that might actually be
interested, unless it's really groundbreaking stuff that makes sense to
bring up in the roundtable.
In any case, I have the impression that Mozilla Messaging is trying to
reduce communication as well as emotions (like fun) in the project, so
if that's a real target, go forward with doing it.
Robert Kaiser
Dan Mosedale
> Dan Mosedale wrote:
>> On 3/16/10 5:17 AM, Robert Kaiser wrote:
>>> Dan Mosedale wrote:
>>>> I'm very encouraged by
>>>> how much more useful and engaging the revamped project-wide meeting
>>>> has
>>>> been recently, and I'm hoping we can do something similar.
>>>
>>> Maybe this is so good because it's grown completely uninteresting for
>>> me now.
>> Can you unpack what you mean by that?
>
> Maybe the changes that make it sound good for you are the same why it
> is now pretty uninteresting for me - like, I don't get much
> information there anymore that are of any value to me.
> I'm interested in status of the Mozilla project, which I get less and
> less there.
where general status reporting happens, and the phone/video part, where
people drill into detail on pieces that are likely to be of interest to
contributors. The theory there is that it's much easier and more
efficient to get status just by reading, whereas the presentations keep
people up-to-date with things that have bigger picture implications that
actually get high value from the medium. My experience is consistent
with that theory: I find it much more engaging, and I tend to get
significantly more value from the time that I invest.
It seems like even if you don't find the phone/video lightning talks
particularly valuable, this could be a better situation for you, since
it means you could just read the wiki page and not bother with the media
piece at all, and you would have saved a bunch of time. It sounds to me
like this isn't the way you're experiencing it, however... can you
elaborate more?
>> I do try to skim the status updates that people make. What's not clear
>> to me from what you've written above is whether there is
>> Thunderbird-related info that you want to keep up on but don't because
>> of the current format. Is there?
>
> I just think that it's probably hard for you to filter out what
> affects Thunderbird or not in updates like mine,
Right, that's true. I tend to assume that if there's something
SeaMonkey like that I need to spend time on, you or another SeaMonkey
contributor will bring it to my attention.
> and I don't have a good venue any more to point you to things in the
> meeting that might actually be interested, unless it's really
> groundbreaking stuff that makes sense to bring up in the roundtable.
I'm confused. If you're referring to the fact that you don't have a
speaking slot in the project-wide meeting any more, that doesn't seem
like a problem, since there's still the project-wide wiki page for you
to include the sort of information you're referring to. If you're
referring to something in the Tb meeting, I'm unclear what you're
objecting to, since nothing's changed there yet, and if it does change,
it would certainly leave space for that sort of info as well.
> In any case, I have the impression that Mozilla Messaging is trying to
> reduce communication as well as emotions (like fun) in the project, so
> if that's a real target, go forward with doing it.
In fact, increasing fun is a strong goal! Can you unpack what gave you
the impression we were trying to reduce fun?
We're trying to refactor our communications so that people can move
stuff forward in ways that increase happiness and decrease frustration
across the board. As an example, users expressing frustration by
venting or ranting is a valid, human thing to do. That said, when it
happens in the middle of design and development discussions in Bugzilla,
it results in unhappy and unproductive developers and designers, and the
actual problem at hand gets fixed much more slowly, and, often times,
less well. GetSatisfaction, on the other hand, is very much designed as
a place for users to give their reactions and express emotions in many
ways, and for community members to help them work through their issues.
Dan
Gervase Markham
> I'm confused. If you're referring to the fact that you don't have a
> speaking slot in the project-wide meeting any more, that doesn't seem
> like a problem, since there's still the project-wide wiki page for you
> to include the sort of information you're referring to.
And you are welcome to request a speaking slot (limited to 3 minutes, as
they all are) if there are things you want to say :-)
Gerv
Robert Kaiser
I don't even dial in or watch it any more, so what should I say
anything? Also, requesting a slot for 1-2 sentences (and more isn't
interesting to a community who doesn't seem to be very interested in
SeaMonkey in the first place) is just not worth the time.
Robert Kaiser
Robert Kaiser
> That meeting is effectively now split into two pieces: the wiki page,
> where general status reporting happens
Which most people probably don't read - at least I don't and won't,
without listening to vices talking about it.
> and the phone/video part, where
> people drill into detail on pieces that are likely to be of interest to
> contributors.
Well, nothing of much interest for me anymore, or so I feel. May I just
am no Mozilla contributor any more, or just not the target audience of
this meeting.
> The theory there is that it's much easier and more
> efficient to get status just by reading
Well, that might be true for people who are not as overloaded and tired
of reading and writing as I am. Listening and talking is a relief for me
every time it happens.
Maybe the meeting are tailored for a different type of person than I am,
and I'm used to being the one whose needs are just outside the norm and
ignored in favor of things fitting a larger audience.
> I tend to assume that if there's something SeaMonkey
> like that I need to spend time on, you or another SeaMonkey contributor
> will bring it to my attention.
I thought so.
>> and I don't have a good venue any more to point you to things in the
>> meeting that might actually be interested, unless it's really
>> groundbreaking stuff that makes sense to bring up in the roundtable.
> I'm confused. If you're referring to the fact that you don't have a
> speaking slot in the project-wide meeting any more, that doesn't seem
> like a problem, since there's still the project-wide wiki page for you
> to include the sort of information you're referring to. If you're
> referring to something in the Tb meeting, I'm unclear what you're
> objecting to, since nothing's changed there yet, and if it does change,
> it would certainly leave space for that sort of info as well.
I usually brought up the one or two sentences on SeaMonkey status of
interest when my personal updates were up on the TB meeting. Maybe that
was the wrong place anyhow and we should have a SeaMonkey slot in there
where I bring up those max. 1-2 sentences per week (if any) that are of
significance to Thunderbird.
>> In any case, I have the impression that Mozilla Messaging is trying to
>> reduce communication as well as emotions (like fun) in the project, so
>> if that's a real target, go forward with doing it.
> In fact, increasing fun is a strong goal! Can you unpack what gave you
> the impression we were trying to reduce fun?
You're trying to reduce emotions, and fun is an emotion, you're trying
to reduce discussions, but figuring out the needs and problems of others
and addressing them produces more overall fun, and you're splitting up
communication ways needlessly (see tb-planning) which greatly reduces
fun for a number of participants. So I can't say you're successful in
increasing fun - at least from where I stand.
<rant>But then, getting rid of me in TB discussions might increase the
fun for some people, not sure. Some people also have fun dissing
SeaMonkey or telling me I'm an idiot, who's to say that increasing their
fun isn't a good thing?</rant>
> We're trying to refactor our communications so that people can move
> stuff forward in ways that increase happiness and decrease frustration
> across the board.
Well, your efforts alone increase frustration for a number of people,
which you conveniently just seem to ignore. See e.g. the thread about
tb-planning.
> As an example, users expressing frustration by venting
> or ranting is a valid, human thing to do.
I'm much more talking about contributors than users here. I'm frustrated
enough without getting to the depressing talk about users and support.
Robert Kaiser
Archaeopteryx
> That meeting is effectively now split into two pieces: the wiki page,
> where general status reporting happens, and the phone/video part, where
> people drill into detail on pieces that are likely to be of interest to
> contributors. The theory there is that it's much easier and more
> efficient to get status just by reading, whereas the presentations keep
> people up-to-date with things that have bigger picture implications that
> actually get high value from the medium. My experience is consistent
> with that theory: I find it much more engaging, and I tend to get
> significantly more value from the time that I invest.
page changed to something like the summary of Delivery, QA, etc. meeting
(compared to Firefox), but MailNews Core and UI (Thunderbird) related
items are nearly missing. I liked the old wiki page because it was more
time efficient than attending the meeting.
> In fact, increasing fun is a strong goal! Can you unpack what gave you
> the impression we were trying to reduce fun?
1) Lobbying for blocking-requests!
2) tb-planning. I had never the impression that mdat is overcrowded
Archaeopteryx
Andrew Sutherland
> 2) tb-planning. I had never the impression that mdat is overcrowded
One of my big hopes for for tb-planning is that the archives of the list
will be much more useful than those of mdat. Many people use mdat like
it was a thunderbird-users list rather than a thunderbird-dev list. For
example, there are near-daily posts to ask whether something is a bug,
frequently with follow-ups by people trying to be helpful, as well as
enhancement requests and the like.
While someone who reads mdat daily is unlikely to be seriously
inconvenienced by skipping these messages/threads, it does add a lot of
noise to the signal. If the archives are more usable to people, this
will hopefully improve the signal even further as people with questions
appropriate to tb-planning but which have already been answered can
check the archives before re-asking the question.
Andrew
Simon Paquet
> 2) tb-planning. I had never the impression that mdat is overcrowded
Did tb-planning already start? I thought that as a member of the
TB release drivers list, that I would we automatically added to the
list of subscribers, but that doesn't seem to be case?
Simon
--
Thunderbird/Calendar Localisation (L10n) Coordinator
Thunderbird l10n blog: http://thunderbird-l10n.blogspot.com
Calendar website maintainer: http://www.mozilla.org/projects/calendar
Calendar developer blog: http://weblogs.mozillazine.org/calendar
Dan Mosedale
> Dan Mosedale wrote:
>> That meeting is effectively now split into two pieces: the wiki page,
>> where general status reporting happens, and the phone/video part, where
>> people drill into detail on pieces that are likely to be of interest to
>> contributors. The theory there is that it's much easier and more
>> efficient to get status just by reading, whereas the presentations keep
>> people up-to-date with things that have bigger picture implications that
>> actually get high value from the medium. My experience is consistent
>> with that theory: I find it much more engaging, and I tend to get
>> significantly more value from the time that I invest.
> That now requires that anybody interested is attending, right?
captured on the wiki page (or pages linked to from it), like it always
was. However, if you miss the Lightning talks, that content is only
available to folks who are willing to go review the video.
> The wiki page changed to something like the summary of Delivery, QA, etc. meeting
> (compared to Firefox), but MailNews Core and UI (Thunderbird) related
> items are nearly missing.
page is still there (though I did miss updating it a week or two ago),
and I think I've continued to put similar content in there to what I put
into in the old page.
What do you think is missing?
> I liked the old wiki page because it was more
> time efficient than attending the meeting.
W.r.t. the status information, I think that's mostly still true. It's
just the things in the Lightning talks that one would miss. Do you
disagree?
Dan
Dan Mosedale
> Dan Mosedale wrote:
>> That meeting is effectively now split into two pieces: the wiki page,
>> where general status reporting happens
>
> Which most people probably don't read - at least I don't and won't,
> without listening to vices talking about it.
haven't said why you think it is.
>> The theory there is that it's much easier and more
>> efficient to get status just by reading
>
> Well, that might be true for people who are not as overloaded and
> tired of reading and writing as I am. Listening and talking is a
> relief for me every time it happens.
> Maybe the meeting are tailored for a different type of person than I
> am, and I'm used to being the one whose needs are just outside the
> norm and ignored in favor of things fitting a larger audience.
from home a lot, I tend to like voice meetings better as well. But I
think it's very unlikely that you and I are the typical cases here, and
since we're asking a lot of people to give up their time for these
meetings, I think it's important that they be structured in a way which
is most helpful to most of those people.
>>> and I don't have a good venue any more to point you to things in the
>>> meeting that might actually be interested, unless it's really
>>> groundbreaking stuff that makes sense to bring up in the roundtable.
>> I'm confused. If you're referring to the fact that you don't have a
>> speaking slot in the project-wide meeting any more, that doesn't seem
>> like a problem, since there's still the project-wide wiki page for you
>> to include the sort of information you're referring to. If you're
>> referring to something in the Tb meeting, I'm unclear what you're
>> objecting to, since nothing's changed there yet, and if it does change,
>> it would certainly leave space for that sort of info as well.
>
> I usually brought up the one or two sentences on SeaMonkey status of
> interest when my personal updates were up on the TB meeting. Maybe
> that was the wrong place anyhow and we should have a SeaMonkey slot in
> there where I bring up those max. 1-2 sentences per week (if any) that
> are of significance to Thunderbird.
how we might want to adjust the Tb meeting going forward, and I think
this would fit nicely.
>>> In any case, I have the impression that Mozilla Messaging is trying to
>>> reduce communication as well as emotions (like fun) in the project, so
>>> if that's a real target, go forward with doing it.
>> In fact, increasing fun is a strong goal! Can you unpack what gave you
>> the impression we were trying to reduce fun?
>
> You're trying to reduce emotions, and fun is an emotion, you're trying
> to reduce discussions, but figuring out the needs and problems of
> others and addressing them produces more overall fun, and you're
> splitting up communication ways needlessly (see tb-planning) which
> greatly reduces fun for a number of participants. So I can't say
> you're successful in increasing fun - at least from where I stand.
> <rant>But then, getting rid of me in TB discussions might increase the
> fun for some people, not sure. Some people also have fun dissing
> SeaMonkey or telling me I'm an idiot, who's to say that increasing
> their fun isn't a good thing?</rant>
>
emotional creatures, which is just great. I'm trying refactor
discussions so that certain _expressions_ of emotion aren't allowed to
damage important discussions. Indeed, if someone sent a post to
tb-planning suggesting that you were an idiot, or dissing SeaMonkey, I'd
bounce it! There are plenty of ways to constructively express emotion
that don't damage our ability to get work done.
>> We're trying to refactor our communications so that people can move
>> stuff forward in ways that increase happiness and decrease frustration
>> across the board.
>
> Well, your efforts alone increase frustration for a number of people,
> which you conveniently just seem to ignore. See e.g. the thread about
> tb-planning.
course" with "ignoring". If you'll notice, I responded to the majority
of points that people brought up in that discussion.
The reality is, change is always hard, but often times (and I believe
very much so in this case!) the difficulties caused by the change are
outweighed by the improvements.
Dan
Robert Kaiser
> Indeed, if someone sent a post to
> tb-planning suggesting that you were an idiot, or dissing SeaMonkey, I'd
> bounce it!
Ah, nice, so that new list is a censorship instrument after all.
I have taken all those insults on newsgroups, esp. the SeaMonkey support
one, and I think it's something one needs to read and study as well as
constructive messages. Those people are flaming and dissing for a
reason, they are emotionally attached to something in our products which
is basically a very good thing, and they get the impression of us
attacking those thing they feel attached to. It's a bad move to ignore that.
> The reality is, change is always hard, but often times (and I believe
> very much so in this case!) the difficulties caused by the change are
> outweighed by the improvements.
And often enough, those changes are the doom of some things that were
dearly loved and one comes back to the old ways and trying a different
approach later, when those few that are left and have swallowed the
wrong and bad times come back with a "I have said that from the
beginning". Somehow reminds me of some episodes I've seen in Mozilla
elsewhere. ;-)
In any case, for a non-employee, the Mozilla project has become cold,
dry, and sometimes even quite hostile compared to the old AOL/Netscape
days. Contributing by "outsiders" doesn't feel that much appreciated as
in earlier times, and the fragmented but overloaded ways of
communication make it harder to have some running gags and jokes running
around. When we said "we suck" in 2000, it was a way to light your day
and grin after seeing the trees burn, when anyone says it today, someone
is offended.
And all we are doing is making it more convenient to employees and even
less convenient to those who want to get in contact with ongoing core
contributors or let alone new people trying to come in. In earlier days,
we encouraged people who were emotionally attached to something to help
improving it, now we try to push them off the cliff where we don't have
to deal with them - or so it seems in Firefox and possible even more
Thunderbird communities.
Robert Kaiser
Dan Mosedale
> Dan Mosedale wrote:
>> Indeed, if someone sent a post to
>> tb-planning suggesting that you were an idiot, or dissing SeaMonkey, I'd
>> bounce it!
>
> Ah, nice, so that new list is a censorship instrument after all.
> I have taken all those insults on newsgroups, esp. the SeaMonkey
> support one, and I think it's something one needs to read and study as
> well as constructive messages. Those people are flaming and dissing
> for a reason, they are emotionally attached to something in our
> products which is basically a very good thing, and they get the
> impression of us attacking those thing they feel attached to. It's a
> bad move to ignore that.
people can't say those sorts of things. I am, however, asserting that
they don't belong in certain specific venues. If I were to bounce such
a message from tb-planning, the original poster would be more than
welcome to post it on their own blog or anywhere else where it was
acceptable.
> In any case, for a non-employee, the Mozilla project has become cold,
> dry, and sometimes even quite hostile compared to the old AOL/Netscape
> days. Contributing by "outsiders" doesn't feel that much appreciated
> as in earlier times, and the fragmented but overloaded ways of
> communication make it harder to have some running gags and jokes
> running around. When we said "we suck" in 2000, it was a way to light
> your day and grin after seeing the trees burn, when anyone says it
> today, someone is offended.
> And all we are doing is making it more convenient to employees and
> even less convenient to those who want to get in contact with ongoing
> core contributors or let alone new people trying to come in. In
> earlier days, we encouraged people who were emotionally attached to
> something to help improving it, now we try to push them off the cliff
> where we don't have to deal with them - or so it seems in Firefox and
> possible even more Thunderbird communities.
that. One of the things that I've read recently and found exceedingly
insightful is <http://shirky.com/writings/group_enemy.html>; it's been
influential in my thinking as I've made recent suggestions and changes.
I disagree strongly that any of these changes will make it harder on new
people joining the community; I expect the fact that people are able to
have discussions without fear of name-calling or someone jumping down
their throats to make it (on average) significantly _easier_ and more
rewarding for new people to participate.
In any case, I think we're off on a tangent here, in the sense that most
of this isn't really related to tweaking the format of the status
meeting in any specific way.
Dan
Craig
>
> In any case, for a non-employee, the Mozilla project has become cold,
> dry, and sometimes even quite hostile compared to the old AOL/Netscape
> days.
I greatly appreciate this thread for highlighting issues around the idea
of "what kind of community does the Mozilla community want to have?" In
that vein, a question:
Is there a someone at the Mozilla project tasked with a role similar to
Jono Bacon's "community manager" at Ubuntu? The reason I ask is that,
in my (very limited) experience, it seems the development of the Mozilla
/community/ is relatively ad hoc.
I'm aware, for example, that Mary Colvig is the Mozilla Community
Manager but, in that context, it's a marketing function:
> Mary Colvig engages with the global Mozilla community to foster
> participation in marketing Mozilla and Firefox. She oversees
> Mozilla's community events program, where she works to facilitate
> Mozilla community collaboration in the offline world -- at
> conferences, user groups, install days, developer days and more. Mary
> was a driving force behind the Mozilla community effort to set a
> Guinness World Record for the launch of Firefox 3...
> Source : <http://www.spreadfirefox.com/MozillaBios>
Whereas the Ubuntu Community Manager position articulates a conscious
goal of developing the human ecosystem that is "the project:"
> Hello! I am Jono Bacon, and I work for Canonical as the Ubuntu
> Community Manager (UCM). As the UCM I am here to help the Ubuntu
> community tick along, ensure teams can work together easily, help
> build LoCo teams, work with upstream communities and more.
> Importantly, I am here for the Ubuntu community as someone to consult
> with with any community related issues. If you're unsure of anything,
> want to flesh some ideas out, or just want some advice, give me a yell. :)
> Source : <https://wiki.ubuntu.com/JonoBacon>
I'm not saying that the Ubuntu project or Mr Bacon has the "the way" of
making a "good" community. Rather, it's the Ubuntu project's /explicit
commitment/ to addressing overall community dynamics that is so... I
don't know. Illuminating?
fwiw,
-Craig
Archaeopteryx
>> That now requires that anybody interested is attending, right?
> Yes and no. My impression is that the status stuff is generally still
> captured on the wiki page (or pages linked to from it), like it always
> was. However, if you miss the Lightning talks, that content is only
> available to folks who are willing to go review the video.
the wiki about a stream or on demand videos. Can you please provide more
information.
> I'm surprised to hear you say this. The Thunderbird section of the wiki
> page is still there (though I did miss updating it a week or two ago),
> and I think I've continued to put similar content in there to what I put
> into in the old page.
The old status updates have moved to Mozilla Status Board (
http://benjamin.smedbergs.us/weekly-updates.fcgi/project/thunderbird ),
but unfortunately it
a) lacks the participation of some people (look at "Who's Late?")
b) doesn't take participation of more than one person into account.
https://wiki.mozilla.org/Thunderbird:UX/Priorities/3.1 is interesting as
a good human readable ToDo-List, does something like this also exist for
backend stuff?
Firefox has a page for small to medium-sized changes, called Projects,
which is
a) good for reading about current activities once
b) bad for tracking was changed in the last time (diffs too short, you
have to select the version to compare, etc.)
It seems as
https://wiki.mozilla.org/Thunderbird:Thunderbird3.1:Driving_Scratchpad
should provide this, but current status information is missing, so a
status and a last updated column would be appreciated.
Thank you
Archaeopteryx
Justin Wood (Callek)
Except that archives are NOT available if I simply subscribed to the
list, now. or a month from now. and read in my e-mail (on TB).
I'd have to load a website, which sometimes I have a much harder time
doing (if I am compiling SeaMonkey, or Firefox etc.).
--
~Justin Wood (Callek)
Andrew Sutherland
> Except that archives are NOT available if I simply subscribed to the
> list, now. or a month from now. and read in my e-mail (on TB).
I agree that this is a limitation and something I want to address going
forwards; the web interfaces to mailing lists generally suck. I think
there are mitigating actions we can take; for example, the apache
project provides mbox-format archives of (at least some of) their
mailing lists.
> I'd have to load a website, which sometimes I have a much harder time
> doing (if I am compiling SeaMonkey, or Firefox etc.).
Are you trying to make an argument in favor of having an NNTP-exposed
list because you are more likely to have an NNTP reader available than a
web browser? While I agree with your point about NNTP and archives, it
seems a bit of a stretch for this to be a widescale problem. I would
also highly advise always having (at least) one stable and usable web
browser on your system at all times.
Andrew
Justin Wood (Callek)
> On 03/20/2010 07:33 PM, Justin Wood (Callek) wrote:
>> I'd have to load a website, which sometimes I have a much harder time
>> doing (if I am compiling SeaMonkey, or Firefox etc.).
>
> Are you trying to make an argument in favor of having an NNTP-exposed
> list because you are more likely to have an NNTP reader available than a
> web browser?
More an argument for *part* of my personal preference reasoning. [a
reason I've never stated before]
> While I agree with your point about NNTP and archives, it
> seems a bit of a stretch for this to be a widescale problem.
I never intended to assert that it was.
> I would
> also highly advise always having (at least) one stable and usable web
> browser on your system at all times.
I have IE6, does that count :-P
I have FF 3.6 installed as well as SM 2.0; but I really hate
upgrading/downgrading my used version, as pref/profile incompats have
bitten me hard in the past; so I try to stick with the dev once I choose
to load my main profile with it.
--
~Justin Wood (Callek)
Simon Paquet
>> Indeed, if someone sent a post to tb-planning suggesting that you
>> were an idiot, or dissing SeaMonkey, I'd bounce it!
>
> Ah, nice, so that new list is a censorship instrument after all.
> I have taken all those insults on newsgroups, esp. the SeaMonkey
> support one, and I think it's something one needs to read and study
> as well as constructive messages. Those people are flaming and
> dissing for a reason, they are emotionally attached to something
> in our products which is basically a very good thing, and they get
> the impression of us attacking those thing they feel attached to.
> It's a bad move to ignore that.
While I'm also no big proponent of the tb-planning list, simply
because I'd like to have it accessible via NNTP as well, I think
that you are dead wrong here.
Insulting someone or calling him names is never appropriate and
should be discouraged in every mozilla forum/newsgroup/mailing list
that exists. The reason is simply that those ations drive off
people, core contributors just like new folks.
I can't imagine that a newbie appreciates it, when he joins mdac
or mdat and makes a suggestion or posts a question and is told to
go away or shut up, just because someone disagrees with him.
I also don't appreciate it when people give me all kinds of names
when I defend our decision to discontinue Sunbird because of our
well-known resource constraints in the Calendar Project and I know
(based on our real-life discussions and the discussions that I watch
in mdas) that you don't seem to appreciate that either.
Peter Lairo
this passage seems to contradict the strategy you have been forcing
through recently:
> "Of the things you have to accept, the first is that you cannot
> completely separate technical and social issues. There are two
> attractive patterns. One says, we'll handle technology over `here,
> we'll do social issues there. We'll have separate mailing lists with
> separate discussion groups, or we'll have one track here and one
> track there. This doesn't work."
IOW: you are damaging the community.
--
Regards,
Peter Lairo
The browser you can trust: www.Firefox.com
Reclaim Your Inbox: www.GetThunderbird.com
Islam: http://www.jihadwatch.org/islam101/
Israel: http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/myths2/
Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster: http://www.venganza.org/
Anthropogenic Global Warming skepsis: http://tinyurl.com/AGW-Skepsis
Gervase Markham
> I don't even dial in or watch it any more, so what should I say
> anything? Also, requesting a slot for 1-2 sentences (and more isn't
> interesting to a community who doesn't seem to be very interested in
> SeaMonkey in the first place) is just not worth the time.
To a degree, that's a chicken-and-egg problem. If you want them to be
interested in SeaMonkey, tell them interesting things about it :-)
If all you have to say is 2 sentences then yes, you are probably better
off putting them in the wiki.
Gerv
Gervase Markham
> Ah, nice, so that new list is a censorship instrument after all.
Do you think that people should have the right to say anything they
like, in any forum?
> I have taken all those insults on newsgroups, esp. the SeaMonkey support
> one, and I think it's something one needs to read and study as well as
> constructive messages.
I think perhaps there is only a certain amount one can do that before it
becomes tiring.
> Those people are flaming and dissing for a
> reason, they are emotionally attached to something in our products which
> is basically a very good thing, and they get the impression of us
> attacking those thing they feel attached to. It's a bad move to ignore
> that.
Do you think it's definitely true that the people who make it as far as
the mailing lists to express their opinions are a representative sample
of users?
> In any case, for a non-employee, the Mozilla project has become cold,
> dry, and sometimes even quite hostile compared to the old AOL/Netscape
> days. Contributing by "outsiders" doesn't feel that much appreciated as
> in earlier times,
I'm sad that you think this is true. Do you have concrete examples (e.g.
Bugzilla comments or IRC logs)?
> and the fragmented but overloaded ways of
> communication
How can our ways of communication be both fragmented (in lots of little
pieces) and overloaded (lots of discussion in one place)?
We are a big community; it's inevitable that there are going to be a
number of different forums.
> And all we are doing is making it more convenient to employees and even
> less convenient to those who want to get in contact with ongoing core
> contributors or let alone new people trying to come in. In earlier days,
> we encouraged people who were emotionally attached to something to help
> improving it, now we try to push them off the cliff where we don't have
> to deal with them - or so it seems in Firefox and possible even more
> Thunderbird communities.
I don't think Dan is against all emotional attachment, just persistent
negativity. I confess I don't see as much of it as he says there is, but
I'm happy to admit that may be because I'm not day-to-day involved in
Thunderbird development (although I do read this group).
The new group will be open for all to subscribe. No people are being
excluded.
Gerv
Gervase Markham
> Is there a someone at the Mozilla project tasked with a role similar to
> Jono Bacon's "community manager" at Ubuntu? The reason I ask is that, in
> my (very limited) experience, it seems the development of the Mozilla
> /community/ is relatively ad hoc.
I don't like the title but perhaps that's me, if it's anyone. Part of
(not all of) my job is to make other community members' lives easier,
either by developing policy, writing code, or connecting people.
However, we have a large community and there's only one of me.
> I'm aware, for example, that Mary Colvig is the Mozilla Community
> Manager but, in that context, it's a marketing function:
You are right; Mary's job is not anything like Jono's job.
Gerv
Gervase Markham
> That now requires that anybody interested is attending, right? The wiki
> page changed to something like the summary of Delivery, QA, etc. meeting
> (compared to Firefox), but MailNews Core and UI (Thunderbird) related
> items are nearly missing. I liked the old wiki page because it was more
> time efficient than attending the meeting.
If you think the wiki page format sucks, email Jono and get him to
change it. It's not set in stone :-)
Gerv
Gervase Markham
> Interesting, I didn't know yet about videos and can't find anything in
> the wiki about a stream or on demand videos. Can you please provide more
> information.
The video is embedded in the top of the wiki page a short time after the
meeting finishes. Examples from the last 3 weeks:
https://wiki.mozilla.org/WeeklyUpdates/2010-03-15
https://wiki.mozilla.org/WeeklyUpdates/2010-03-08
https://wiki.mozilla.org/WeeklyUpdates/2010-03-01
> The old status updates have moved to Mozilla Status Board (
> http://benjamin.smedbergs.us/weekly-updates.fcgi/project/thunderbird ),
> but unfortunately it
> a) lacks the participation of some people (look at "Who's Late?")
> b) doesn't take participation of more than one person into account.
I think that's a misunderstanding. That tool is for personal statuses,
not team statuses.
Gerv
Dan Mosedale
> On 03/20/2010 07:33 PM, Justin Wood (Callek) wrote:
>> Except that archives are NOT available if I simply subscribed to the
>> list, now. or a month from now. and read in my e-mail (on TB).
>
> I agree that this is a limitation and something I want to address
> going forwards; the web interfaces to mailing lists generally suck. I
> think there are mitigating actions we can take; for example, the
> apache project provides mbox-format archives of (at least some of)
> their mailing lists.
I'd love to see a Tb add-on that either grabbed these for grovelling, or
linked to the Google Group archives for existing mailing lists.
Dan
Archaeopteryx
was talking about the "project-wide" meeting - I had feared to have
missed something (and my comments about the wiki page were for the
Thunderbird meeting).
Shame on me
Archaeopteryx
Dan Mosedale
original topic, so I'm going to summarize what I've heard people say so
far along with what I plan to do going forward.
First, I understand that KaiRo doesn't perceive
>> 1) a moderate amount of the meeting is effectively equivalent to people
>> reading aloud what they've already written on the wiki page, which is
>> neither a good use of people's time nor particularly engaging to
>> listen to.
as a problem that should be solved. I hear that, and I can see why
that's true for him, but I still believe that opposite is the case both
for most current meeting attendees as well as for most Thunderbird
contributors whom we might be interested in having attend. If others
feel similarly to KaiRo, now would be the time to speak up!
> 2) too many sections of the page contain extremely large amounts of
> detail, resulting in things that are important to everyone as well as to
> smaller subsets of people being lost in the noise.
Unless I see compelling feedback in response to this message that
changes my understanding of the important problems to solve here, I
will, at some point soon, offer some proposals for changing that meeting
that I hope will address these problems.
Separately from issues related to this meeting, I heard concern around
the fact that I've been driving changes to the overall architecture of
participation used by Thunderbird. While I'm aware that these changes
have costs, I strongly believe that the benefits to the changes outweigh
the costs significantly, and I've tried to explain that in quite a bit
of detail.
That said, I think there is an opportunity to think holistically about
our architecture of participation now. Doing so will likely help us get
some insight into where the most important pain points are and what we
can do about them. So I'll try and draft a document that describes our
current AoP at a high level for review by the community at large
sometime in the next several weeks.
Dan
Robert Kaiser
> Insulting someone or calling him names is never appropriate and
> should be discouraged in every mozilla forum/newsgroup/mailing list
> that exists. The reason is simply that those ations drive off
> people, core contributors just like new folks.
I fully agree there in *discouraging* that, but when it happens (and
usually it does from some kind of users towards some developers) then we
should read and study those, as statements like that means that people
are emotionally attached to something in our products, and we should try
to convert that to constructive fuel for our projects and good hints of
what we can do or not. Getting rid of those messages completely means
getting rid of emotional attachment and killing off the humanity of our
projects. And IT - including OSS - is too inhumane in many cases anyhow.
That's what I wanted to say with that.
Robert Kaiser
Robert Kaiser
> On 19/03/10 17:40, Robert Kaiser wrote:
>> Ah, nice, so that new list is a censorship instrument after all.
>
> Do you think that people should have the right to say anything they
> like, in any forum?
Basically, yes. That's what openness is about, right?
Of course, bashing, flaming, and unconstructiveness should be
*discouraged* anywhere, be it a newsgroup or mailing list, but
forbidding emotional outbursts and moderating them off is just wrong IMHO.
> Do you think it's definitely true that the people who make it as far as
> the mailing lists to express their opinions are a representative sample
> of users?
There is no representative sample anywhere, and we should not even care
about one, IMHO. We should care about those who are emotionally attached
to what we are doing, though, find out why, and leverage those emotions,
turning them into something constructive. Blocking them off makes us die
slowly but surely - first emotionally, then in all other ways possible.
>> In any case, for a non-employee, the Mozilla project has become cold,
>> dry, and sometimes even quite hostile compared to the old AOL/Netscape
>> days. Contributing by "outsiders" doesn't feel that much appreciated as
>> in earlier times,
>
> I'm sad that you think this is true. Do you have concrete examples (e.g.
> Bugzilla comments or IRC logs)?
It's hard to put a finger on it, it's a slowly creeping in general
attitude I'm feeling there. One of the most difficult things to diagnose
and find solutions for. Perhaps also just a result of how much that
community has grown and how one part of the project has tremendous
mass-market success. Maybe something worth talking over in a place like
the upcoming Summit.
>> and the fragmented but overloaded ways of
>> communication
>
> How can our ways of communication be both fragmented (in lots of little
> pieces) and overloaded (lots of discussion in one place)?
>
> We are a big community; it's inevitable that there are going to be a
> number of different forums.
We're first fragmenting our communication paths into many discrete and
non-connected places (various newsgroups, mailing list, blogs,
microblogging channels and whatever) and then cross-posting across those
places realizing we only catch parts of the fragmented community and
sometimes not catching them when we should, but overloading those
reading many channels with the same messages all over again. Also, due
to the fragmentation, we're getting overloaded with lots of out-of-place
discussions as people don't know any more where to go with what topic or
repeating discussions that were already had elsewhere because the
participants in some fragment didn't realize the discussion in the other
place.
> I don't think Dan is against all emotional attachment, just persistent
> negativity.
I agree with him on that, I just think that in many cases what seems
like persistent negativity is an expression of some real-world problem
that the one feeling attacked might fail to see when just putting it off
as "persistent negativity". I am pretty sure that there's way fewer
people out there who are intentionally negative as one might think when
reading discussions in some places here.
Robert Kaiser
Gervase Markham
> Gervase Markham wrote:
>> Do you think that people should have the right to say anything they
>> like, in any forum?
>
> Basically, yes. That's what openness is about, right?
Then I guess that's the fundamental disagreement.
"Donnie Berkholz - Assholes Are Killing Your Project"
http://blip.tv/file/2444432
I'm not calling any particular contributor an asshole but, while I'm sad
that the new list had to be created, I get a consistent message from the
Thunderbird team that they are just exhausted with having to spend
emotional energy dealing with this stuff. And, I suggest, if they don't
have a way to improve things, then discussion will end up moving into
private email threads - and nobody wins. That's what happened in the
early days of Firefox and it took us years to shove the discussion back
into somewhere public.
>> Do you think it's definitely true that the people who make it as far as
>> the mailing lists to express their opinions are a representative sample
>> of users?
>
> There is no representative sample anywhere, and we should not even care
> about one, IMHO. We should care about those who are emotionally attached
> to what we are doing, though, find out why, and leverage those emotions,
> turning them into something constructive. Blocking them off makes us die
> slowly but surely - first emotionally, then in all other ways possible.
But there's a big difference between being passionate about a product,
and being negative or having only stop energy. I'm sure the new list
will have many forcefully-stated opinions - but they will be opinions
about issues, not people, and they will be backed up with data, rather
than just "I think your idea sucks".
> mass-market success. Maybe something worth talking over in a place like
> the upcoming Summit.
We could certainly have a session on that, but it would probably have to
be led by someone who feels that way, and who is able to articulate why
(at least to an extent). Are you offering?
>> How can our ways of communication be both fragmented (in lots of little
>> pieces) and overloaded (lots of discussion in one place)?
>>
>> We are a big community; it's inevitable that there are going to be a
>> number of different forums.
>
> We're first fragmenting our communication paths into many discrete and
> non-connected places (various newsgroups, mailing list, blogs,
> microblogging channels and whatever) and then cross-posting across those
> places realizing we only catch parts of the fragmented community and
> sometimes not catching them when we should, but overloading those
> reading many channels with the same messages all over again. Also, due
> to the fragmentation, we're getting overloaded with lots of out-of-place
> discussions as people don't know any more where to go with what topic or
> repeating discussions that were already had elsewhere because the
> participants in some fragment didn't realize the discussion in the other
> place.
How would you improve things? I'm not sure we can e.g. forbid people
from using Twitter. :-)
Gerv
Robert Kaiser
> Then I guess that's the fundamental disagreement.
>
> "Donnie Berkholz - Assholes Are Killing Your Project"
> http://blip.tv/file/2444432
Well, the question is where to draw the line, and I'm seeing that the
Thunderbird project is drawing it very tightly right now, which I don't
understand as compared to SeaMonkey, I'm seeing fewer real stop-energy
postings here though there are more available human resources.
But then, I'm not reading Thunderbird support channels - still, what is
being sliced and diced is the developer communication channels.
> But there's a big difference between being passionate about a product,
> and being negative or having only stop energy. I'm sure the new list
> will have many forcefully-stated opinions - but they will be opinions
> about issues, not people, and they will be backed up with data, rather
> than just "I think your idea sucks".
Well, the new list at least misses my opinion. I'm reading it but I
refuse to take part in its discussions. But then, I may not be of much
value to Thunderbird discussions anyhow.
>> Maybe something worth talking over in a place like
>> the upcoming Summit.
>
> We could certainly have a session on that, but it would probably have to
> be led by someone who feels that way, and who is able to articulate why
> (at least to an extent). Are you offering?
I'm surely offering to take part in that discussion, but I think someone
with a more neutral position should actually lead it.
> How would you improve things? I'm not sure we can e.g. forbid people
> from using Twitter. :-)
Sure, and I unfortunately don't have a recipe either. I also guess I
won't find one by myself or in the midst of work and skimming all
information channels I need to catch up with - which is the usual state
I come in here. Probably another thing to look into in that session.
With a few brilliant minds teaming up, we might even find solutions.
Robert Kaiser
Dan Mosedale
> Gervase Markham wrote:
>> Then I guess that's the fundamental disagreement.
>>
>> "Donnie Berkholz - Assholes Are Killing Your Project"
>> http://blip.tv/file/2444432
>
> Well, the question is where to draw the line, and I'm seeing that the
> Thunderbird project is drawing it very tightly right now, which I
> don't understand as compared to SeaMonkey, I'm seeing fewer real
> stop-energy postings here though there are more available human
> resources.
> But then, I'm not reading Thunderbird support channels - still, what
> is being sliced and diced is the developer communication channels.
>
time for the stop energy. The reality is that exactly what happened to
Firefox (conversations moved to private places, despite everyone's best
intentions), has happened to Thunderbird. Since the last attempts
(message-header, javascript in messages, etc.) went so horribly, no one
has the energy to start discussions they think are likely to be
controversial in d-a-t anymore, so it just doesn't happen.
The creation of tb-planning is specifically an attempt to create a venue
without that problem. In other words, to get work that should be
happening in a transparent way to _actually_ happen in a transparent way.
> Well, the new list at least misses my opinion. I'm reading it but I
> refuse to take part in its discussions. But then, I may not be of much
> value to Thunderbird discussions anyhow.
As much as we'd love your opinion and contributions, we _can't_ continue
to have a development forum where developers feel they're unable propose
significant changes safely.
Dan
Simon Paquet
> The creation of tb-planning is specifically an attempt to create a
> venue without that problem.
BTW, how can I subscribe to tb-planning? I didn't find it mentioned
anywhere on https://lists.mozilla.org/listinfo
Cya
Dan Mosedale
> Dan Mosedale wrote on 25. Mar 2010:
>
>> The creation of tb-planning is specifically an attempt to create a
>> venue without that problem.
>
> BTW, how can I subscribe to tb-planning? I didn't find it mentioned
> anywhere on https://lists.mozilla.org/listinfo
Dan
Wayne Mery
> On 3/25/10 7:59 AM, Robert Kaiser wrote:
>> Gervase Markham wrote:
>>> Then I guess that's the fundamental disagreement.
>>>
>>> "Donnie Berkholz - Assholes Are Killing Your Project"
>>> http://blip.tv/file/2444432
>>
>> Well, the question is where to draw the line, and I'm seeing that the
>> Thunderbird project is drawing it very tightly right now, which I
>> don't understand as compared to SeaMonkey, I'm seeing fewer real
>> stop-energy postings here though there are more available human
>> resources.
>> But then, I'm not reading Thunderbird support channels - still, what
>> is being sliced and diced is the developer communication channels.
>>
> That's a fair point. The short answer is: look a little further back in
> time for the stop energy. The reality is that exactly what happened to
> Firefox (conversations moved to private places, despite everyone's best
> intentions), has happened to Thunderbird. Since the last attempts
> (message-header, javascript in messages, etc.) went so horribly, no one
> has the energy to start discussions they think are likely to be
> controversial in d-a-t anymore, so it just doesn't happen.
These are good examples. I don't recall seeing anything in mdas that
approaches the magnitude of "unattractive" postings as has been seen in
mdat (but I could be wrong).
Hey, it may take some experimentation to get things realigned. Major
architectural and UI changes have been addressed in the last couple
years in mdat that did not happen in prior years. Via spot check:
* mdat's "old times" (spring 2006 - spring 2007) lists mostly technical
questions and answers, a few release and bug announcements, the vast
majority of postings (90%?) are people other than the 2 primary
developers. No big discussion of new features and such. About 400 topics
for the period.
* mdat's recent times (spring 2007-spring 2010), 1900 topics (50%
increase), hard to characterize the make up due to the volume but seems
like: 07-08 increased dev postings and interaction and plenty of real
spam, 08-09 more of the same, 09-10 big UI stuff hits the alphas and
betas, perhaps perception developing of more things being broken than
being fixed - things get controversial
Here's my take - people saying things in public to each other that they
wouldn't say to each face to face as peers, being rude, repeating
themselves ad nauseum and being demanding is just plain wrong. I don't
care what the reason is. And being "open" is about way more things than
being in your face or stating your opinion (which by the way does not
necessarily derive from being "passionate").
Conversely, when rules are in place and people can't participate without
following the rules (whether it's a closed or open list) then suddenly
people tend to change their methods in order to participate. I run a
mailing list for 24 years with 1,000 participants and I can count on no
more than two hands the number of times I've had to intervene in
discussions - and it was for reasons *other* than people being rude.
Perhaps more education is the answer. perhaps not. I don't pretend to know.
--
http://wiki.mozilla.org/Thunderbird:Testing
http://www.spreadthunderbird.com/aff/165/
Mark Banner
> In my case a folder with mail actually stored on IMAP?
>
I haven't tried this, but I guess you could create a new local folder,
put the archive in its place, start up Thunderbird and then move the
messages from local folder to IMAP folder.
Standard8
Archaeopteryx
enhanced):https://nic-nac-project.org/~kaosmos/mboximport-en.html
You have to import to a local folder and move the files after this, if I
understand it correct.
Archaeopteryx
Justin Wood (Callek) wrote:
> On 3/22/2010 5:23 PM, Dan Mosedale wrote:
Justin Wood (Callek)
Other than using the extension that was linked in reply to my message is
there a "steps" or any other information around on how to do this?
[I will note I'll gladly backup my profile to be sure I don't break
stuff on this]
--
~Justin Wood (Callek)
JoeS
>> Gervase Markham wrote:
>>> Then I guess that's the fundamental disagreement.
>>>
>>> "Donnie Berkholz - Assholes Are Killing Your Project"
>>> http://blip.tv/file/2444432
>>
>> Well, the question is where to draw the line, and I'm seeing that the Thunderbird project is drawing it very tightly right now, which I don't understand as compared to SeaMonkey, I'm seeing fewer real stop-energy postings here though there are more
>> available human resources.
>> But then, I'm not reading Thunderbird support channels - still, what is being sliced and diced is the developer communication channels.
>>
> That's a fair point. The short answer is: look a little further back in time for the stop energy. The reality is that exactly what happened to Firefox (conversations moved to private places, despite everyone's best intentions), has happened to
> Thunderbird. Since the last attempts (message-header, javascript in messages, etc.) went so horribly,
Well. IMO it wasn't sooo horrible. How else should the "Community" voice their opinion. Yes, it was emotional,
but just think what the reaction would have been if suddenly, Javascript in mail just stopped working, with no
known cause. At least there was a chance to affect that decision when brought to a public forum.
Ya know I often see references to bringing TB to the everyday user. I really don't know the target market there.
I only know what I and the folks in my circle want to use, and remain available. JS was one of those things, Plugins
and Newsgroups are another.
As a "Community member" I have been accused of adding negative energy at times, I would call it "stirring the pot"
You should get a better "soup" if you stir while simmering. That goes for "homemade" soup, doesn't go for canned
pre-prepared product. Let's keep Thunderbird "homemade" rather than a bland "canned" variety.
That takes user involvement and _open_ _public_ discussion on sensitive issues.
no one has the energy to start discussions they think are likely to be controversial in d-a-t anymore, so it just doesn't happen.
>
> The creation of tb-planning is specifically an attempt to create a venue without that problem. In other words, to get work that should be happening in a transparent way to _actually_ happen in a transparent way.
>> Well, the new list at least misses my opinion. I'm reading it but I refuse to take part in its discussions. But then, I may not be of much value to Thunderbird discussions anyhow.
> As much as we'd love your opinion and contributions, we _can't_ continue to have a development forum where developers feel they're unable propose significant changes safely.
>
> Dan
>
--
JoeS
Ben Bucksch
> I've been doing some thinking about this of late. I'm very encouraged
> by how much more useful and engaging the revamped project-wide meeting
> has been recently, and I'm hoping we can do something similar.
>
> The two issues I do see around both our meeting and the page are:
>
> 1) a moderate amount of the meeting is effectively equivalent to
> people reading aloud what they've already written on the wiki page,
> which is neither a good use of people's time nor particularly engaging
> to listen to.
>
>
> 2) too many sections of the page contain extremely large amounts of
> detail, resulting in things that are important to everyone as well as
> to smaller subsets of people being lost in the noise.
>
> them in detail, I think it would be useful to nail down what problems
> we're trying to solve.
>
> How do folks feel about 1) and 2) as statements of the most important
> problems to solve here?
I agree, on both points.
I once dialed into the status meeting, and it took an hour, and in the
end I decided it was a waste of time, so I didn't again. It felt more
like a company-internal meeting where the employees report what they did
last week to their manager (i.e. everybody says something)
I also didn't read the wiki page, for mostly irrational but human
reasons: there was nothing concrete to push me to do it - maybe post to
tb-planning when they're done and ready to be read, weekly? The other
reason was that, again, most of the stuff there had no meaning at all to me.
What I'd like is something exactly what you outlined: People report in
speech or video or writing (wiki) what they achieved, but only if it's
interesting for the project at a whole. The amount of space taken should
be relative to the importance of the matter and how complex it is.
Basically in 5 minutes per week reading, and I should be up to date with
all important developments in the project. If there's a subject which is
interesting me more, and there's a video about it, I'd like to watch it
by clicking on a link (this way, I can pick and choose, and repeat and
save parts). If I can be selective, I get less bored (because I simply
never click on those parts which I don't care about, but still got the
short summary in reading).
Release planning (incl. deadlines) is important, and should be
justified, but should only occupy a minority of the time. I am more
interested in what cool stuff people develop, and which effects this
will have on me as user, me as developer, and all other users.
This would naturally tie in with the second goal, which I also agree is
lacking a bit recently positive emotions/"vibe": code changes to the
better and great results and other people's enthusiasm lead to fun,
which in turn encourage creativity and constructiveness.
That's just my ideas and perspective, but it's great that you've picked
this up. Good communication in the project is vital.
Thanks,
Ben