Emails not Docs

[Suresh Marru <sm...@apache.org>]

Hi All,

I have been poking around various apache project lists on how brainstorming of various topics is done. I could not find an alternative example but using Mailing lists for all communications and decisions. Many projects are using JIRA for easy recording of a topic, mainly because they intern hit the mailing lists. Most of the projects also have a IRC channel to hash out any opinions on a topic and summarize it back to the ML thread. 

I suggest we also follow the same protocol and once a conclusion is made, record it on the Wiki.

Here is my personal opinion on why we should avoid any document links and email itself:

* The whole point of communication is to engage the community. The elegance of free form writing and in-line comments is far out-weighed by grabbing community attention on a topic. The more the merrier and an increased chance of attention. Community engagement is already a tough battle many open source projects deal with and communication is the last thing we want to reduce. 
* With so many sites mirroring and archiving apache mailing lists, making the content first class searchable is undeniable. 
* All mailing list context is guaranteed to be persistent, external documents are outside the scope and cannot be guaranteed. 

I can go on, but in short, I strongly vouch we avoid important architecture brainstormings in google docs and put the content in a JIRA and comment on it with every one’s opinions recorded. 

Suresh

Re: Emails not Docs

[Lahiru Gunathilake <gl...@gmail.com>]

+1

Regards
Lahiru


On Mon, Dec 9, 2013 at 11:37 AM, Suresh Marru <sm...@apache.org> wrote:

> Hi All,
>
> I have been poking around various apache project lists on how
> brainstorming of various topics is done. I could not find an alternative
> example but using Mailing lists for all communications and decisions. Many
> projects are using JIRA for easy recording of a topic, mainly because they
> intern hit the mailing lists. Most of the projects also have a IRC channel
> to hash out any opinions on a topic and summarize it back to the ML thread.
>
> I suggest we also follow the same protocol and once a conclusion is made,
> record it on the Wiki.
>
> Here is my personal opinion on why we should avoid any document links and
> email itself:
>
> * The whole point of communication is to engage the community. The
> elegance of free form writing and in-line comments is far out-weighed by
> grabbing community attention on a topic. The more the merrier and an
> increased chance of attention. Community engagement is already a tough
> battle many open source projects deal with and communication is the last
> thing we want to reduce.
> * With so many sites mirroring and archiving apache mailing lists, making
> the content first class searchable is undeniable.
> * All mailing list context is guaranteed to be persistent, external
> documents are outside the scope and cannot be guaranteed.
>
> I can go on, but in short, I strongly vouch we avoid important
> architecture brainstormings in google docs and put the content in a JIRA
> and comment on it with every one’s opinions recorded.
>
> Suresh
>
>
>


-- 
System Analyst Programmer
PTI Lab
Indiana University

Re: Emails not Docs

[Saminda Wijeratne <sa...@gmail.com>]

+1.

JIRA is a good option when you have alot of content to put (long emails to
architecture/dev lists tend to be "missed" in the long run) and have a
outline mail for it linking the JIRA for more details.


On Mon, Dec 9, 2013 at 8:46 AM, Amila Jayasekara <th...@gmail.com>wrote:

> +1, please.
>
> Regards
> Thejaka Amila
>
>
> On Mon, Dec 9, 2013 at 11:37 AM, Suresh Marru <sm...@apache.org> wrote:
>
>> Hi All,
>>
>> I have been poking around various apache project lists on how
>> brainstorming of various topics is done. I could not find an alternative
>> example but using Mailing lists for all communications and decisions. Many
>> projects are using JIRA for easy recording of a topic, mainly because they
>> intern hit the mailing lists. Most of the projects also have a IRC channel
>> to hash out any opinions on a topic and summarize it back to the ML thread.
>>
>> I suggest we also follow the same protocol and once a conclusion is made,
>> record it on the Wiki.
>>
>> Here is my personal opinion on why we should avoid any document links and
>> email itself:
>>
>> * The whole point of communication is to engage the community. The
>> elegance of free form writing and in-line comments is far out-weighed by
>> grabbing community attention on a topic. The more the merrier and an
>> increased chance of attention. Community engagement is already a tough
>> battle many open source projects deal with and communication is the last
>> thing we want to reduce.
>> * With so many sites mirroring and archiving apache mailing lists, making
>> the content first class searchable is undeniable.
>> * All mailing list context is guaranteed to be persistent, external
>> documents are outside the scope and cannot be guaranteed.
>>
>> I can go on, but in short, I strongly vouch we avoid important
>> architecture brainstormings in google docs and put the content in a JIRA
>> and comment on it with every one’s opinions recorded.
>>
>> Suresh
>>
>>
>>
>

Re: Emails not Docs

[Amila Jayasekara <th...@gmail.com>]

+1, please.

Regards
Thejaka Amila


On Mon, Dec 9, 2013 at 11:37 AM, Suresh Marru <sm...@apache.org> wrote:

> Hi All,
>
> I have been poking around various apache project lists on how
> brainstorming of various topics is done. I could not find an alternative
> example but using Mailing lists for all communications and decisions. Many
> projects are using JIRA for easy recording of a topic, mainly because they
> intern hit the mailing lists. Most of the projects also have a IRC channel
> to hash out any opinions on a topic and summarize it back to the ML thread.
>
> I suggest we also follow the same protocol and once a conclusion is made,
> record it on the Wiki.
>
> Here is my personal opinion on why we should avoid any document links and
> email itself:
>
> * The whole point of communication is to engage the community. The
> elegance of free form writing and in-line comments is far out-weighed by
> grabbing community attention on a topic. The more the merrier and an
> increased chance of attention. Community engagement is already a tough
> battle many open source projects deal with and communication is the last
> thing we want to reduce.
> * With so many sites mirroring and archiving apache mailing lists, making
> the content first class searchable is undeniable.
> * All mailing list context is guaranteed to be persistent, external
> documents are outside the scope and cannot be guaranteed.
>
> I can go on, but in short, I strongly vouch we avoid important
> architecture brainstormings in google docs and put the content in a JIRA
> and comment on it with every one’s opinions recorded.
>
> Suresh
>
>
>