End-User versus Developer Software

[Rob Weir <ap...@robweir.com>]

Moving to its own thread.

On Sun, Aug 21, 2011 at 1:09 PM, RGB ES <rg...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> Hello to all,
> I'm monitoring the list since a while but never wrote before so
> please, forgive me for entering the discussion on this conflictive
> point ;) (1)

Thanks for joining the discussion.

> I certainly do not have the experience of you on software development,
> but I think that there is a point you are missing here: even if
> software development/managing/testing/whatever is almost the same game
> on every software project, software *usage* could be quite different
> depending on the product. People who use a web server or a svn tool
> have a *high* technical profile while people using a word processor or
> a presentation tool do not.

This is true, the usage is different.  But the skills used to create
software for end users are not different than the skills used for
creating developer-oriented software.   Certainly not different enough
to suggest that the Apache model of how a project works should be
considered inapplicable.

I think an important difference with OOo is the size.  With a smaller
project the developers could write all of the documentation. This
would be true for smaller end-user-oriented projects as well as
smaller developer-oriented projects. But for a larger project we will
specialize more.  There will be people who write documentation but do
not write code.  But the reason why we need more volunteers to write
doc and to support the product is because of scale.  It has nothing to
do with whether the application is for end users or developers.

> I know of people writing complex documents and with the ability to
> perfectly explain you how to properly use the program that enters in
> panic just because an unlucky keyboard combination switched their
> keyboard layout... We need to be very carefully about what we are
> asking them to do in order to remain "connected".

True.

> I also think that the problem with existing mailing list is more
> profound than the "to aliases or not to aliases": we cannot ask all
> the contributors on all OOo related mailing lists to come here if not
> for other reason because of the language. For instance, very valuable
> persons on both, the Spanish and Italian forums will never be able to
> survive to 60+ *full English* mails a day.

There are language-specific lists for other Apache projects.  We can
do that as well.  Maybe not 160 different language lists.  But we can
create a handful of them, as needed.   We do that already, for
example, with the support forums.  So, ooo-users-es, would be fine.

The thing we need to think about is how we coordinate in project work.
 Obviously if there was an ooo-dev-es list and an ooo-dev-pt-br list
and an ooo-dev-de list, as well as the existing ooo-dev list, then
committers would have difficulty reviewing code, etc.   So for some
project areas we'll need to agree on a single language, and that will
probably be English.  I assume this means a single ooo-dev list, a
single ooo-private list, and a single ooo-security list.

Where do we need language-specific lists, beyond the support forum?
In previous discussions I've heard the locale-specific translation
lists would be needed.

I also heard mentioned "local marketing lists', but I'm not sure how
such activities map to the way Apache projects are run.  Events,
publicity, press, etc., are coordinated at the Apache level.  So I'm
not sure how much we can devolve such activities to sub-project lists.

-Rob

> Cheers
> Ricardo
>
> (1) Presenting myself: I'm one of the admins of the Spanish Community
> forums, but also participate as volunteer on the English and Italian
> forums. You'll see me as RGB on the English forum and as RGB-<two
> character locale indicator> on the other two ;)
>

Re: End-User versus Developer Software

[eric b <er...@free.fr>]

Hi,

Le 21 août 11 à 21:14, Manfred A. Reiter a écrit :

>> for each required local group
>> (i. e. with german you cover Germany, Austria and parts of  
>> Switzerland,
>> but you need for portuguese you nedd a pt-pt and a pt-br)
>>
>> 1. one list for coordination
>> 2. one list for user-support
>>
>> you can call any ot them whatever you like, but I would
>> strongly recommend to keep "internal business" separate from the  
>> users.
>>
>
> and these TWO lists should be created
> 1. only on request and
> 2. if there are at least two moderators
>

Looks a good idea. But to find moderators, we must post to this list,  
and initiate the debate, explain everything.

This is not even possible at the moment with fr lists, because of the  
automatic spamming ...


That's the reason why my initial request was to see my rights granted  
(temporarly, why not): we currently can't even send a mail to the  
existing mailing list, without cause an avalanche of spam.

Causing a terribly bad image of OpenOffice.org. And more we wait,  
worse it is.

Of course, after removing the guilty email (and or control a bit what  
happens, remove other possible spams), it will become possible to  
initiate the debate and why not go in the direction Rob explained.  
I'm confident they are volunteers to continue to moderate, and  
maintain those lists (not me, I prefer the code), but we are not yet  
there.


Regards,
Eric Bachard

-- 
qɔᴉɹə
Education Project:
http://wiki.services.openoffice.org/wiki/Education_Project
Projet OOo4Kids : http://wiki.ooo4kids.org/index.php/Main_Page
L'association EducOOo : http://www.educoo.org
Blog : http://eric.bachard.org/news

Re: End-User versus Developer Software

["Manfred A. Reiter" <ma...@gmail.com>]

followup

2011/8/21 Manfred A. Reiter <ma...@gmail.com>:
> 2011/8/21 Rob Weir <ap...@robweir.com>:
>> Moving to its own thread.
>>
>> On Sun, Aug 21, 2011 at 1:09 PM, RGB ES <rg...@gmail.com> wrote:
>>>
>
> [...]

>> not sure how much we can devolve such activities to sub-project lists.
>
> to start "local groups" we need
>
> for each required local group
> (i. e. with german you cover Germany, Austria and parts of Switzerland,
> but you need for portuguese you nedd a pt-pt and a pt-br)
>
> 1. one list for coordination
> 2. one list for user-support
>
> you can call any ot them whatever you like, but I would
> strongly recommend to keep "internal business" separate from the users.
>

and these TWO lists should be created
1. only on request and
2. if there are at least two moderators

M.

Re: End-User versus Developer Software

[Rob Weir <ap...@robweir.com>]

On Sun, Aug 21, 2011 at 2:53 PM, Manfred A. Reiter <ma...@gmail.com> wrote:
> 2011/8/21 Rob Weir <ap...@robweir.com>:
>> Moving to its own thread.
>>
>> On Sun, Aug 21, 2011 at 1:09 PM, RGB ES <rg...@gmail.com> wrote:
>>>
>
> [...]
>
>> There are language-specific lists for other Apache projects.  We can
>> do that as well.  Maybe not 160 different language lists.  But we can
>> create a handful of them, as needed.   We do that already, for
>> example, with the support forums.  So, ooo-users-es, would be fine.
>>
>> The thing we need to think about is how we coordinate in project work.
>> Obviously if there was an ooo-dev-es list and an ooo-dev-pt-br list
>> and an ooo-dev-de list, as well as the existing ooo-dev list, then
>> committers would have difficulty reviewing code, etc.   So for some
>> project areas we'll need to agree on a single language, and that will
>> probably be English.  I assume this means a single ooo-dev list, a
>> single ooo-private list, and a single ooo-security list.
>
> - only one ooo-dev list and this one in english
>
>>
>> Where do we need language-specific lists, beyond the support forum?
>> In previous discussions I've heard the locale-specific translation
>> lists would be needed.
>>
>> I also heard mentioned "local marketing lists', but I'm not sure how
>> such activities map to the way Apache projects are run.  Events,
>> publicity, press, etc., are coordinated at the Apache level.  So I'm
>> not sure how much we can devolve such activities to sub-project lists.
>
> to start "local groups" we need
>
> for each required local group
> (i. e. with german you cover Germany, Austria and parts of Switzerland,
> but you need for portuguese you nedd a pt-pt and a pt-br)
>
> 1. one list for coordination

Coordinating what? I thought we used ooo-dev for coordination?

> 2. one list for user-support
>
> you can call any ot them whatever you like, but I would
> strongly recommend to keep "internal business" separate from the users.
>
> cheers
>
> M.
>

Re: End-User versus Developer Software

["Manfred A. Reiter" <ma...@gmail.com>]

2011/8/21 Rob Weir <ap...@robweir.com>:
> Moving to its own thread.
>
> On Sun, Aug 21, 2011 at 1:09 PM, RGB ES <rg...@gmail.com> wrote:
>>

[...]

> There are language-specific lists for other Apache projects.  We can
> do that as well.  Maybe not 160 different language lists.  But we can
> create a handful of them, as needed.   We do that already, for
> example, with the support forums.  So, ooo-users-es, would be fine.
>
> The thing we need to think about is how we coordinate in project work.
> Obviously if there was an ooo-dev-es list and an ooo-dev-pt-br list
> and an ooo-dev-de list, as well as the existing ooo-dev list, then
> committers would have difficulty reviewing code, etc.   So for some
> project areas we'll need to agree on a single language, and that will
> probably be English.  I assume this means a single ooo-dev list, a
> single ooo-private list, and a single ooo-security list.

- only one ooo-dev list and this one in english

>
> Where do we need language-specific lists, beyond the support forum?
> In previous discussions I've heard the locale-specific translation
> lists would be needed.
>
> I also heard mentioned "local marketing lists', but I'm not sure how
> such activities map to the way Apache projects are run.  Events,
> publicity, press, etc., are coordinated at the Apache level.  So I'm
> not sure how much we can devolve such activities to sub-project lists.

to start "local groups" we need

for each required local group
(i. e. with german you cover Germany, Austria and parts of Switzerland,
but you need for portuguese you nedd a pt-pt and a pt-br)

1. one list for coordination
2. one list for user-support

you can call any ot them whatever you like, but I would
strongly recommend to keep "internal business" separate from the users.

cheers

M.

Re: End-User versus Developer Software

[RGB ES <rg...@gmail.com>]

2011/8/21 Rob Weir <ap...@robweir.com>:
> Moving to its own thread.
>
> On Sun, Aug 21, 2011 at 1:09 PM, RGB ES <rg...@gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>> Hello to all,
>> I'm monitoring the list since a while but never wrote before so
>> please, forgive me for entering the discussion on this conflictive
>> point ;) (1)
>
> Thanks for joining the discussion.
>
>> I certainly do not have the experience of you on software development,
>> but I think that there is a point you are missing here: even if
>> software development/managing/testing/whatever is almost the same game
>> on every software project, software *usage* could be quite different
>> depending on the product. People who use a web server or a svn tool
>> have a *high* technical profile while people using a word processor or
>> a presentation tool do not.
>
> This is true, the usage is different.  But the skills used to create
> software for end users are not different than the skills used for
> creating developer-oriented software.   Certainly not different enough
> to suggest that the Apache model of how a project works should be
> considered inapplicable.

I've never said that...


> I think an important difference with OOo is the size.  With a smaller
> project the developers could write all of the documentation. This
> would be true for smaller end-user-oriented projects as well as
> smaller developer-oriented projects. But for a larger project we will
> specialize more.  There will be people who write documentation but do
> not write code.  But the reason why we need more volunteers to write
> doc and to support the product is because of scale.  It has nothing to
> do with whether the application is for end users or developers.

There is another difference: history (or "legacy"?). It took me a
while to understand how Writer calculates line spacing, for example
(as a matter of fact I found a couple of articles on the net about
this topic that are *completely wrong*). The choice of using font
metrics to calculate "single spacing" was (is) correct, IMO, and was
done, I suppose, a long time ago before and OOo project started...
with the result that there is not a single line on the documentation
regarding this feature.
How many "hidden features" are there on the code?

>> I know of people writing complex documents and with the ability to
>> perfectly explain you how to properly use the program that enters in
>> panic just because an unlucky keyboard combination switched their
>> keyboard layout... We need to be very carefully about what we are
>> asking them to do in order to remain "connected".
>
> True.
>
>> I also think that the problem with existing mailing list is more
>> profound than the "to aliases or not to aliases": we cannot ask all
>> the contributors on all OOo related mailing lists to come here if not
>> for other reason because of the language. For instance, very valuable
>> persons on both, the Spanish and Italian forums will never be able to
>> survive to 60+ *full English* mails a day.
>
> There are language-specific lists for other Apache projects.  We can
> do that as well.  Maybe not 160 different language lists.  But we can
> create a handful of them, as needed.   We do that already, for
> example, with the support forums.  So, ooo-users-es, would be fine.
>
> The thing we need to think about is how we coordinate in project work.
>  Obviously if there was an ooo-dev-es list and an ooo-dev-pt-br list
> and an ooo-dev-de list, as well as the existing ooo-dev list, then
> committers would have difficulty reviewing code, etc.   So for some
> project areas we'll need to agree on a single language, and that will
> probably be English.  I assume this means a single ooo-dev list, a
> single ooo-private list, and a single ooo-security list.

Agree

> Where do we need language-specific lists, beyond the support forum?
> In previous discussions I've heard the locale-specific translation
> lists would be needed.

Sound reasonable. For translating you need a good knowledge of the
target language, but not necessary of the base language if you know
how the program works: it is possible to have good translators that do
not know English well. It is also possible to participate by checking
existing translations to correct spelling and grammar errors and in
that case it is possible to not know English at all.

>
> I also heard mentioned "local marketing lists', but I'm not sure how
> such activities map to the way Apache projects are run.  Events,
> publicity, press, etc., are coordinated at the Apache level.  So I'm
> not sure how much we can devolve such activities to sub-project lists.
>
> -Rob
>
>> Cheers
>> Ricardo
>>
>> (1) Presenting myself: I'm one of the admins of the Spanish Community
>> forums, but also participate as volunteer on the English and Italian
>> forums. You'll see me as RGB on the English forum and as RGB-<two
>> character locale indicator> on the other two ;)
>>
>