[teampractices] Why are WMF Department/team pages on mediawiki.org?

[Matthew Flaschen]

On 05/22/2015 06:12 PM, Kevin Smith wrote:
> Thanks for the context!
>
> S: Yes, my first sentence was meant to be TPG-specific. I lost that in
> editing right before I hit "send".
>
> Restricted access on mwfoundation is a pretty good argument for not
> going there.
>
> Having "one" place to go sounds good in theory, but at least as a
> foundation employee I find myself bouncing between several wikis, so I
> don't feel like we have achieved that.
>
> It does seem like if the foundation is focused on the software, then
> having all the teams on mediawiki would be reasonable. But since we do
> so much non-software community work, and so much non-software technical
> work, meta sounds appealing. Shifting from mw.o to meta would actually
> be moving toward community, as opposed to splitting away from it.
> However, I have spent almost no time on meta, so that's purely a snap
> response.
>
> Currently, the Search & Discovery department is working on 3 projects:
> Cirrus/text search, maps, and Wikidata Query Service. Of those, I think
> only one is actually "mediawiki" work, which is part of what inspired my
> question.

On what basis?  Maps and Wikidata are also technical projects, using 
PostgreSQL, OSM software, WikiBase, graph software, etc.  I don't see 
why they would be considered unrelated to MediaWiki software.

> The other part is that the TPG is starting to work with
> non-Engineering teams within the foundation, and thus is working more
> and more on non-mediawiki stuff. I suppose it depends on how broadly you
> define "MediaWiki".

I agree.  TPG is a border-line case, and it would be reasonable to put 
on Meta (I wouldn't vehemently oppose putting software development team 
pages on Meta, but it makes it more complicated since sometimes team and 
technial pages overlap).

>
> I was putting myself in the shoes of a non-foundation mediawiki
> developer. Certainly I would care about Cirrus Search, but would I care
> about maps?

Of course.  This is a killer app, very useful for both WMF and 
third-party wikis.  Right now, people have to use annoyingly 
non-interactive maps screenshots, or one-off gadgets.  MediaWiki is not 
supposed to be just text and bitmaps (hence, *Media*Wiki).  Maps are the 
next step in media.

> Would I care about the TPG? And, in fact, we have had
> pushback when naming our new department pages in mediawiki. Both
> Editing[1] and Search & Discovery[2] have been criticized in their
> Discussion pages.

Yes, these names need to be fixed.   Same with Collaboration.

Matt Flaschen