Cormac, according to Brions presentation at Wikimania, the feature is ready for deployment/beta test.
The slides are here http://wikimania2006.wikimedia.org/wiki/Proceedings:BV1
I'll quote sheet 17:
Single user status This has been delayed a long time because every time devs discuss this, it becomes a big fight. Details are non-negotiable or well get sidetracked again! Basic back-end login and auto-transition code working Should be ready for live transition tests later this month, and can go live afterwards May delay final transition until Wikimedia board election is complete to avoid breaking votes
So this is really just around the corner :)
Cheers, Erik
-----Original Message----- From: Cormac Lawler [mailto:cormaggio@gmail.com] Sent: Monday, 11 September 2006 13:53 To: erikzachte@infodisiac.com; Research into Wikimedia content and communities Subject: Re: [Wiki-research-l] Any progress on General User Survey?
On 9/9/06, Erik Zachte erikzachte@infodisiac.com wrote:
Piotr:
So I would like to ask if any of you, especially those who promised help with implementation during Wikimania, have been giving it some further thought? Every day, we are loosing more opportunities to learn about who we are... I think it's a shame.
I talked to Kevin after Wikimania. Kevin gave me the name of an employee/programmer who did other wiki related work and is eager to contribute, but not available till late September.
I also briefly talked about the project with the Special
Projects Committee
and got an informal approval from Anthere.
So it is not forgotten. I think we can expect more interest and feedback from the community when we have a demo survey form in PHP version with at least
two languages
(at least two to demonstrate language dependant issues, e.g. behind the scenes the form should process index numbers not texts, like an index number in a country dropdown box, not country names etc).
The technical implementation is not trivial at all and will
take time and
require discussion. For one, authentication will be so much easier after single
signon which is
not live yet.
Erik Zachte
Thanks Erik, and yes, there should be no problem in getting this survey approved (by the SPC) - I think everyone in the community who knows about it thinks it's a good idea. I also agree with you in that I don't think there's a rush to get it done *now* - it should be done properly, IMO, and the technical details worked out. But hopefully we *can* get this done in reasonable time - and so, on your final point, is there a tentative timetable for single login? <cough> :-)
Cormac