As a long-time phabricator user (and long-time community member) I really don't get the desire to push this to Phabricator. This is not to say it is bad: it is good at what it is designed to do (handling technical tasks in an all-encompassing sorta way). But lately it feels like every conversation about a process involves debating whether that too goes to Phabricator - in this case, a non-technical process.
Funded IdeaLab projects /that are technical/ ending up on Phabricator sounds great: treat it as we would any other code. But the consultations and discussions themselves are very deliberately oriented towards our community - because IdeaLab projects are - a community that tends not to have Phabricator accounts, not to have experience using the system, and tends to conduct discussion in a much more prose-based and conversational style than Phabricator easily supports: it's designed for bug-tracking, not 100-comment threads. MediaWiki, however, is designed (for a given value of "designed" ;p) for those sorts of discussions, and additionally is software that literally everyone people reach out to about the IdeaLab is likely to be somewhat familiar with.
So I'd rather we kept the discussions there - in a venue that is already used, for an audience that is familiar with that venue - than shift them over to a project that isn't designed for these kinds of interactions and doesn't offer familiarity to the users the IdeaLab tries to reach. Phabricator should be for transparency and process when a project with technical components is funded.
On 8 December 2015 at 01:14, Rob Lanphier robla@wikimedia.org wrote:
Hi Chris,
I wonder if we can use Phabricator as an incubator for IdeaLab proposals? We already have the #possible-tech-projects tag in Phabricator [1], which seems like a sensible place to discuss the ideas amongst the people who have ideas in this area.
I know there is some cynicism about the upcoming Wikimedia Developer Summit in January, because it seems like a great opportunity to talk about what we want, but then not have a strategy for getting it done. That seems justified, since "resourcing" seems a constant refrain in these conversations. Would anyone from IdeaLab be available to be at WikiDev '16, looking out for appropriate opportunities to get from ideas to IdeaLab(tm) grant proposals?
Rob
[1] The board: < https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/tag/possible-tech-projects/%3E and the description: https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/project/profile/1042/
On Mon, Dec 7, 2015 at 12:54 PM, Chris Schilling cschilling@wikimedia.org wrote:
Hey everyone,
I've recently initiated a consultation to help decide on topics for IdeaLab campaigns for the future, and I'm very interested in your input on what technical issues, gaps, or general features we could consider focusing our attention upon. These campaigns can generate novel proposals for tools and improvements to address needs in the Wikimedia projects to which you contribute:
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:IdeaLab/Future_IdeaLab_Campaigns
You can offer feedback and add your own campaign topics through a survey conducted through AllOurIdeas < http://www.allourideas.org/idealab_campaigns%3E in addition to participating on the IdeaLab talk page.
I’m looking forward to seeing your feedback and exploring potential directions we can take IdeaLab campaigns starting next year.
Take care,
Jethro
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