Thank you for this interesting thread (and thank you for the interesting
blog post in the first place). I'll pick a quote and I will try to propose
ways forward about other comments made.
On Mon, Jan 18, 2016 at 11:35 PM, Magnus Manske <magnusmanske(a)googlemail.com
wrote:
I would hope the Foundation by now understands better
how to handle new
software releases.
I think so, although I'm sure the Foundation still needs to understand
better how to handle new software releases -- and the communities too.
https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/WMF_product_development_process is the
common protocol where we want to apply all the learning. Clarifying
how community engagement works in this WMF product development process is a
main priority for us during this quarter (
https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T124022
), and everybody is invited to join.
I do think that we have many problems as software partners, the first
problem being that we all got used to this situation of
confrontation-by-default as something natural, they way it is. We are
software partners, we really are, and in order to make this partnership
productive we need to be in a mood of collaboration-by-default.
We need a climate where new ideas are welcomed and encouraged. Today
someone comes with a new idea and the chances are that the first replies
setting the tone will be more discouraging than encouraging. We need a safe
and exciting place where everybody can share new concepts, collaborate on
them, learn from each other.
We need a prioritization process where great concepts receive initial
support for planning and prototyping, and where good plans and prototypes
receive support to start their way toward production. The WMF needs to open
that process to the participation of our communities, and our communities
need to understand that this is the best point of time to discuss new plans.
We need design and build processes that volunteers find easy to follow and
participate in. There are many and very diverse groups of people (at
Wikimedia and beyond) that would give their feedback about design concepts
or alpha releases if they would only know about them.
We need to make our deployment process more flexible and predictable,
allowing development teams and communities to agree on beta releases, A/B
tests, opt-in/opt-out approaches, first/last waves... Some ideas:
* In order to enter the deployment phase, a project would need to have a
deployment plan proposed, agreed, and documented -- which can be adapted
based on data and feedback gathered.
* For every new product or significant feature, each community could have
the chance to determine whether they want to be early adopters (first
waves) or, on the contrary, be placed in the last waves, after seeing how
the new software is being used by others and is being matured.
* Communities would focus not so much on {{Support}} / {{Oppose}} decisions
about the totality of a feature, but on the identification of specific
blockers, allowing development teams to negotiate and change their plans
under clearer terms.
This common protocol should allow us to move away from the current
situation where both communities and development teams fear that a single
strike might disrupt their work overnight, without even seeing it coming.
A more predictable path with specialized checkpoints should allow
communities and development teams understanding better what is going on and
when to talk about what. It should also help recruiting more and more
diverse participants, who could contribute their time and skills in more
daring and productive ways.
What makes me optimistic about this common product development process is
that we don't need to finalize all the pieces to make it work. As long as
we agree that we are software partners and we agree that iterations are
good, we can start agreeing on improvements and implement them one by one.
Get involved, please. You can either join the more theoretical work about
the overall process or you can pick a specific improvement and help pushing
it forward in very practical terms. See you at
https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Talk:WMF_product_development_process (where
we have been a bit slow lately but not anymore now that is a top goal).
--
Quim Gil
Engineering Community Manager @ Wikimedia Foundation
http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/User:Qgil