Writeup from aKademy

[Carlos Leonhard Woelz]

On Mon, 30 Aug 2004 20:02:58 +0100, "Tom Chance"
<lists at tomchance.org.uk> said:
> Hello everyone,

Hi Tom!
 
> aKademy has been really cool, not only for all the usual stuff, but also
> for 
> Quality Teams. What follows is as brief a writeup as I can manage :)

> My talk slides are available online at:
> http://conference2004.kde.org/slides/tom.chance-quality.teams.pdf
> The video and audio from my talk can be found at: 
> http://ktown.kde.org/akademy/
> And a transcript:
> http://conference2004.kde.org/transcripts/tom.chance-qualityteams.php
Great presentation, Tom. Too bad I could not make it.


> Feedback from my talk:
> o To reach devs, we should use the dot & kde-devel-core & kde-devel...
> all 
> devs read at least one of those

> o We should send out fresh e-mails / stories explaining the project soon
It would be nice to update the modules pages for the new release cycle
that is starting. It is 3.4 or 4.0? Personally, I would love a 3.4
release... We could really improve the apps in one small release cycle
if we start early.

I need to update the quality web pages for the new release. I am just
waiting to know for sure what it will be.

> o Developers didn't know about us! But they really like the idea
Really? Even with the big splash we made at the beginning?

> o Some are very keen to get us to do artwork competitions
Well, I guess this is in good hands now...

> o We have O'Reilly books we can offer as prizes in competitions
Great!

> o Maybe we could have people promote apps to OS distributors?
Oh, this is a *great* idea for the kdeextragear apps.
 
> Brad Hards wrote an interesting blog entry, in which he suggested:
> o Quality Teams should be a training ground for contributors
I totally agree. BTW, I was positively surprised about developers
response to the quality team call, and negatively surprised about non
developers response to the call. I guess the only people who do not
program here are Tom, Kurt and me :)

> o We should have exercises for potential contributors, and give feedback
> o Maybe we should run training workshops? At the next summit?
> http://www.kdedevelopers.org/node/view/574

Marc started the programming HOWTO, but I guess it could be improved.
http://quality.kde.org/develop/howto/howtohack.php
The Junior Jobs (JJ) are already a success. It is a great invitation for
new developers, saying hey you *are* welcome. Thanks Adriaan de Groot
for the idea. If developers could spread this to the rest of kde apps
/libraries... This is definitely worth a dot story.

> Some other ideas that I talked about with people through the event
> include:
> 
> o Regular competitions like the documentation one we did on the
> dot(.kde.org)
> o Allow people to enter 'WhatsThis' text from the UI if it is missing;
> have a 
> facility to collect these submissions and easily commit them to CVS
Yes, but new guidelines for whatsthis are required first. It is really
easy to write bad whatsthis. I know, I wrote a lot of them :)

> o Find ways to get more people involved in writing for the dot
> o We should really promote documentation work more
Indeed. Every quality team member should care for the docs. It is great
because it forces you to know the app inside out. After that, usability
suggestions and whatsthis suggestions appear naturally, and bug managing
is easier.

(Sorry, Philip Rodrigues for my unfinished work. I am still committed to
do it...)

> o There is an 'instant gratification' problem with docs, in that the
> writers 
> don't get to see their work in the same was as a coder does... how to
> solve?
Not true if you are running KDE CVS. I get instant gratification :)
Also, there is docs.kde.org.

> That's all I can think of for now. I look forward to getting some
> replies!

Next actions suggestion:

a) New release efforts.
1) Update the website as soon as we know what are the release plans.
2) Update the module/apps status wiki pages for the new release.
3) Announce the call for help in the dot/newsforge whatever.

b) Call for developers effort
1) Improve the howtohack page
2) Send a mail to the devel lists asking the developers to assign JJ to
bugs and wishes.
3) Run a dot story about this, with the manual on how to develop
(howtohack) and suggestion on what to work (JJs)

Cheers,

Carlos

-- 
  Carlos Leonhard Woelz
  carloswoelz at imap-mail.com