[feedback] How to bring txp back on track ? Let's debate !

Skubidu · 2006-02-27 14:27:47

@TheEric: Please calm down.
This thread was intended to be constructive!

Thanks, Nils

Last edited by Skubidu (2006-02-27 14:28:38)

RussLipton · 2006-02-27 14:28:01

TheEric’s experience has been mine; one reason I have not actively participated before though I love TxP.

There is a conveyance of defensiveness and secrecy from the devs here that has been embedded in TxP culture from the beginning; a shame. Those who initiated this thread could not have been more positive in describing their intentions (and carrying through across the thread).

In the most successful open source projects long-term, the ‘community’ is always ‘right’ (not really; but just as for commercial projects the ‘customer’ is always right).

So, it’s no wonder that communication from the beginning until now remains TxP’s achilles heel. Coordination of communication ditto. True, TxP has been saved so far by its own quality. No harm in betting on that forever but I wouldn’t. Anyway, maybe no one cares, but the TxP community would be 2X to 5X bigger now if the communication had been better. What might that have meant for the quality of the product? There is lost opportunity for open source just as there is for ordinary businesses.

Someone on a known core team (whether a dev or in some other community-recognized authority role, even if the authority is tacit, not official) needs to be the go-to person from the community and the person who brings across the idea that the core team loves their own community – and enjoys them.

So, to the devs who ask what the heck is wanted, the answer isn’t something new to be put on a feature or a project list per se but something way harder and simpler: a person who keeps us on top of the most important TxP news in all domains cohesively day-to-day and does so with a warm, friendly spirit.

Even another forum won’t come close to doing that … without a face at the front with the delegated authority, ability and grace to speak to all.

Sencer · 2006-02-27 14:28:29

There is no need for an update, because the concept of Elements is still in essence the same thing now. Just as file-downloads today are the same thing today as they were back when it was added.

If you want micro-reporting on every change that gets checked in, you can read the svn-logs. We try to aggregate those checkins as good into weblog-posts a we can. If that’s not enough for you, I am sorry. It doesn’t justify putting words in our mouth or implying that we are elitist about information.

ramanan · 2006-02-27 14:38:10

.. as there are users, frustrated with the information elitism prevalent with Textpattern.

There is a developer weblog, which gets posted to fairly frequently. Infact, the last few posts have been responses to an ‘ask-a-dev’ post that Sencer wrote a month or so back. Also, I’m not sure if you’ve noticed, but all three developers post here in the forums quite frequently. If you feel left out, perhaps it is because you aren’t making an effort to get involved? The people behind the Textbook documentation are also very open about what they are up to.

Developer: You’ll get it when you get it – I’m working on it when I feel like it. I don’t get PAID to do this you know. Be grateful for what you have and sit down and shut up.

Just out of curiosity, what exactly would you want from the dev team. As far as I can tell, you haven’t contributed much at all here (am I wrong?), yet feel some sense of entitlement because…?

I’ve been contemplating the switch to Expression Engine, and the decision is becoming clearer.

If TheEric switches to ExpressionEngine will my website stop working? I certainly hope not.

I get the impression reading this thread that the quality of Textpattern is somehow proportionally related to its userbase.

TheEric · 2006-02-27 14:38:33

> wet wrote:

> Why wasn’t that acceptable? You didn’t even know of it until today, so probably weren’t waiting for it anyway.

I’ve been around TXP since the initial release. I do read and keep up to date with the progress of it, and have again (as happens so cyclically in regards to TXP) become disgruntled with the progress and waiting for progress status.

It’s gotten to the point where I’m weight the pros/cons of purchasing an Expression Engine (EE) license and using that as my blog platform instead. I much prefer the TXP interface over that of EE, but since EE does possess many of the features I’m looking for, and maintain an active communication between developers and users – I’m edging that way.

neutrino · 2006-02-27 14:45:03

Sencer said:

That’s the point. We’re comunicating, that which we can communicate. There is neither any elitism nor any “masterplan-secrecy” involved. If we’re not communicating on something, then most likely, because we can’t (yet).

Sencer, are there folks here that you and Zem and Dean are willing to “chat” with on a regular basis, as in commit to the chat so that then they can agree to be responsible to (and be given permission to) post official announcements? You wouldn’t have to do it, just verbally dump it and then maybe ok it before posting.

Last edited by neutrino (2006-02-27 14:45:30)

alexandra · 2006-02-27 15:33:16

Hi folks, can we calm down a bit :)

let me tell you: Sencer and me live in the same town and i consider Sencer to be a friend. 2 hours ago we did phone. We did not scream into the phone defending our point of view :) we did not bump our heads against the wall in agony … i am not on my way to Sencers house with a pump gun :)
honestly
Russ, TheEric, David .. things are fine, honestly.

KurtRaschke · 2006-02-27 16:32:09

I’ve stayed out of this discussion until now because I really don’t believe that TXP is “off track”. But the talk of secrecy does bring up a long-standing concern that I’ve had—so I’d like to raise a few points in that vein:

The private beta of XML-RPC support: What possible point is there to a private beta for open-source software? The code will be released to the community anyway, so why not release it now? For that matter, why wasn’t it in SVN during its development? Why is it just being released now as a fait accompli? Could it not have been developed in the public eye, in order that users could have been testing it all along? Holding private betas does not foster the spirit of openness and inclusiveness which must be at the core of a successful open-source project.

The testing framework which may or may not exist: There’ve been a few hints dropped here and there which suggest that there is some sort of testing framework either in place or under development for Textpatternâ€”but there’s been no official discussion of it, let alone a public code release. If there is a unit test framework for Textpattern, how hard would it be to stick it in a public SVN repository somewhere? Again, more generallyï¿½what is code for a public, open-source project doing in a private repository?

The creation of new “private forums so as to have some privacy”: Great, just what we need—more secrecy. The justification given for this is “being able to talk more openly”, and frankly I don’t see the point. Look at a project like Mozillaâ€”with the rare exception of things pertaining to security bugs, discussion on development is conducted in full view of the public. It works for them, it works for the Linux kernel, and it works for a lot of other open-source projects.

Holding private discussions, creating private SVN repositories, etc. is an exclusive process which drives community members away. Opening up the development process; letting members of the community be active participants and conducting development in full view of the public is an inclusive process which will help to draw the community together.

-Kurt

Last edited by KurtRaschke (2006-03-28 03:49:57)

ramanan · 2006-02-27 16:36:14

Great post Kurt: It is concise and to the point, and it points out some clear problems with the way things are being done now.

Last edited by ramanan (2006-02-27 16:39:36)

michaelkpate · 2006-02-27 17:37:36

I agree as well. Kurt articulated exactly what is at the heart of this discussion very well.

Sencer · 2006-02-27 18:20:06

The heart of this discussion? If I am not mistaken david and alexandra repeatedly said that it was about the process of how people from the community can help textpattern as a project. And now that we have gotten things there moving ( see the subforum), others keep piling on everything that has ever irked anybody about textpattern?

I am not saying that those are questions which shouldn’t be asked, I just find it sad, that it’s not possible to take one step at a time and see where hings go from there. Has this thread now turned into a free-for-all “bash ‘em”?

Question 1+2: Just because we are core developers for textpattern doesn’t mean everything we ever do is owned by the public by default.

Why is it closed beta-testing? Maybe because it involves handing out accounts to people and you don’t want to give the whole world an account to that site? IIRC pedro wanted the testers to post to a site that he wanted to modify such that requests get logged which should help with trouble-shooting or at least documenting the bugs. (I can tell you from my repeated requests on the dev mailing-lists that simply having code accessible in the repository for everybody and asking them to test against their sites/plugins gives you (or me at least) very little feedback.)

—-

As for the third issue: It was not my suggestion, but the suggestion of the people who initiated this thread for it to being constrained to those who already are or want to actively contribute. And they’ve made the point that they would like to talk about things, where they wouldn’t be comfortable to talk about in the public. Am I the one to tell them how to feel or what to do? I don’t think so.

For me, I don’t care how people organize themselves. If the majority of contributors wants the forum to be open to everybody, that’s just as fine for me. If they want to communicate via ROT13 on avian carriers, I don’t mind. But I am getting tired that each and every move gets interpreted in negative ways.

RussLipton · 2006-02-27 18:47:06

Alexandra – LOL.

Tempers have grown heated and I’ll again say how much I appreciate TxP – devs and community alike. My main thing was just that I feel the creators of this thread had-have a positive spirit themselves. As they said many times, it’s not that the process is broken, far from it – if there was, there would be a fork or whatever. Compared to the viciousness I have seen on other projects, this thread itself has been most civil.

The devs do communicate and interact with the community. There is a ton of information available. Progress with the product itself is made steadily.

But, as we all are trying so hard to share (devs too), this isn’t binary: broken or not-broken; fine or not-fine.

I will again request that someone would take or be given the authority to be the authorized spokesperson-dude for the project; if nothing else, we will then only have one person to beat up on ;-).

And thanks.

TxP ain’t broken AND we would love it to be that much more killer in the coming years, not just in the coming months.

(Now, this non-contributing end-user needs to retire to his listening post ….).

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#169 2006-02-27 14:27:47

Re: [feedback] How to bring txp back on track ? Let's debate !

#170 2006-02-27 14:28:01

Re: [feedback] How to bring txp back on track ? Let's debate !

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Re: [feedback] How to bring txp back on track ? Let's debate !

#172 2006-02-27 14:38:10

Re: [feedback] How to bring txp back on track ? Let's debate !

#173 2006-02-27 14:38:33

Re: [feedback] How to bring txp back on track ? Let's debate !

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Re: [feedback] How to bring txp back on track ? Let's debate !

#175 2006-02-27 15:33:16

Re: [feedback] How to bring txp back on track ? Let's debate !

#176 2006-02-27 16:32:09

Re: [feedback] How to bring txp back on track ? Let's debate !

#177 2006-02-27 16:36:14

Re: [feedback] How to bring txp back on track ? Let's debate !

#178 2006-02-27 17:37:36

Re: [feedback] How to bring txp back on track ? Let's debate !

#179 2006-02-27 18:20:06

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Re: [feedback] How to bring txp back on track ? Let's debate !

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