Development process improvement/Communications recommendations


 * http://thread.gmane.org/gmane.org.wikimedia.foundation/46081
 * http://thread.gmane.org/gmane.science.linguistics.wikipedia.technical/49535
 * http://lwn.net/Articles/383945/
 * Communication

Mailing lists

 * Mailing lists

IRC channels

 * MediaWiki on IRC

Tech announcements
en.wikipedia


 * project mailing list
 * wikipedia signpost http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost
 * local tech village pump http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Distribution_list
 * announcement list: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimediaannounce-l
 * blogs

to avoid
 * centralnotice (efficient, reaches everyone, but disruptive)

large & medium wikis

if possible, translated:
 * local counterparts of the signpost, ie. http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Kurier ; see interlanguage links of http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost for a full list
 * local village pumps http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Distribution_list
 * project mailing list

English:
 * announcement list https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimediaannounce-l
 * blogs
 * centralnotice (efficient, reaches everyone, but disruptive)

small wikis


 * list of local village pumps http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Distribution_list
 * small wikis: talk page of the wiki's main page
 * active participants talk pages (check that automatically)
 * translators mailing list
 * centralnotice (efficient, reaches everyone, but disruptive)


 * announcement list
 * blogs

What kind of messages?

 * announcements for technical new features
 * wider audience possible


 * seeking translation for announcements
 * translators (mailing list + meta + translatewiki.net)


 * calls for testing
 * volunteer technical-savvy testers able to report bugs and actually help solve them


 * major bug fixes announcements
 * mostly technical audience


 * technical discussions
 * wikitech-l

Issues

 * Lack of transparency from WMF engineering towards the world
 * Mixing of MediaWiki development and Wikimedia-specific development & operations
 * Difficulty for unpaid developers & editors to know what's going on in WMF projects, and to have an impact on those projects
 * Lack of appeal / outreach / onboarding process for prospective and new developers
 * Synchronous communication (online or IRL) excludes remote or absent participants

Peers

 * developers
 * WMF staff & management (including non-developer staff involved in software development: designers, product managers, EPMs, etc.)

Users

 * Wikimedia "editors" (e.g. Wikimedia participants not involved in development)
 * general public (including the press & donors)
 * API users
 * Data dumps users
 * users of MediaWiki outside Wikimedia (including enterprise use)

Peers

 * RfCs, peer discussion
 * report & check-in (i.e. person status)

Users

 * support request
 * bug report
 * feature request
 * call for testing
 * user research
 * strategic product research

Peers & Users

 * reference, documentation (including project status & progress)
 * announcement

Process notes

 * task tracking
 * scheduling at various levels (roadmap, target versions, milestones, daily scrums...)
 * bug squashing periods
 * CodeReview periods
 * lightweight general process applicable to all developers + additional processes for paid staff if necessary (but should still remain fairly lightweight)