Git/IRC

Right now there's a bunch of discussions on how best to configure our IRC feeds in #mediawiki to get people the notifications they want without spamming other users.

Random ideas

 * Disabled Gerrit "New review" messages when there is "(no comment)". That notification is triggered when some one change the Verified or CodeReview labels.
 * This should be pretty easy to do.
 * See https://gerrit.wikimedia.org/r/#/c/13146/
 * Get wikibugs change reviewed and deployed on production. That would split the bugzilla notifications per product. Changes are in /trunk/tool/wikibugs
 * Ideally we should move this to git as well, but no need to hold up the fix on that.

#wikimedia-dev
we move the bots to #wikimedia-dev, thus we likely kill the #wikimedia-dev channel, and all #mediawiki devs will loose the track of what's going on (defacto we rename #mediawiki to #wikimedia-dev and most of people who were in #mediawiki will just move to -dev).

separate feed
We move the bots to separate channel which would be +m. That will make all channels more usable for regular talk. But some people will find it difficult because they would have to switch channels more often.
 * That is similar to the existing #mediawiki-codereview channel. That solution has my preference. Antoine &#34;hashar&#34; Musso (talk) 10:58, 27 June 2012 (UTC)
 * I think this is the easiest solution, but it's kind of like taking a sledgehammer to the problem. Not to mention the issues that have been raised (not so much the actual switching, but the context being lost between channels). ^demon (talk) 12:32, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

new channel for users
we create new channel for mediawiki help and keep the rest as it is
 * I would prefer #mediawiki to be the help channel. That is the easiest to remember of and probably the one most people will attempt to join by default. A new channel mean we will have to send people to another channel, leading to some frustration for newcomers / beginners. Antoine &#34;hashar&#34; Musso (talk) 11:00, 27 June 2012 (UTC)
 * I agree with Antoine. We've been telling people for years that the main channel for support & discussion is #mediawiki. I think either bots or hardcore users can move easier than drive-by contributors. ^demon (talk) 12:30, 27 June 2012 (UTC)
 * Ok, in that case we should make it bot free, the help channel should not be so much for developers, but people who are seeking help and who don't want to be bothered by some bots who are of no help to them. Petrb (talk) 13:03, 27 June 2012 (UTC)
 * I'm not sure "bot-free" is the right solution either. We've had bots in there for years, but it's only been in the last couple where it's gotten out of control. Timely, on-topic announcements aren't harmful. Mass spam is. ^demon (talk) 13:06, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

customized feeds
we get all bots to -feed channel, where they send everything and reconfigure them to send only topic related feed to current channels, (mediawiki related stuff to #mediawiki, wikimedia related stuff to #wikimedia-dev) which either make the channels friendlier as well as we would have a relevant stuff in there (I don't understand why #mediawiki devs need to see bugs related to wikimedia platform issues, these should go to -dev). That would mean more spam in -dev and less spam in #mediawiki and more relevant feeds, people who just like to watch spam and flood could stay in #mediawiki-feed. It would involve some people to work on that and change the code of bots, devs are lazy (like me) so this is likely a bad option :)
 * -feed is to me a duplicate of -codereview . I am not sure what is the point of having another channel to host bots. Just reuse -codereview? Antoine &#34;hashar&#34; Musso (talk) 11:02, 27 June 2012 (UTC)
 * The complaint is that "codereview" isn't an applicable name if we're sending bug comments (and potentially other things there too). But really, it's just a channel name and isn't worth bikeshedding over right now. ^demon (talk) 12:35, 27 June 2012 (UTC)
 * Ok. So if we choose that path, we can have -codereview set to redirect user to whatever new channel name is chosen. Antoine &#34;hashar&#34; Musso (talk) 16:31, 27 June 2012 (UTC)
 * Splitting bug notifications per product is a change in wikibugs source code which is still pending for review :-( Antoine &#34;hashar&#34; Musso (talk) 11:02, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

Middle ground
May not be perfect, but I'm aiming for improvement of the current situation on the short term. We can always adjust and perfect later. The idea is to minimize traffic in #mediawiki about things not related to MediaWiki core or extensions. Thus keeping traffic on-topic and also reduces confusion to new users by not being confronted with unrelated stuff. Send a little more notifications to #wikimedia-dev to guide discussions about Wikimedia development to this channel instead (which is already the case most of the time, except that notifications were sent to #mediawiki). Effective changes: --Krinkle (talk) 15:02, 27 June 2012 (UTC)
 * #mediawiki wikibugs: MediaWiki-only
 * Wikimedia bugs and wmf-config commits go into #wikimedia-dev.
 * I like this middle ground. I'd maybe add wikimedia/* repos to the -dev channel as well. ^demon (talk) 16:33, 27 June 2012 (UTC)
 * I like this middle ground as well, it keeps on-topic bot notifications in-channel so we don't lose context when devs are talking with each other about a particular bug/changeset/what have you, but reduces overall noise so less scrollback needs to happen to view a full conversation with someone. -- Skiz zerz  16:43, 27 June 2012 (UTC)
 * Not that I'm ever in irc anymore, but +1. I feel a lot would be lost if the bots were totally removed from #mediawiki. Bawolff (talk) 18:09, 27 June 2012 (UTC)