| [Andre_S] | While Christian is downloading, I'll start. |
| [Andre_S] | Topic of the talk is "Why am I here" ... |
| [Andre_S] | if you have a look at slide 2 (Content), ther is, what I want to speak about |
| [Andre_S] | 1st short but important point: why i choose this topic |
| [Andre_S] | after that I like to speak a little about me (in fact the complete talk is more or less about me) |
| [Andre_S] | The main part is then, what reasons I had to join the OOo community, what I expected |
| [Andre_S] | .. and after all .. what I have achieved (and learned) |
| [Andre_S] | If you have any questions, please feel free to interrupt me and ask |
| [Andre_S] | let's move on to slide 3 "Why did I choose this topic?" |
| [Andre_S] | many people wonder, why somebody is volunteering within a open source project ... |
| [Andre_S] | .. and there are many theories about this "why" |
| [Andre_S] | even within the OOo community we often came across this question, but we never answered in detail |
| [Andre_S] | in fact ... I don't think, that we would be able to answer this question ... |
| [Andre_S] | But as it seems important to me, I'd like to talk about my reasons, just to get (hopefully) feedback about other people |
| [Andre_S] | .. other people's reasons |
| [Andre_S] | Move on to slide 4 - some words about me |
| [Andre_S] | ok, these are just some facts |
| [Andre_S] | .. not realy that important, just to tell, that you are speaking with someone, who is addicted to computers ;-) |
| [DanielC] | :-) |
| [christianju] | Andre_S: Andre, you still have the Atari? |
| [DanielC] | Andre_S: Are you still in Switzerland? |
| [Andre_S] | christianju: yes .. it still (or again) here (beside two other atari ST's and some game consoles) |
| [Andre_S] | DanielC: yepp, I am. |
| [DanielC] | cool |
| [Andre_S] | at the moment it's a little cold here ... |
| [Andre_S] | but .. let's move on to slide 5 and get closer to software and open source |
| [christianju] | :), nice. |
| [Andre_S] | I've been fascinated by the public doamin software scene for a long time |
| [Andre_S] | (this is related to the Atari ST's .. great scene there) |
| [Andre_S] | I startet to code some smaller programms and share the code |
| [Andre_S] | but .. for larger software I've been only a user - a user of free software for a long time |
| [Andre_S] | but I'm not, what you might call a "evangelist" (that means .. I still use windows) |
| [Andre_S] | the first OS-project with a little more involvement was PostgreSQL (a real great Database) |
| [Andre_S] | .. and it was fun to see Justin Clift here at the OOo project (as I knew im fromm PostgreSQL by name) |
| [Andre_S] | But still ... I have been a user, notmuch more ... |
| [Andre_S] | and around 2001 / 2002 I felt, this was not enough |
| [Andre_S] | .. and I was looking for opportunities to contribute back |
| [Andre_S] | sooo .. move on to slide 6 |
| [Andre_S] | quite at this time, I came across OpenOffice.org (I never used StarOffice before .. I really started with OOo) |
| [Andre_S] | And . there were some reasones, why it seemed interesting to contribute to OpenOffice.org |
| [Andre_S] | first - I've been fascinated by the complexity of the software and the project |
| [Andre_S] | (I've been coding makros / projects with MS Office .. so ... I have respect for Office Software developers and users) |
| [Andre_S] | REally interesting to me was, how the community deals with end users (I'll come later to this, why i think, this is special) |
| [Andre_S] | and .. the tipping point was my first installation of OOo 1.0 |
| [Andre_S] | the story in short is at the slides (and this is one, how Open Source should work) |
| [Andre_S] | by the way ... thanks to Eric Hoch, who was the one to care about my "first problem" ;-) |
| [Andre_S] | my reasons .. what I would like to achive: move on to slide 7 |
| [Andre_S] | First - I've been really impresst, how easy it was to fin help with technical (oo end user) problems. |
| [Andre_S] | So .. I'd just liked to help other people and say thanks that way. |
| [Andre_S] | But I thought, I could learn a lot within the community (in fact everybody can learn a lot of things here) |
| [Andre_S] | As I'm a trained software developer I've been interested in the open source development process (if there is any .. seems often chaotic from outside) |
| [Andre_S] | Than .. how does this "Community-thing" work? What is this .. how can people claim to be a community, even without knowing each other? |
| [Andre_S] | .. and .. well there was the question, if it is possible to become know by working in and for this community |
| [Andre_S] | the only thing I didn't want to do here was coding |
| [Andre_S] | (as I'm coding in my profession, I don't want to do the same in spare time) |
| [DanielC] | interesting |
| [Andre_S] | I was just about to ask, if everybody is still awake ;-) |
| [Andre_S] | thanks, Daniel :-) |
| [Andre_S] | Ok .. so much for my reasons .. and why I have joined. |
| [IcoBgr] | yes |
| [Andre_S] | Now .. some words to what I achieved (or think, I have learned) |
| [Andre_S] | .. or are there any questions so far? |
| [eskroni] | for me, no :) |
| [Andre_S] | ok .. so let's go to slide 8 |
| [Andre_S] | That's what i did so far within the community |
| [Andre_S] | I think, this is more or less typical, if you don't write code |
| [Andre_S] | it is not that much .. but there are a lot of activities you can help with, even without coding |
| [Andre_S] | .. and all are important |
| [Andre_S] | the last point is that, what now becomes more and more important to me. |
| [Andre_S] | im more and more interested in the people .. thot that much in the software itself ;-) |
| [christianju] | Andre_S: Andre, as most of us probably know you were in leading positions and now are the qa lead. Why did you choose to take the responsibility for such big projects? |
| [Andre_S] | But .. it's fun, if youmeet great people, working on a great software and contributing here |
| [Andre_S] | christianju: wait a little .. this will be at the "selfish slide" |
| [DanielC] | :-) |
| [drake2] | Andre_S, Thanks to cloph and pl, they also resolved an issue for me in amazingly short period of time. However, it seems some issues just remain stagnant for multiple years, since you are a developer in your profession, do you have opinions on how to make it seem the open source developers are less resistant to end user suggestions? The time ranges on bug/issue reporting to fixes vary from a few days to years. |
| [Andre_S] | drake2: belive mie .. this is not an oen source problem. professional developers are as resistant to end user problems as free developers are |
| [christianju] | ups, ok ;). |
| [Andre_S] | .. but for Open Source project this is more a problem than for the professional project |
| [Andre_S] | as open source projects need to turn users into developers (or contributors) ... |
| [Andre_S] | .. and if users are becoming upset, it's unlikely, they will turn into developers |
| [Andre_S] | drake2: another problem with "ever open" issues might be special to OOo ... sorry to say that, but it's or largest contributor (in some way) |
| [Andre_S] | drake2: but .. the answer I could give is, that we need to bring users and developers closer together (and some pople here at the community are constantly working on that) |
| [Andre_S] | ok .. let's go to slide 9 .. what (I think) I have learned about open source development |
| [Andre_S] | .. and processes |
| [Andre_S] | first .. you don't need processes for all and everything ;-) |
| [Andre_S] | Some things just happen |
| [Andre_S] | (and that is somewhat blocked wihtin OOo, just as many people see, that we have one big contributor .. and it seems we don'T need that much other contriutors) |
| [DanielC] | which processes are better than in a propietary environment? |
| [Andre_S] | DanielC: qa (indeed) |
| [DanielC] | ok |
| [DanielC] | cool |
| [Andre_S] | but .. I really think, QA is better, as it ranges from picking up user feedback |
| [Andre_S] | .. through specification ... |
| [Andre_S] | .. to to release testing ... |
| [Andre_S] | it's not perfect in all stages .. but at least we have covered most of the stages |
| [cjw] | Drake2 said we need to bring users and developers closer together (and some pople here at the community are constantly working on that) I hope that there will be some exploration of this. |
| [drake2] | actually, Andre_S said that in his reply |
| [cjw] | Sorry, I'm new to this irc business |
| [christianju] | cjw: Don't worry, you're not the only one :). |
| [Andre_S] | cjw: just to give one example ... at ther german user lists, we have the luck to have some core developers answering user questions there |
| [DanielC] | cjw: welcome to IRC :-) |
| [cjw] | Thanks. I don't see that in the English lists |
| [drake2] | but targeted timelines or deadlines for easily fixed issues and proper assignment of developer resources to achieve that would help a great deal I think. |
| [Andre_S] | cjw: another thing is working with IssueZilla ... people should be polite there .. and .. if they are not, we will have (again) discussions about it at the qa-lists |
| [Andre_S] | drake2: it's not that easy, to assign ressources in an open source project :-( |
| [BeDipp] | Another point are Issues: look at http://qa.openoffice.org/issues/show_bug.cgi?id=43146 - that wouldn't hace happened in closed source |
| [butibum] | cjw:dba-users are lucky to have Frank Schönheit (English list) |
| [Andre_S] | drake2: this is more easy to companies like microsoft, as they can calculate the money |
| [DanielC] | cjw: Most core developers are German. |
| [Andre_S] | BeDipp: this issue has happened, as it is the default behaviour in a closed software product :-( |
| [cjw] | Perhaps IssueZilla is part of the problem. I, as a newcomer, find it horrendous. Responding to Daniel, my German is too primitive to discuss anything |
| [Andre_S] | cjw: responding to Daniel Rentz? |
| [eskroni] | cjw: but most developers understand English :) |
| [DanielC] | Andre_S: resmonding to my comment that most core developers are German. |
| [BeDipp] | Andre_S: I didn't mean the content - the way to convince devellopers is unique IMHO |
| [drake2] | Does anyone know how many core developers there are in total for the whole project or each module? |
| [Andre_S] | drake2: yes there is "anybody" ;-) |
| [Andre_S] | (but I don't think he / she is here at the channel) |
| [drake2] | Well, I mean people that actually get stuck with a lot of time consuming coding work |
| [DanielC] | drake2: 80-ish from Sun and 20-ish from Novell in total. |
| [Andre_S] | sounds reasonable |
| [butibum] | are there other parttimers writing patches that get accepted into the code? |
| [drake2] | for about 11,000 open issues |
| [christianju] | cjw: I can only agree with you, Issuezilla is a very complicated and confusing tool. |
| [Andre_S] | butibum: yes, there are others .. but not many |
| [christianju] | butibum: there certainly are.# |
| [DanielC] | I also think IZ is really complicated. |
| [cjw] | I'm not following IZ? |
| [DanielC] | IssueZilla |
| [cjw] | Thanks |
| [butibum] | how would then MS handle the IZ question ie how does an open source issue based system differ from that used by proprietary companies? |
| [Andre_S] | ok .. another thing 've learned about Open Source development: tools are often complicated |
| [Andre_S] | butibum: not that much |
| [butibum] | sorry OT |
| [drake2] | proprietary companies you usually end up arguiing with them over the phone, paying them a huge maintenance fee and still not have them do anything |
| [Andre_S] | butibum: but within microsoft, only trained employees work with this system .. but as we are open for every one, everybody has access to IZ |
| [butibum] | which could actually say something about how OSS works? |
| [christianju] | just a question: Does anyone know about other bug-tracking tools in the OpenSource world that are easier to use? If I see bug tracking systems, they very much resemble ours (mozilla, opendarwin) |
| [Andre_S] | christianju: there should be some .. but I don't know them :-( |
| [DanielC] | christianju: http://website.openoffice.org/tryouts/dcarrera/miniZilla/ |
| [DanielC] | christianju: Just as a demonstration of what's possible. |
| [cjw] | I've had a little experience, as a reporter with Python, which uses SourceForge. It's much easier to use. |
| [Andre_S] | /me is trying to go back to the slides ;-) |
| [Andre_S] | maybe some questions might be answered with the next slide ... slide 10 |
| [drake2] | If openoffice.org had a knowledge base type of thing in addition to issuezilla, that would work well |
| [Andre_S] | Of course, you can only learn about the community, if you are part of the community (all other things are imho stupid) |
| [DanielC] | drake2: http://mindmeld.cybersite.com.au/ |
| [DanielC] | drake2: There is a monthly announcement on the users list and authors telling people that it exists. |
| [Andre_S] | ;-) |
| [drake2] | why isnt it hosted at openoffice.org and readily apparent? |
| [Andre_S] | but .. we are just in the middle of one of the key point about a opne source community .... |
| [Andre_S] | ..it's diversity ... diversitiy is great, as people are free to do what they want |
| [DanielC] | drake2: Ask again later. |
| [Andre_S] | but diversity becomes a problem if people need to focus on one topic ;-) |
| [Andre_S] | we have so many people within our community, so many ideas and ways to contribute ... |
| [Andre_S] | it is great to have tham, but sometimes difficult to get something concrete out of it |
| [Andre_S] | (like this "one special issue") |
| [Andre_S] | but if you look at the goals of the community in general, they would be achieved |
| [Andre_S] | .. slide 11 .. I think, we can go fast over it ... |
| [Andre_S] | .. as we just have discussed a little about it |
| [christianju] | Andre... wait a second. |
| [Andre_S] | ok |
| [Andre_S] | questions? |
| [christianju] | Andre_S: What is a 'strong enough' community for you and what do you think are the main goals of the OOo community as a whole? |
| [Andre_S] | hm .. "strong enough" tome means, if a community does not depend on single persons |
| [pseudo_daoist] | The "New User" v "Established Community" split can be seen clearly in the adoption/replacement of MSOffice errors, instead of working solutions that OOo has had/could have. |
| [Andre_S] | pseudo_daoist: right ... it often escalates in such questions. |
| [Andre_S] | but if you talk to rather new members ... you will often hear, that we need to care much more about them |
| [DanielC] | but I don't see much happening to do that. |
| [drake2] | copying the precedence of the unary minus over exponentiation is a good example of copying a MSOffice error |
| [Andre_S] | I rather focus on "established members" .. but get often criticiezed for that |
| [DanielC] | OOo has a very strong split between "new members" and "old members". Some people have complained that I am "too new" even though I've been around for 2 years. |
| [DanielC] | This shouldn't be. |
| [Andre_S] | DanielC: i expected, that this would come ;-) |
| [DanielC] | :-) |
| [Andre_S] | you are right, that shouldn't be. |
| [christianju] | DanielC: That is poison for OpenSource projects, in my opinion. |
| [Andre_S] | I cannot give a perfect solution for that (I think nobody can) |
| [Andre_S] | the only thing we might try is not to take too many things personal |
| [DanielC] | In other FOSS projects (Ruby and Mono) I was "part of the group" very quickly. |
| [DanielC] | So it's not a problem general to FOSS. |
| [cjw] | Would it help if I outlined how things are handled in the Python world? |
| [Andre_S] | DanielC: I've been "part of the group" within a couple of months |
| [DanielC] | Andre_S: I'm glad. That's more like it should be. |
| [DanielC] | Andre_S: So there is hope :-) |
| [Andre_S] | DanielC: there always is hope ;-) |
| [DanielC] | :-) |
| [Andre_S] | .. but .. I agree .. OOo tends keep new members a little outside |
| [Andre_S] | but often this is not bad will .... |
| [Andre_S] | .. it is just, that "old members" hav thought already about a lot of things and cannot discuss this on and on |
| [Andre_S] | (but that's just how i see it) |
| [Andre_S] | It becomes really a problem, if it get's personal and you forget to work for the project ... |
| [christianju] | Andre_S: I think it's good to get a fresh look at things and you dont get from the "old members" since they already have become used to many things, it's from new users. |
| [drake2] | that is good in my opinion, if the new members do not see something in an appropriate light, older members can correct them quickly. The exception being when there becomes resistance to fixing issues affecting UI and work flow. |
| [DanielC] | I agree. New ideas are important. |
| [DanielC] | That's supposed to be one of the virtues of open source. |
| [Andre_S] | :-) |
| [DanielC] | Andre_S: I still agree with what you said btw. |
| [christianju] | DanielC: And that's why we need to respect new users as we would the ones we have been dealing with for a much longer time. |
| [Andre_S] | And that's one of the reasons, whi I think, Open Source communities should not focus too moch on single persons |
| [Andre_S] | (although it is great to have strong contributors within a community) |
| [Andre_S] | may we move on to slide 12? |
| [DanielC] | sure :) |
| [Andre_S] | Ok .. the selfish thing ;-) |
| [Andre_S] | .. just, as I do some things here, because *I* like it :-) |
| [DanielC] | Very important IMHO ;-) |
| [Andre_S] | So .. my initial ideas were .. how to become known .. or finding acceptance |
| [Andre_S] | to answer the question of christianju: being responsible for a larger project is some kind of acceptance |
| [christianju] | by becoming the lead :)) |
| [Andre_S] | you got it ;-) |
| [Andre_S] | So .. have been Co Lead at the germanophone project (after a rather short time of about 6 months within the project) |
| [Andre_S] | .. and now being project lead a qa (although I think, other people might be more qualified than I am) |
| [Andre_S] | .. otuside the project .. there are just some things, that are really fun to me |
| [Andre_S] | whe I was at CeBit Hannover, somebody cam across, bringing greetings from turkey (from Görkem) |
| [Andre_S] | or after a presentation at Linuxtag Karlsruhe, one visitor sttod up .. |
| [Andre_S] | .. and said "I have no question, I just wanted to say Thank you" ;-) |
| [Andre_S] | (not me in particular, but the project, for implementing XForms) |
| [DanielC] | :-) |
| [Andre_S] | Btw: this is seomething, that is well appreciated by developers ;-) |
| [Andre_S] | (hint for new users) |
| [Andre_S] | and .. after all .. it's interesting to meet people from other projects |
| [Andre_S] | if it was, because they do also contribute to OOo or if they are interested, how Ooo works or if you just meet them at events |
| [Andre_S] | *uff* .. I think ... I've talked a little long .. sorry for that |
| [Andre_S] | .. now just one slide is left. |
| [Andre_S] | .. and that's the slide with people, I like to thank, because I worked a little closer with them ... |
| [Andre_S] | and all of them helped *me* |
| [DanielC] | Hey! My name is there! |
| [DanielC] | :-D |
| [DanielC] | Thank you Andre. |
| [christianju] | thank you too Andre_S |
| [Andre_S] | So .. hanks to all those people, as well as to all the people that build that "commnity thing" ;-) |
| [eskroni] | There are more names on the list... Thanks, André |
| [Andre_S] | .. and thanks to all of you for listening ;-) |
| [eskroni] | it was really interesting, André |
| [cjw] | THanks to Andre for his thoughts |
| [DanielC] | clap clap clap clap clap clap clap |
| [DanielC] | Very good talk. |
| [christianju] | yes. |
| [DanielC] | It certainly got a lot of us thinking :) |
| [Andre_S] | Hey .. so I got, what I wanted ;-) |
| [DanielC] | For those new here: Now is the supposed "question and answer" period. |
| [DanielC] | so ask :-) |
| [Andre_S] | Any questions (that culd be answered now) ? |
| [DanielC] | I have a comment, not a question. One of the reasons I work at OOo is because the project is so broad. There are so many /different/ things to do. |
| [christianju] | what are your goals within the ooo community? ;-) |
| [DanielC] | I mentioned that I worked with Ruby and Mono. |
| [DanielC] | But to be honest, I got bored after a few months. |
| [DanielC] | With OOo, if I get bored of something and want to do something else, I can /still/ make it relate to OOo. |
| [DanielC] | Whether it's web page design, documentation, drawing, QA, or whatever. |
| [DanielC] | And that's why I managed to stay at OOo. :-) |
| [christianju] | I work at OOo to get to know more people ;) and because nobody can "shut up"-me like some of those american interviewers can ;). |
| [Andre_S] | DanielC: it's the same with me ;-) |
| [christianju] | (comment) |
| [DanielC] | :-) |
| [Andre_S] | christianju: own expiriences with american interviewers? |
| [IcoBgr] | I have a Q about QA process. What have it to include? There is some automation tests with testool and some instructions tests. Which one have to be used? |
| [Andre_S] | IcoBgr: it's just in discussion, as it is to complicated (imho) at the moment |
| [christianju] | Andre_S: What are your goals within the ooo-community? (see above) |
| [Andre_S] | IcuBgr: see issue 53051 |
| [IcoBgr] | Andre_S: Also, I have some dificulties with adoptiong autotest for our language. Can it possible to have some instructions how can it be done? |
| [Andre_S] | http://www.openoffice.org/issues/show_bug.cgi?id=53051 |
| [Andre_S] | IcoBgr: could you ask this at dev@qa? Devvelopers of the testtool and of the scripts are there |
| [IcoBgr] | Andre_S: ok |
| [Andre_S] | christianju: at the moment .. meeting people |
| [IcoBgr] | ups |
| [DanielC] | Well, at least that didn't happen mid-way through the talk... |
| [DanielC] | He'll be back. |
| [IcoBgr] | :) T4 |
| [christianju] | nice to meet you guys and get your thoughts. Bye! |
| [eskroni] | Bye christian :) |
| [DanielC] | oops, a bit too quick. |
| [DanielC] | There he is... |
| [eskroni] | :) |
| [DanielC] | :-) |
| [christianju] | eskroni: Thanks for reminding me. |
| [eskroni] | no problem :) |
| [Thalion72] | .. sorry for leaving this fast :-( |
| [eskroni] | when you've used the power-off switch, than you were back really fast... |
| [Thalion72] | hte last question I saw was by christianju .. was the answer sufficient? |
| [Thalion72] | eskroni: it does a clean shut down ;-) |
| [Thalion72] | well .. other questions left? |
| [DanielC] | drake2: you had a question. |
| [DanielC] | drawke2: The OOo website only provides a system called SourceCast and IssueZilla. |
| [DanielC] | drake2: It is not *capable* of hosting a knowledge base like the one I showed you. |
| [christianju] | Thalion72: sure. |
| [DanielC] | drake2: Though it could certainly be better advertised on the site. There could be links from the support page for example. |
| [DanielC] | drake2: Would you be willing to file an issue about this, and tell people on the website list that this is important to you? I would be happy to vote for the issue and join in the discussion. |
| [Thalion72] | *sigh* ... the problem is, that it is not that important to me |
| [DanielC] | Thailon72: fair enough :-) |
| [DanielC] | It doesn't have to be. |
| [Thalion72] | .. it was important, if other people are willing to care about integration to the Oo website (what means, they would at least file an issue) |
| [DanielC] | I was just suggesting a course of action to drake2 if the issue is important to him. |
| [TonyPool] | Thanks for an interesting talk and chat. It makes me feel I should join in more. Perhaps head for the qa project. But it won't be for a while. Right now I have to be off for my dinner, Thanks all! |
| [BeDipp] | That's one of our chances - different opinions and the possibility to convince one another |
| [BeDipp] | But we have to keep in mind, that we need new members to become developpers (in André's wider sense) |
| [Thalion72] | let's say contributors ;-) |
| [BeDipp] | my translations are poor sometimes ;-) |
| [butibum] | André thanks for an interesting talk, keep up the good work. CUL |
| [Thalion72] | CU |
| [Thalion72] | Well .. it seems, I have to leave. |
| [Thalion72] | DanielC: do you have the log? |
| [DanielC] | Thank you for the talk Andre. |
| [DanielC] | Yes, I do. |
| [DanielC] | I'll send you an HTML formatted version today. |
| [DanielC] | As well as Sigrid's. |
| [eskroni] | :) |
| [DanielC] | Thank you for putting them up on the website, since my SSH problem isn't resolved yet. |
| [Thalion72] | Ok, thanks again to you all ... and bye |
| [BeDipp] | Thanks a lot, André |
| [BeDipp] | good bye |
| [eskroni] | Thanks André |
| [drake2] | DanielC, it is linked from support already |
| [DanielC] | drake2: Excellent. :-) |
| [christianju] | eskroni: m ay I go now? :-)) |
| [DanielC] | That's good t oknow. |
| [DanielC] | that's good to know. |
| [drake2] | I was just playing around with it, thinking it should have sections to limit searches, but now that I looked at MindMeld docs, it works much simpler than that |
| [eskroni] | christianju: You needn't to ask me... if you want, you can leave, or you can stay a bit longer :) |
| [DanielC] | drake2: Are you interested in contacting the maintainer and helping out? |