Last meeting: Editorial Board Meeting 2008 04
Next meeting: Editorial Board Meeting 2008 06
Members considered current for this meeting (6): chibaguy, dthacker, marclaporte, mlpvolt, ricks99, xavi
Passing or defeating a motion will require 4 votes this month.

Contributors to this meeting: chibaguy, luci, dthacker, ricks99, mlpvolt, xavi

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Motions Passed Last Month

Motions Defeated Last Month

1. Motions Carried Over

1.1. Documentation Page Formatting (kernel22's proposal)

This really stems from 1.9 vs. 1.10. I would like to propose an "Information" sub-section on each doc page relating to features/mods/etc which would contain sub-headings with related information like:

Example

!!!!Import forums
Blurb about what the feature does.

!!!!!Change Log
''Outlines significant changes in the appearance or behaviour of the feature...''

1.9.8.3 - Introduced.
1.10.0 - Added ability to import directly from another DB server.
1.10.1 - Able to now migrate phpBB3 forums.
1.11.0 - Removed SQL dump import option because seldom used.

!!!!!Known Issues
1.9.8.3 - Only works with mysql for sql dump import.

!!!!!Examples
blahblahblah....

Discussion:

1.2. Documentation page formatting (ricks99's proposal)

Discussion

ricks99: Here was my proposal for redesigning doc pages from a while ago. I'm not 100% pleased with it, but I think it does a good job making it easy to find the key information for a given feature (i.e., which Tiki version, required permissions, etc.).

Xavi: as a General Idea, I like it, ricks99. But I'm scared of the work of reformating that part of every single page.... Moreover, shouldn't we use somehow the tracker info here in doc.tw.o that Marc Laporte created and many have been updating for all features?

• Which tracker are you talking about? Are you suggesting using trackers in place of wiki pages for features? How would that work? (ricks99)
• I (xavi) mean creating a tracker to store all the metainformation of the features, and retrieve whatever information for that feature using trackerlist plugin using filtervalue or similar params. Similar to how marclaporte has been using trackers on dev.tw.o to show the bugs related to that feature. We would show the metadata related to that feature... However, this is a bunch of work, which I can't do myself (I can't find enough time to even easier things...)

mlpvolt: again documentation templates is the process imo.

• dthacker: I want to tie this to a tracker too. Now that we have staging, I can work up a prototype. So opposed for now and watch for a new motion.
• dthacker: The problem with templates is that they are not dynamic in tiki, they are just skeletons. This morning I saw a demo of templates on Mediawiki, and they are dynamic across the wiki. If you change the template the changes carry through to all wiki pages. I think our dyamic content feature may allow for something like this so I'm going to experiment with that.
• mlpvolt: overall, imo pagenames, linking and tagging is more important for the function of the docs than the similarity of individual pages. dynamic templates would be nice to have but let's keep the required boxes to fill to a minimum. I'm also concerned that staging&approval may be too much to maintain. We might also differentiate between editors (who clean things up) and contributors (who can do anything they want - just contribute)

Vote
In Favor:

Opposed: xavi, (it seems that we don't have enough human resources to accomplish this task, at least so far), dthacker, mlpvolt

1.3. Screenshot Tagging/Captioning

In the case of today, we would try and get all screenshots current as of 1.10.0 until we come up with a 1.10.1 down the road. The Change Log proposed above will fill in the blanks. Maybe also have a "-HEAD" version of the page that talks about and documents changes to an existing feature that are in development in the head branch. When the time comes, those details can be easily incorporated into the current release page. Obviously, if the feature doesn't exist yet, then instead of ahving a -HEAD version (for example Contributions-HEAD), then it'll just be the name of the feature (Contributions) and in the Change Log section we'd have "1.11.0 - Introduced". I think we need to document new features that are being developed, but keep it separate from what is current so as to avoid confusion.

Discussion:

• All screenshots should have a standard caption including version. We could add an "under development" tag as the equivalent to HEAD.(dthacker)
• I personally think that having a HEAD version of any doc page publicly available is dangerous. The HEAD version is not easily available. Too many newbies are going to ask... Why is the doc page showing me 1.10, but I can only download 1.9.9??
  ricks99
• in fact, they can indeed download 1.10 (or HEAD) at their own risk, from Download page (-> http://dev.tiki.org/Download). Mmmmmm, I like the idea: some people might like the idea of using 1.9.9 in themeantime but knowing that in the next version (1.10 in this case) this or that feature or enhancement is already coded and working... (specially if we as community take so long between releases of new stable branches...) (Xavi)
• One problem with a standard (static) caption is that as soon as a new Tiki version is released, all the doc captions are going to be (or appear to be) out of date. I mean if the screenshots were all labeled 1.9.11 now, what happens when 1.10 is released? People need to know what info is for what version, but hardcoding the version in the doc page should be done as little as possible, I think, since many or most descriptions will continue to be valid even as version numbers increase. Maybe the assumption should be (and described somewhere) that screenshots are accurate for the latest stable version unless otherwise indicated.
• ricks99: Could we use the Versions plugin for this, maybe?

Vote
In Favor: dthacker, xavi

Opposed: chibaguy (opposed to specific version numbers on screenshots unless the image is for a beta or old release)

1.4. Using SourceForge for downloads

(from Marc, rescued from a proposal sent months ago by him and xavi to Editorial Board Meeting page)

Discussion:
Marc:

• For instance :

http://doc.tiki.org/files/Tiki19beta.pdf

We could have a permanent redirect. Ex.: http://doc.tiki.org/printed to the exact location on SF (which could change over time)

It will reduce the load on my server and be counted towards our stats over there.

• Xavi:
  
  I fully agree with you Marc. When I uploaded my first .odt & pdf, I didn't have access to upload files to tikiwiki area in sf.net, but I do right now.

  Months ago I uploaded files to tw area in sf.net, including the latest pdf from doc.tw.o:
  http://downloads.sourceforge.net/tikiwiki/Tiki19beta.pdf?modtime=1204906231&big_mirror=1

  And we could do something similar for the odt file? (or maybe it's not needed since less people download the source pdt file)...

Vote
In favor: xavi

Opposed:

1.5. Admin Settings for doc.tw.o 1.10

We did set new doc.tw.o in a certain way. Some disagreement might arise (or not) on some of the proposals of new settings. Report below the changes that any admin on doc.tw.o made to the site, so that we can decide the best configuraqtion for the community according the maximum amount of points of view.

details

Discussion:

• dthacker: These settings make sense to me. I'd like to get the discuss feature re-enabled when possible
• chibaguy: Is web help working? It was broken the last time I tried it at a test site.
  • xavi: no idea. Since I saw a new setting on Admin > wiki I thought (I wished, to be honest) that is was fixed. But I haven't tried. Just change it on the proposal, if you wish.
• ricks99: Can we disable the login module for anonymous visitors? There's already a login tab at the top of the pge.
  • xavi: yes, I fully agree, as soon as the theme style is upgraded or patched to properly show the link to that "login" link on the horizontal menu for anonymous. I've just added the "logout" link for registered, which was missing (wasn't it there months/years ago??? what happenned to it?)
• module last wiki page changes seems to have disappeared from doc.tw.o server. ¿?
  • nope: it was called last_modif_pages . Reenabled (Xavi)

Vote
In Favor: dthacker, chibaguy, xavi

Opposed:

1.6. Use Blog to keep track of changes in doc.tw.o admin settings

Discussion

• mlpvolt: why not just use the table created above, place it in doc.two settings edit to log changes and use the edit comment to explain why.
  • luci: err, what table ?
• mlpvolt: perhaps also the chief editor should approve (or at least be informed of) all settings changes.

vote
In favor: luci, xavi, mlpvolt

Opposed:

1.7. Defining groups, permissions and contributions

Ricks99 proposes a groups / permissions scheme as follows:

• Registered users should be allowed to edit/update wiki pages, as needed.
• Doc contributors should use the pages' comments for editorial discussions of the page. This would:
  1. Eliminate the comment noise from "registered users" who use the comments for support questions.
  2. Replace the Author Coffeeshop forum.
• Editors are admins of the docs.

Discussion

• IMHO, this site differs from main tw.o — end-users come here looking for specific information; not necessarily to contribute. (And infact, all research shows that the overwhelming majority of visitors will not/do not contribute.) As such,
• Anonymous users are simply looking for answers. Let them rate wiki pages (for quality) and add tags (a form of community-organization)
• xavi: I like your proopsal a lot, Rick. I would suggest to clarify that registered users need also the perm to make minor changes, according to current behavior of translation feature, and once the related bug or missconfiguration is fixed. (See http://dev.tiki.org/bug1697)
• xavi: I would suggest avoiding trackers for support tickets on doc.tw.o, but I know there is not much agreement on this issue on editorial board, and I would follow whatever we decide (afaik). Just comments ti wiki pages (either redirected to a forum through discuss or as comments on pages from a single All the Documentation structure that can be watched/monitored with a single click (to avoid dispersion of comments on pages that nobody was monitoring to answer).
• xavi: if the issue with the msn bot spamming the forum through "discuss feature" is sorted out and fixed, then I would'nt mind keeping the discuss feature as it was before.
• dthacker: There are the tags that refer back to the status page (need a screenshot, refactor) and there are folksonomy tags. Which tag would anonymous be able to work with?
  • ricks99: The "tagging" I was referring to is the folksonomy tags... letting anonymous users "tag" wiki pages with keywords (which would/should replace the keywords pages. I'll confess that I'm not 100% sure I understood the discussion of tagging screenshots.
    • dthacker: I edited my question above for clarity
• dthacker: Having used both, I think the tagging system works better than trackers.
• dthacker: The coffeeshop has been struggling for over two years. Time to try something else
  • ricks99: I aggreee. Let's use comments to discuss a specific page. Making the comments visible only to major contributors will reduce the noise.
• mlpvolt: i like the description of groups and perms. "Editors" should more or less correspond to editorial board no?
• mlpvolt: disagree with using hidden comments to discuss changes to individual pages. That is way too micro. If something needs to be fixed, fix it. If a caveat needs to be applied, it should be visible to all readers. Inviting editorial discussion of individual changes invites stagnation i think, like wikipedia where 3/4 of all edits are to talk pages.
• mlpvolt, i guess o don't see less need for differentiation between registered and contributor. we can use it as a screen to help encourage self-training. Perms like revert, rename, categorize fit with contributor i think.

Vote
In Favor: ricks99, xavi (ok with me), mlpvolt (ok except for using comments).

2. New Business

2.1. Use H2 to describe the motion

Discussion:

• also need edit by section as soon as possible! 😊

Vote
In Favor: mlpvolt (also tends to add show/hide), Xavi

Opposed:

2.2. New Editor in Chief

discussion

• Xavi: I think we might not need that role as far as ebm keep working...

Vote
Opposed: luci (I also think (like Xavi) we don't need that role at all)

2.3. Proposed changes to doc.tw.o site

Discussion

1. Remove the Search by Page Name module.
   We already have the Search bar in the header. Maybe (possibly) keep it for Registered users; but I think Anonymous visitors will become confused with 2 different search boxes
   • luci: I'm not sure how efficient is the top search when you look for wiki page name
2. The Documentation menu is empty for Anonymous visitors.
   What's it for?
   • luci: huh ? it's not empty here for me as Anonymous...
   • ricks99: Actually, what's going on is... the module uses the "flip" parameter, but the FLIP icon is only visible when you hover over the menu title. I think this is bad usability — if the module/menu is minimized, there's no way for user to know how to maximize it!
3. Remove the To register module.
   Instead, let's add this information to the tiki-login.tpl template. Additionally it should be in the "become an author" section.
4. Remove the Last Forum Posts module
   I thought we were going to remove the forum functionality completely?
5. Change the Most Popular Tags module to a cloud, and show more than 10 tags. For example:

   Most Popular Tags

   admin   administration   articles   configuration   documentation   edit   files   google   groups   i18n   images   import   installation   language   links   login   maps   module   modules   permissions   plugin   structures   syntax   tag   theme   toc   trackers   translation   users   wiki  

Vote
In Favor: ricks99, Xavi

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Next meeting: June 2008