[Chandler-dev] Re: instructions for dogfooders

[Ted Leung]

I'd say that if there is demand for a list, we ought to start one.    
The tough thing has been gauging whether or not there is demand.   If  
people are getting offlist requests for help or for a list, then I'd  
say the time has probably come for a users list of some kind.

Ted

On Dec 27, 2006, at 7:08 PM, Katie Capps Parlante wrote:

> Hi Andre,
>
> Aha! I didn't understand that you meant a mailing list for dogfooders.
>
> I agree with you that a community of technically skilled users/ 
> dogfooders helping out other users/dogfooders would be a real asset  
> to the project. It is indeed frustrating to have a bug parked at  
> "works for me" when the bug still occurs for the person dogfooding  
> -- I can see how a forum for discussing the bug would be helpful.  
> You bring up a good point that we have a window of a few months to  
> think through the mechanics about how we'll support early adopters.
>
> Anyone else have 2c on whether now is the time to start up such a  
> list, in advance of Preview?
>
> Anything else that would be helpful in establishing such a  
> community? We weren't really ready for that in the past, but  
> Chandler is now stable enough that we can start pushing on that as  
> a goal.
>
> Is "works for me" the right resolution for bugs the developers  
> can't reproduce but we know happen for end users? If not, how  
> should we handle these bugs? (Mail bugs in particular seem prone to  
> this kind of situation).
>
> Cheers,
> Katie
>
> Andre Mueninghoff wrote:
>> Hi Katie,
>> Thanks for your interest. A little of both, I think, if I understand
>> your example options.
>> My goal is possibly the same as yours, that is, to maximize OSAF
>> developer productivity towards new features and functions, as  
>> compared
>> to following up on bug reports that have questionable reproducibility
>> instructions at best, or have a root cause in a misconfigured user
>> environment at worst. It seems to me there might be/are probably  
>> others
>> like me who encounter issues that occur more than once, but are  
>> unable
>> to reproduce these issues consistently such to be able to craft a
>> coherent bug report for further investigation by a developer. I think
>> there may be an opportunity to provide a bit of structure to the
>> community of "some-what technical, but non-developer" dogfooders  
>> through
>> perhaps a list. It could happen, for example, that more
>> technically-skilled dogfooders step in are assist others in
>> distinguishing between known issues (a.k.a. duplicate bug  
>> prevention),
>> user environment issues, and user expectation mismatches  
>> (expectations
>> speeding ahead of the release plan). Dogfooders might be able to  
>> assist
>> each other in verifying instructions for reproducing issues, all  
>> prior
>> to intial triage <grin> by the developer(s) covering the relevant
>> component. It seems to me that developers and dogfooders share a  
>> common
>> lack of interest in bug research that results in a "works for me" tag
>> though the dogfooder continues to experience the issue. The  
>> opportunity
>> for OSAF as preview approaches is to shape and manage actively the
>> expectations of the eventual beta users by working out in advance the
>> mechanics of the support of early adopters. Hope that makes sense  
>> and is
>> helpful.
>> Please let me know if you have any questions.
>> Thanks, Andre
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