Re: [gentoo-dev] Re: Improving Gentoo User Relations

[Christel Dahlskjaer <christel@gentoo.org>]

Heya Chris, 

Thank you for responding!

On Fri, 2006-04-07 at 09:51 +0100, Christopher O'Neill wrote:
> As a Gentoo user, one thing that I'd very much like to see is improved
> communication between the dev teams and the users.  At the moment it
> feels pretty much like I am in the dark as regarding to how we are
> progressing on certain things.  Let me pick some examples:


So, if we somehow ensured we kept up to date with projects and where
they were at and maybe worked closely with our GWN liaison to maybe do a
'whats hot' type section of what's brewing? 
Now, as there is constant change I don't think we could make sure that
we could keep you updated on every single detail but we could certainly
entertain the thought of looking into ways of giving a brief update on
various projects progress.

> . A few days ago someone posted on the dev list asking about KDE3.5.x
> and it's current masked status.  As a KDE user myself I was also
> interested in the answer to his question, but to my dismay his first
> response was less than helpful! Although he did eventually get a
> satisfactory response, wouldn't it have been better if he hadn't had
> to ask at all? I'm sure many more people are wondering the same and
> probably aren't subscribed to this list.

I watched that thread with much interest. And yes, we need to improve
developer to user communication/information on other mediums as well.
Mind, a decent number of developers make good use of their planet. blogs
and they are always good to keep an eye on.

> 
> . I notice certain other popular distros are now running GCC4 (and
> have been for some time), yet we are still running 3.4.6 (on ~x86). I
> know it's a lot of work ensuring that all packages compile properly
> with GCC4 and that there are no introduced bugs, but I have no idea
> how we are progressing on this - and wouldn't even like to ask for
> fear of asking in the wrong place..

Yes, I think the fear issue is quite a big one for many users, and for
some developers and prevent them from both asking questions and piping
in with ideas. And we certainly need to work on making people feel more
welcome again. 

> 
> . How's portage 2.1 getting along? I notice it gets frequent updates.
> 
> I am not asking for answers for those questions, they are merely
> examples (I could think of many more, so please don't single these
> out).  The point I am making is how we (the users) are in the dark on
> how Gentoo is progressing. This is the main reason I have subscribed
> to this mailing list (as well as Gentoo-Users) in an attempt to keep
> track of what's happening, but without much success).

We will look at what other ways we have of keeping people informed, and
see how we can make various projects work together on making sure we
reach as many users as possible.

> Ideally, what I'd like is for the various dev teams to compile a
> weekly status report, which could then be compiled into the weekly
> newsletter (which currently seems to be lacking much useful
> information).  It would be great if we (the users) could find out
> what's going on behind the scenes of our favourite distribution.

That is a pretty decent idea, however I suspect many developers already
invest whatever time they have in to the work they currently do and
won't be looking to take on yet another task. We may however look at
ways of keeping updated with various projects and doing something with
GWN to keep you more up to date. It's certainly something we are happy
to toy with to try find a way of doing this that works both for
$rand_project, User Relations, GWN and the target userbase.

> Anyway Christel, I hope this is the sort of response you are looking for.

Again, Thank you very much Chris. It was certainly the sort of response
I was after! If you have anything to add, don't hesitate to grab us!

Christel


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