And perhaps we could change the name of this mailing list to devel-support. That still sounds like the place for noobs to get support .

On Thu, Mar 17, 2011 at 10:07 PM, Randy Fay <randy@randyfay.com> wrote:

OK, I have another proposal:

Let's move all non-support (announcements to developers primarily, or policy discussion, that sort of thing) off this mailing list and onto a Developers group on Groups.drupal.org, where only announcement-type material is posted. That way those who want to use this as a support list can do so, and those who want to use StackExchange and other venues can do so, but everybody knows where non-support things of interest to developers are announced.

And perhaps we could change the name of this mailing list to devel-support.

-Randy

On Thu, Mar 17, 2011 at 7:32 PM, nan wich <nan_wich@bellsouth.net> wrote:

...

-1 for me. I have yet to find an actual discussion on SE.

*Nancy*

Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. -- Dr. Martin L. King, Jr.

------------------------------ *From:* Randy Fay <randy@randyfay.com> *To:* development <development@drupal.org> *Sent:* Thu, March 17, 2011 1:24:34 PM *Subject:* [development] Proposal: Move all dev support off this list to new StackExchange site

The new http://drupal.stackexchange.com is now live, and several outstanding Drupal contributors are monitoring and contributing to it.

It seems like we'd get better long-term use of people's time if we did development support over there, where it's searchable, and where repeat questions can be answered by an internet search instead of everybody reading and answering the same thing over and over.

And yes, I'm in favor of providing this capability on Drupal.org<http://drupal.org/>, as per http://drupal.org/node/1047632, but for now, what about taking dev support off this list since there's such a good alternative?

-Randy

-- Randy Fay Drupal Module and Site Development randy@randyfay.com +1 <970.462.7450>970.462.7450

-- Randy Fay Drupal Module and Site Development randy@randyfay.com +1 970.462.7450

My problem is that while I enjoy providing support and in a few areas consider it my responsibility, I don't like to have to handle similar questions multiple times. And the mailing list approach to support does not promote context or alternate support vehicles. In many ways this list is Twitter's "Dear #lazyweb". I don't mind. I just want to be able to offer support in a more efficient way,and in a way that encourages people offering support to have good resources before they ask. This list has long been, as Angie notes, a dev support list. That's not so bad. It's just that we could improve the quality by finding better, more contextual ways to offer support. Oh well :-) -Randy On Thu, Mar 17, 2011 at 8:58 PM, Angela Byron <drupal-devel@webchick.net>wrote:

On 2011-03-17, at 7:21 PM, Walt Daniels wrote:

...

And perhaps we could change the name of this mailing list to devel-support. That still sounds like the place for noobs to get support .

Well, that's essentially what this list has become, and why most of the people who used to frequent the list back in 2005-2007 no longer do.

It used to be that this list was for high-level strategical discussions around core/contrib/d.o development, active brainstorming on big problem solving, important announcements that affected CVS (now Git) account holders, and those sort of things. What we currently (badly) use "meta" issues and a variety of fragmented groups on g.d.o for, was what this development list was for at one time. Support questions were directed to the forums or to IRC.

However, over time, the volume of support requests coming into this list for "Is there a module that does what I want?" and "How come my code is broken?" have far out-stripped most of the veterans' ability to ask, repeatedly, for them to be taken off-list. And so most of them have by now vacated the premises in favour of lower-traffic IRC channels like #drupal-contribute or to groups.drupal.org silos. These mediums have now mostly taken over the core function the mailing list used to, but in an ad-hoc, "you only know about it if you happened to be there or if some kind soul wrote a summary in the issue queue about it" fashion. This "support creep" has been happening in lots of other places too over the past couple of years: #drupal, issue queues, etc. and it all only exacerbates the problem of the more dedicated and hard working individuals withdrawing away from the larger community in an attempt to maintain some sort of sanity. All of which is *extremely* detrimental to our community, including the people who need support.

I believe Randy's proposal is an attempt to rectify this situation, and get this mailing list back to its roots, by providing an alternate mechanism for both support and important announcements. I don't agree that shuffling contributors off of Drupal.org is the answer (I have a long-winded, ranty blog post about this I need to write up sometime...), but I also frankly don't believe that this list will ever overcome the stigma/reputation that's grown up around it among the core group of contributors, even if we were all to do a concerted effort to get the content back under quality control. It's easier to just give up and call a spade a spade (or, in this case, a development support list a development support list). :(

-Angie

On Thu, Mar 17, 2011 at 10:07 PM, Randy Fay <randy@randyfay.com> wrote:

...

OK, I have another proposal:

Let's move all non-support (announcements to developers primarily, or policy discussion, that sort of thing) off this mailing list and onto a Developers group on Groups.drupal.org, where only announcement-type material is posted. That way those who want to use this as a support list can do so, and those who want to use StackExchange and other venues can do so, but everybody knows where non-support things of interest to developers are announced.

And perhaps we could change the name of this mailing list to devel-support.

-Randy

On Thu, Mar 17, 2011 at 7:32 PM, nan wich <nan_wich@bellsouth.net> wrote:

...

-1 for me. I have yet to find an actual discussion on SE.

*Nancy*

Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. -- Dr. Martin L. King, Jr.

------------------------------ *From:* Randy Fay <randy@randyfay.com> *To:* development <development@drupal.org> *Sent:* Thu, March 17, 2011 1:24:34 PM *Subject:* [development] Proposal: Move all dev support off this list to new StackExchange site

The new http://drupal.stackexchange.com is now live, and several outstanding Drupal contributors are monitoring and contributing to it.

It seems like we'd get better long-term use of people's time if we did development support over there, where it's searchable, and where repeat questions can be answered by an internet search instead of everybody reading and answering the same thing over and over.

And yes, I'm in favor of providing this capability on Drupal.org<http://drupal.org/>, as per http://drupal.org/node/1047632, but for now, what about taking dev support off this list since there's such a good alternative?

-Randy

-- Randy Fay Drupal Module and Site Development randy@randyfay.com +1 <970.462.7450> <970.462.7450>970.462.7450

-- Randy Fay Drupal Module and Site Development randy@randyfay.com +1 <970.462.7450>970.462.7450

-- Randy Fay Drupal Module and Site Development randy@randyfay.com +1 970.462.7450

I wish there was some way to save the mailing list format. It is awesome for listening in on conversations and has always been a great way of ambient learning for me. * Ryan LeTulle* On Thu, Mar 17, 2011 at 10:33 PM, <jeff@ayendesigns.com> wrote:

Well, I was really without an opinion one way or the other until I read this. For my part, I have certainly asked a number of questions here, primarily because they are heavy lifting questions and I found most of the helpful souls in #drupal-support to be more of the site-building types than bitheads, and when I first crossed paths with this list it was apparently already 'polluted,' so I came away thinking this was what it was for. And also, I freely admit that I found a lot of pleasure in reading opinions on the best way to accomplish things FROM people like Angie, Earl, Randy, Dave, Larry and the other heavy hitters. In a world where, despite best intentions, the architecture is not necessarily intuitive, the handbook often falls short (yes, I need to help out there) and the demand on us as developers leaves less and less time available to spend 2-3 hours hunting and reading to empower 5 minutes of coding, it was one of the few places I've had a warm and fuzzy feeling. All of that, though, was simply my ignorance as to what this list is supposed to be. So, all of that said, I think those who established it and used it while it was still being what was intended ought to make the decision. I'm quite happy to seek assistance wherever a place exists, and, now that I know, excited to think that there can again be a place, here or wherever you all decide, for me to eavesdrop on the types of discussions that used to occur here.

Jeff

On 03/17/2011 10:58 PM, Angela Byron wrote:

Well, that's essentially what this list has become, and why most of the people who used to frequent the list back in 2005-2007 no longer do.

It used to be that this list was for high-level strategical discussions around core/contrib/d.o development, active brainstorming on big problem solving, important announcements that affected CVS (now Git) account holders, and those sort of things. What we currently (badly) use "meta" issues and a variety of fragmented groups on g.d.o for, was what this development list was for at one time. Support questions were directed to the forums or to IRC.

However, over time, the volume of support requests coming into this list for "Is there a module that does what I want?" and "How come my code is broken?" have far out-stripped most of the veterans' ability to ask, repeatedly, for them to be taken off-list. And so most of them have by now vacated the premises in favour of lower-traffic IRC channels like #drupal-contribute or to groups.drupal.org silos. These mediums have now mostly taken over the core function the mailing list used to, but in an ad-hoc, "you only know about it if you happened to be there or if some kind soul wrote a summary in the issue queue about it" fashion. This "support creep" has been happening in lots of other places too over the past couple of years: #drupal, issue queues, etc. and it all only exacerbates the problem of the more dedicated and hard working individuals withdrawing away from the larger community in an attempt to maintain some sort of sanity. All of which is *extremely* detrimental to our community, including the people who need support.

I believe Randy's proposal is an attempt to rectify this situation, and get this mailing list back to its roots, by providing an alternate mechanism for both support and important announcements. I don't agree that shuffling contributors off of Drupal.org is the answer (I have a long-winded, ranty blog post about this I need to write up sometime...), but I also frankly don't believe that this list will ever overcome the stigma/reputation that's grown up around it among the core group of contributors, even if we were all to do a concerted effort to get the content back under quality control. It's easier to just give up and call a spade a spade (or, in this case, a development support list a development support list). :(

Perhaps we could go with the idea that this is a development support list and simply create a new list called, for instance, core-contribution? That way, there's absolutely no way that somebody could misinterpret the name of the list to mean something that it's not intended to mean. That is, I think part of the problem that this list is having is that it's called "development". It's not drupal-core-development or core-development or no-noobs-allowed-development. Because of that, people can (and apparently frequently have) misinterpreted the purpose of the list. We split off the core contribution part of #drupal to #drupal-contribute. I propose that we do the same here. Thanks, Cameron On Thu, Mar 17, 2011 at 21:45, <jeff@ayendesigns.com> wrote:

This is probably a bad idea for more than one reason, but would there be a way to have the list moderated for first-pass messages... i.e. those that are not in reply? If by some chance it's not a horrid idea, and if there's a process for it, I'd volunteer time to weed out and send a canned reply to support questions...even my own :)

On 03/17/2011 11:40 PM, Ryan LeTulle wrote:

I wish there was some way to save the mailing list format. It is awesome for listening in on conversations and has always been a great way of ambient learning for me. *

Ryan LeTulle*

When I started in Drupal a bit over four years ago, most of the questions asked here would have been posted in the [searchable] forums. There were even people who "specialized" in answering questions there. Why do we no longer encourage using the forums for questions that will be asked time and time again? Even most of the "Why doesn't ... work" questions would leave a valuable searchable trail there. True it might not be quite as fast, but it worked most of the time. Then, if those annoying questions don't begin with "I posted in the forums three days ago..." we can easily say, "Go forth and post."   Nancy   Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. -- Dr. Martin L. King, Jr. ________________________________ From: Cameron Eagans That is, I think part of the problem that this list is having is that it's called "development". It's not drupal-core-development or core-development or no-noobs-allowed-development. Because of that, people can (and apparently frequently have) misinterpreted the purpose of the list. Perhaps we could go with the idea that this is a development support list and simply create a new list called, for instance, core-contribution? That way, there's absolutely no way that somebody could misinterpret the name of the list to mean something that it's not intended to mean.

I think we badly need a list for high-level strategic discussions. There have been a couple suggestions about just creating a new list that clearly has that purpose rather than trying to find a way to get this list back to what that was. What about creating a new list called 'core-conversations'. No newbie could ever imagine that was a support list and it is very clear what it is for. The core conversations at DrupalCon this year were some of the best things about the conference for me and a year-round way of having (or at least starting) those conversations would be a great thing for Drupal. We could also use it to propose/discuss the strategic initiatives that Dries wants to use for future development. Karen On Thu, Mar 17, 2011 at 9:58 PM, Angela Byron <drupal-devel@webchick.net>wrote:

t used to be that this list was for high-level strategical discussions around core/contrib/d.o development, active brainstorming on big problem solving, important announcements that affected CVS (now Git) account holders, and those sort of things. What we currently (badly) use "meta" issues and a variety of fragmented groups on g.d.o for, was what this development list was for at one time. Support questions were directed to the forums or to IRC.

A very long time ago, in January 2008, I wondered in the General discussion forum why "I am not receiving any updates on forum threads I participate in". I genuinely thought something was temporarily not working and I hoped it would be fixed! You can still see the responses at http://drupal.org/node/216337 -- generally unhelpful ("Teh subscriptions module is being rewritten", "the few notification modules were not the most well maintained modules", "performance impact of the modules in their state") -- and ultimately closing with killes's disappointing final statement: "This is simply not implemented." Since that moment - I am sorry to say - I virtually stopped contributing or asking questions in the general Drupal forums because I got the impression that "support" areas like Post installation (http://drupal.org/forum/22) or General discussion (http://drupal.org/forum/2) are simply black holes for time and effort. One of the main reason is that there are no e-mail notifications for thread updates. The other is the huge level of duplication and poor searchability. When the d.o. redesign finally took place, one of the main features I was looking for was improvement of these black hole forums and added notifications. But little has changed in that area. So, instead, I have always been trying to locate and collaborate on precise issue threads and in g.d.o. groups and threads, where there tends to be more focus and the notifications do function. Still, I feel that the need for less categorizable questions and comments has been badly missing, so I have very much welcomed the http://drupal.stackexchange.com/ initiative. It features notifications (naturally, that's such a simple feature!), even feeds, people can vote on helpful answers, and there are several safeguards against duplicating content. Loyal to Drupal as I am, of course it hurts me that using it means shifting some activity away from the mother d.o. domain to an external platform. Especially because the same system could easily be done in Drupal! But sorry, efficiency and general progress of the Drupal project as a whole is much more important than fighting to keep inefficient forums on the d.o. domain.** So I am definitely with rfay and others who put so much good energy in trying to radically improve the general Drupal support situation. And as for this dev list - I post extremely rarely out of respect for all the more experienced people, but I read virtually all posts and try to from them as much as I can. It is useful to have it because it offers a stream of unpredictable and therefore potentially inspiring issues. But I can also imagine simply following the new questions feed at http://drupal.stackexchange.com/feeds instead! vacilando http://twitter.com/vacilandois On Fri, Mar 18, 2011 at 12:17, Ronald Ashri <ronald@istos.it> wrote:

Really like Karen's suggestion - a mailing list is a simple effective way to stay in touch that most people can agree with and use.

Let us strictly police it so it does not stray and with respect to David's point about contrib vs core discussions I would say let us keep it strictly core - in the exact spirit of Core Conversations - just like the Snowman likes it :-)

On Fri, Mar 18, 2011 at 11:42 AM, Karen Stevenson <karen@elderweb.com> wrote:

...

I think we badly need a list for high-level strategic discussions. There have been a couple suggestions about just creating a new list that clearly has that purpose rather than trying to find a way to get this list back to what that was. What about creating a new list called 'core-conversations'. No newbie could ever imagine that was a support list and it is very clear what it is for. The core conversations at DrupalCon this year were some of the best things about the conference for me and a year-round way of having (or at least starting) those conversations would be a great thing for Drupal. We could also use it to propose/discuss the strategic initiatives that Dries wants to use for future development.

Karen

On Thu, Mar 17, 2011 at 9:58 PM, Angela Byron <drupal-devel@webchick.net

wrote:

...

t used to be that this list was for high-level strategical discussions around core/contrib/d.o development, active brainstorming on big problem solving, important announcements that affected CVS (now Git) account holders, and those sort of things. What we currently (badly) use "meta" issues and a variety of fragmented groups on g.d.o for, was what this development list was for at one time. Support questions were directed to

the

...

forums or to IRC.

This is a great discussion! First, let me point out the "Improvements to Core" group on g.d.o. http://groups.drupal.org/improvements-core It has 167 members, including many of the "elite" (though I hate that term). Notably, Dries, and I'm many others are missing. But that could change. That group is moderately active. I think it fits many of the needs being addressed in this conversation, especially if it became more active. G.d.o uses Notifications and Messaging, modules, yes? A huge improvement would be achieved if *full messages* were sent in the email notifications instead of only the links to g.d.o. That improvement is just a matter of changing a simple setting, yes? That would be HUGE. Who has the power to make that decision and how is it implemented? The next step is for g.d.o to accept replies and/or posts via email. I understand that is a much bigger task. But is that goal on any working group's to-do list. If so, what is the address for that group? In short, I think improving g.d.o. is the most important thing. I am -1 for shutting down this list. It's use and value will evolve over time. It has been the address for some great discussions. The fact that they may be infrequent doesn't mean they are unimportant. I also want to give more testimony to support what David Meltzer said about the support list. It's not only for newbies. I'm a site builder and I answer a lot of the newbie or even advanced site building questions. But then Dave and others pitch in to answer module development questions. I both ask and answer questions on the list, as do others, and that is the ideal for a support list. I'd prefer it be on g.d.o. but I won't lobby for that until notifications improves significantly. Finally, I do think it is important for site-builders, UI folks and other non-hard-core developers are present when some of the philosophical questions are discussed -- even ones where the "philosophy" is all about the code. Shai Gluskin Owner, Content2zero

On 2011-03-18, at 8:53 AM, Daniel F. Kudwien wrote:

I agree with Angie, Cameron, and Karen. Just like we have #drupal-contribute, we could also need a clearly separated mailing list for all topics focusing on Drupal contributions. That is, regardless of whether core or contrib, or code or usability.

The separation in IRC has proven to be a good idea, as far as I can tell.

Warning: This is an off-topic rant. No. This is actually one of the most damaging things we have *ever* done to our community's health, both in the short term, but especially in the long term. The moment that Drupal 7 came out, this is what was happening in #drupal-contribute, faster than the speed of light: 10:20:17 PM dmitrig01: dries++ 10:20:17 PM davereid: drupal7++ 10:20:17 PM bellHead: beejeebus: Sure - that's the goal. LOC is a far easier metric. 10:20:17 PM ksenzee: liammcdermott: lol 10:20:17 PM Crell: everyone++ 10:20:19 PM Crell: everyone++ 10:20:20 PM dmitrig01: dries++ 10:20:21 PM Crell: everyone++ 10:20:21 PM carlos8f: http://drupalcode.org/viewvc/drupal/drupal/?pathrev=DRUPAL-7-0 http://drupalcode.org/viewvc/drupal/drupal/?pathrev=DRUPAL-7-0 http://drupalcode.org/viewvc/drupal/drupal/?pathrev=DRUPAL-7-0 10:20:21 PM liammcdermott: webchick++ 10:20:22 PM Crell: everyone++ 10:20:22 PM liammcdermott: webchick++ 10:20:23 PM arianek: goodness you crazies 10:20:23 PM jacine: *hugs #drupal-contribute* 10:20:23 PM Crell: everyone++ 10:20:25 PM Crell: everyone++ 10:20:26 PM hejrocker: webchick++ 10:20:26 PM Crell: everyone++ Conversely, here's what was going on in #drupal: robbiethegeek [~robbiethe@12.88.235.74] entered the room. (10:34:24 AM) awjr [~arthur@rthrrchrds.com] entered the room. (10:34:30 AM) V1ntage [~chatzilla@133.30-240-81.adsl-dyn.isp.belgacom.be] entered the room. (10:34:48 AM) Stalski [~stalski@78-21-58-227.access.telenet.be] entered the room. (10:35:09 AM) ryanblair [~ryanblair@216.136.44.83] entered the room. (10:35:13 AM) Stalski left the room. (10:35:18 AM) amye [~amye@c-98-246-185-241.hsd1.or.comcast.net] entered the room. (10:35:19 AM) Bes` [~Guillaume@ax313-5-78-227-128-243.fbx.proxad.net] entered the room. (10:35:20 AM) Stalski [~stalski@78-21-58-227.access.telenet.be] entered the room. (10:35:25 AM) Haza`Aw is now known as Haza` (10:35:37 AM) Irishgringo [~chatzilla@c-66-229-63-143.hsd1.fl.comcast.net] entered the room. (10:36:13 AM) langworthy [~langworth@96.49.144.231] entered the room. (10:36:39 AM) 10:36:40 AM awjr: if i have a module X that calls 'module_invoke_all( 'Y' )', and module X implements hook Y, will Y in module X get invoked? gua_ould left the room (quit: Ping timeout: 276 seconds). (10:36:44 AM) ryanblair left the room (quit: Client Quit). (10:36:56 AM) pwolanin [~pwolanin@drupal.org/user/49851/view] entered the room. (10:37:47 AM) arianek [~arianek@S0106001b63f4b826.vc.shawcable.net] entered the room. (10:38:03 AM) marsilainen [~matt@217.48.125.91.rb3.adsl.brightview.com] entered the room. (10:38:04 AM) arianek left the room (quit: Changing host). (10:38:07 AM) arianek [~arianek@drupal.org/user/158886/view] entered the room. (10:38:07 AM) stella [~stella@78.16.73.62] entered the room. (10:38:33 AM) jjdonson [~jjdonson@pool-108-41-8-217.nycmny.fios.verizon.net] entered the room. (10:38:35 AM) churel_ left the room (quit: Ping timeout: 264 seconds). (10:38:39 AM) 10:39:04 AM darthsteven: Does a D7 issue that is about a test that would cause a fail if it were testing correctly count as a critical issue? iszak [~iszak@unaffiliated/supavisah] entered the room. (10:39:32 AM) It's impossible to understate how fundamentally damaging this shift is. We've relegated the architects, the builders, the collaborators, the "doers"—the people who fundamentally make the Drupal project what it is and are the heart and soul of our culture—to their own "sub" community in a hidden silo off to the side. We've taught newcomers to the project that IRC is the place to consume, to get help, to make demands, to *take*. And we've created both a physical and psychological divide between "us" and "them," where it used to be all "us". And, most distressingly, there is no longer a pathway for going between "them" and "us" because most of "us" have long since stopped going to #drupal due to the volume of support that happens there now since there is no one left to enforce the culture of getting involved. We've repeated this "retreat into our shell" pattern over and over again. IRC (#drupal -> #drupal-contribute), mailing lists (development -> groups/issue queues), the forums (issue queues). What we're left with now is an entire "generation" of Drupal users who think Drupal.org is a place to *consume*, not a place to *participate*. In the end, I have absolutely no idea where Drupal 9 core/contrib developers are going to come from. And that is absolutely terrifying. -Angie And, fwiw, I "called" this inevitable outcome back in 2009 when this shift was proposed: http://drupal.org/node/634486#comment-2272630 Bleh. :(

On 3/18/2011 12:49 PM, Angela Byron wrote:

We've relegated the architects, the builders, the collaborators, the "doers"—the people who fundamentally make the Drupal project what it is and are the heart and soul of our culture—to their own "sub" community in a hidden silo off to the side. We've taught newcomers to the project that IRC is the place to consume, to get help, to make demands, to *take*. And we've created both a physical and psychological divide between "us" and "them," where it used to be all "us". And, most distressingly, there is no longer a pathway for going between "them" and "us" because most of "us" have long since stopped going to #drupal due to the volume of support that happens there now since there is no one left to enforce the culture of getting involved.

No, we have not. We were each doing this, individually. I had left #drupal long before #drupal-contribute was a reality, and others had done the same. At what point are you going to understand that the amount of information being processed in the main channels is now significantly beyond the ability for most people to process? Really, a way to translate what you're saying is that you'd rather *I* didn't have a place where I can participate, because I don't want to be inundated with support requests. If you want to damage the community, by all means, get rid of #drupal-contribute and try to lump everyone together at once. I guarantee you, the bulk of the architects will go somewhere else anyway. Maybe off of IRC entirely because #drupal had become a fundamentally unfriendly place to be.

On 3/18/2011 1:52 PM, Sam Tresler wrote:

...

Really, a way to translate what you're saying is that you'd rather *I* didn't have a place where I can participate, because I don't want to be inundated with support requests.

This isn't about you. That thinking is part of the problem, in my opinion. We're having a conversation here about what is best for Drupal, not what is best for the developers. I'm not trying to be inflammatory, but making the project worse for the end users, the documenters, the forum posters, and various other people who bring good things to the table isn't a tenable solution.

Prior to #drupal-contribute being split out, we had a bot that would, several times a day, 'correct' people about which channel they should be asking support questions in. Sometimes these corrections were taken amiss. No matter how politely we framed them, I always found these corrections to be offensive. One of the reasons I left #drupal was because I was tired of how offensive that was. What webchick wants is a place where everyone can gather and be happy. But, like you just said, we can't please everyone. If the choice is to please new people who may or may not contribute, who may or may not stick around, at the expense of people who are contributing and have stuck around, that is going to create churn. I'm not in agreement with the camp that says our current system is telling new users to go away. I think our OLD system was telling new users to go away, by throwing them into an environment that they fundamentally won't be ready for. And I think it's wrong to insist that people who are on IRC to do work have to stick around in an environment where they will have to watch a bot tell new users to screw off (in nicer words...well, eventually. For at least a year it was NOT nicer words) is fundamentally wrong and counterproductive. Naturally, I find it interesting that when I tried to write from my experience and my example and how I use IRC, the responses are "This isn't about you." Why are you allowed to write about your experiences as being normal, yet my experience makes me elitist and/or childish? Why is it you're assuming that I'm only doing this to make my life easier, and screw the newbies? Am I really that curmudgeonly? So, making this about me: I just interpreted, "Get off IRC. It's for new people." (Yes, that's tongue in cheek).

On 3/18/2011 3:23 PM, Sam Tresler wrote:

How do we make an infrastructure that supports newcomers, facilitates developers, concentrates on non-disruptive integration of factions, and keeps our community strong?" When I say 'you won't please everybody' I mean it, but I feel like the current conversation is please A or please B, there is no C.

Good question. Right now a lot of the conversation is between a camp that can't handle an everything-in-one place system versus a camp that thinks the soloing is bad. I personally don't see a universe where siloing doesn't happen. Either it happens officially or not, and officially makes it easier to figure out where the silos are and enter them. If they're unofficial silos, then they *are* going to come off extremely elitist. So one thing I'm noticing from earlier: #drupal-dev is actually closed and gone. Because it's been made invite-only, and that happened quite some time back, a number of people now think it's a developer hideout. Only it's not -- NO one is invited there. Not even Druplicon. (Neil, not trying to pick on you; I also heard a similar story at least once on IRC today as well, by someone who didn't know #drupal-dev had been shut down). Perhaps one issue is this: It's perfectly okay to come into #drupal-contribute and lurk. One of the reasons for #drupal-contribute is that we can focus the topic. IF we tell someone they're off topic there, it's a lot clearer that someone has crossed the line just due to the name of the channel. #drupal by itself has no clarity of naming, and no one reads topics. Telling people they're off topic in #drupal very quickly leads to hurt feelings because it's not immediately super clear what actually is on topic there. And this is one of the underlying reasons: Focused, topical channels are flat out easier to deal with. I don't think I have a problem at all with #drupal-contribute becoming/being a high volume channel if it's full of people, you know, contributing. That means we're doing awesome. So what I think what webchick *really* wants is a way for #drupal to be step one, where you go, maybe get help, get indoctrinated, and don't have to worry about being yelled at for being off topic, and once you've gotten your feet wet or gotten used to the fact that the water's kind of cold, you can start moving into more focused areas, armed with the knowledge of how to do it. We all know that new people on IRC simply aren't going to know netiquette, but that doesn't make it any less irritating when that netiquette is not followed. Maybe we need to do a better job of saying, "Hey, come and lurk in #drupal-contribute". YOu can learn a lot just by watching conversations in there. It doesn't fit everyone's personalities, though. One thing those of us who spend a LOT of time on IRC forget is that there's a large swath of contributors who spend almost no time on IRC at all. For some people, IRC is just fundamentally unfriendly.

Earl Miles wrote:

some people, IRC is just fundamentally unfriendly.

Not unfriendly, impossible to use as a result of restrictions or environment or time. It is impossible for me to contribute on IRC because of the requirement of immediacy to its use and I don't have minutes to participate in the immediate discussions at hand. With email I can contribute, answer questions, get involved in a more relaxed way. The issue is really the focus of each individual more than it is being elite to newbie. There are some individuals more focused on core and making core do more for its end users who make modules and websites from it. The problem is, the newbie who doesn't always do due diligence in finding the information on using core even though the information exists. And to add to the problem of information is the old information being found instead of the current release which changed something in the old information so we have too much old and outdated information being found when the some due diligence is attempted causing the end user to give up and ask. Therefore it is good to have these "silos" or in other words focus groups in place because the work on Drupal core needs specialty which isn't found in common and perhaps there needs to be a focus group to deal with transition into the Drupal core focus group to set the expectations for that group beyond contributing in the issues queue. -- Earnie -- http://progw.com -- http://www.for-my-kids.com

If we had such an 'obsolete' tag, it would be nice to add color coding to them (make the background pink or something) so you can tell when you're looking at it that it is probably out of date. On Sat, Mar 19, 2011 at 3:13 PM, Brian Vuyk <brian@brianvuyk.com> wrote:

On 11-03-19 03:23 PM, Earnie Boyd wrote:

...

And to add to the problem of information is the old information being found instead of the current release which changed something in the old information so we have too much old and outdated information being found when the some due diligence is attempted causing the end user to give up and ask.

I think the above is a huge problem encountered when using the Drupal.org search functionality. And this is a problem that will only get worse over time. There is a lot of 'cruft' on drupal.org that only relates to unsupported releases, and has no application to current releases.

I wonder if it would be beneficial to make an 'archive' or 'obsolete' flag available to documentation team members, which can be applied to all content on Drupal.org, then have those nodes removed from search by default...

I agree that drupal.org becoming "facebook", where both real-time and support interactions would be welcome and managed well would be fantastic. And we could do that with subsites that don't need such careful supervision. Why couldn't we let members of the community launch subsites like support.drupal.org and make of them what they could? Or launch a chat site specifically for support that had far more sophisticated features than IRC? IMO this is good thinking. -Randy On Sat, Mar 19, 2011 at 7:16 PM, Blake Senftner <bsenftner@earthlink.net>wrote:

This whole thing has led me to realize the head shaking irony that is at the core of this newbie question overload issue: Drupal does not eat it's own food. We've not made a well functioning online community with our platform that is architected for creating online communities. The d.o is scavenger hunt. I spend time answering questions at the forums, of things I know, but I only know what I know and Drupal is huge. My feelings are that new, intermediate and advanced drupal site builders, module developers, and large enterprise architects are all continually searching for quality Drupal information.

Drupal documentation needs help. I write handbook pages, and feel that is probably my best time investment for the community. If someone finds themselves answering some "how to" more than twice, please take the time to write a handbook page, and include the Drupal and module versions in that information.

If we were to add some useful interactive widgets to d.o and the handbook pages, we could get everyone seeking information to side-effect improve and fill out our missing documentation. We need more voting widgets for our handbook pages, tagging, and a search that works better than what we have now. Although I understand they had issues with them, the comments beneath each API page at php.net are rich with useful tidbits. Simply adding required version fields to any comments, and a voting mechanism would make handbook and API pages better resources than they are now. Plus they direct some community information-seeking-energy into d.o where it currently gets consumed by irc, mailing lists like this one, and now the drupal answers site at stackoverwhatever. Answers to questions in mailing lists, irc and the like are lost to d.o; we need to capture that information so others can benefit and spend more time doing rather than asking.

The best thing that could happen is this email list dies, irc dies, and private channels die because drupal.org becomes "Facebook" (not THEM, but I hope you know what I mean) where everyone "Drupalish" to "shadow ninji" contribute and interact in a "24-7" global drupal gathering. There really ought to be a way that each person's account at d.o can have "modules" or something similar (like a Facebook App) that can be contributed, and used at d.o. Then useful whatever-we-call-these will be created, fun, useless, and invaluable ones will be created, and to some degree d.o will radically, radically change. I think such changes will make d.o actually become a community rather than the information scavenger hunt that it is now. As an online community, d.o only has the minimum set of 'community' features to engage with. All an "App" is, is a module that implements a block, and whatever logic is behind that block. We gotta have some security layer somewhere or other to enable these to be "sandboxed" or something similar.

Creating silos and private information channels is ignoring our own food that we make everyday for ourselves, clients and our employers. We need to make a way for all this energy to go into improving d.o, its information and its ability for someone to 'make it their own' as in contribute, interact and feel a part of the great, huge global gathering. Someone, some group, within drupal needs to just do it. Raise the pirate flag, if need be. If you're anything like me, you spend too much time looking for how than actually doing. We can change that. We really can. A big part of that would be making a feedback loop within d.o, like "apps" that one could install into your d.o account, which anyone could contribute and learn from. Make d.o the place where people "hang out", learn, converse, contribute their latest creation, and experience the creations of our fellow drupalistas, while getting working examples of what clever thing they did.

Sincerely, -Blake bsenftner@earthlink.net www.BlakeSenftner.com www.MissingUbercartManual.com

-- Randy Fay Drupal Module and Site Development randy@randyfay.com +1 970.462.7450

I dunno .. I've been around since about Drupal 4.6. Have some modules behind my back, but most of what I do, I do for clients and it ends there. I used to run support on the forums, but in the end, the forums just seemed dead. I haven't been on IRC for a long while, though I used to hang out there, both in #drupal and #drupal-support. My Drupal blog is all but dead, though I still read planet.drupal.org regularly (daily). I never got into the groove of the Groups thing. Not even sure where to look and it doesn't just 'come to me' the way that mailing lists do. I'm on all the mailing lists, and I read - everything - even if I don't always reply. I try to hit support questions, as I can. I don't handle support on the forums anymore, as I find the forums relatively barren and uninteresting and just don't visit. I'd certainly hate for them to go away, although they certainly have changed shape and scope over the years. As has all of the communication venues. Lists put something in my inbox. When I have the time, I read them. I like that. Topics that I might not have sought out just magically come to me. The development list is *nothing* like it used to be. But it is still something. I'd hate for it to go away. How else am I expected to know what you a**holes are on about? ;) On Sat, Mar 19, 2011 at 11:26 PM, Charles Mattice < admin@authentic-empowerment.net> wrote:

personally, if you move everything online such as a drupal "facebook" it might help, then again it could blow up in drupals face. Yeah, it would be great to have a place where we could go and get relevant information.

I started with drupal around ver 4.5 with the civicspace version, I had looked at drupal earlier but at that time was a infant with portals and php-nuke was the best thing out there for quickly getting a site up. Nuke went through the same thing drupal is experiening, rapid growth, developer burn out, the consumers, and then the arrogance of what we at drupal call ""core developers"". Got to say drupal's ""core developers"" are not nearly as bad and this issue is nothing more than a growth spurt.

In my early days people were more open, if you had a question it was generally answered fairly quickly. It may not be what you wanted to here but you were directed to a resource that did in fact have a solution. Since then the whole drupal project, including contrib, has skyrocketed. Instead of a few hundred modules there are a few thousand. Yet at the same time the ratio of new developers to lets say core developers for lack of a better phrase has not even come close to matching that of the skyrocketing community.

I would say one of the reason for this has to deal with the response, or lack of response, to these lists. For instance, in working on the 6.x to 7.x update functions, if I would post something I could almost guarantee who would review it. Typically sun or catch and maybe chx or damz, and yes I learned alot for working with it and the comments I received. but there were other times as well when I would post something and get totally shot out of my seat as I was a bother and didn't know what the f*uck I was talking about and didn't understand. Of course these responses usually came from names I did not recognize but all in all is this the reputation we want for drupal. A couple of times I came close to saying screw it do it your self.

Do I have any commits? NO!, Did I contribute? YES!, Was it worth it? YES and why? I might have been able to contribute back to a community that I have benefited from. Drupal is unique in that anyone can be a ""core developer"", yes there is structure there has to be and for any community to thrive it must be structured accordingly. Success comes from the top down in business or in a community the leaders down. Their impact on the success (or failure) depends on their involvement and how they interact with people.

Now getting back to a facebook drupal and possibly subsites. This could be a good thing to distribute the load, but there still needs to be this list and others so we, who have precious few minutes to contribute may prefer to use. I believe at one time this was brought up (civicspace days) and a bunch of drupal information sites started to crop up, then came the tug of wars on who had the better information and drupal.org itself started to suffer with the newer information lacking behind. hence whether official of not, it was decided that it should be drupal.org that was the main source for information. I think this was right before Dries legally took ownership of the drupal copyright.

If drupal becomes another "Facebook", how soon will it be before the same issues crop up, ie; can't find what your looking for , can't get a decent support response, blah, blah, blah.... How soon will "Drupal Facebook" become "Drupal MySpace"

If subsites crop up to help with the load, whose going to be the main repository, drupal or the subsite if that's where everyone starts to go. Social networking is great for some, but I have seen many sites come and go. In the end it all boils down to the individual, what they want, how they learn, and whether they are willing to give back to the community, even if its only to say "Hey you might want to give drupal a shot."

As someone once said "everything matters", how we deal with "everything" will eventually determine the outcome of drupal and whether our community thrives.

On 3/19/2011 9:34 PM, Randy Fay wrote:

I agree that drupal.org becoming "facebook", where both real-time and support interactions would be welcome and managed well would be fantastic.

And we could do that with subsites that don't need such careful supervision.

Why couldn't we let members of the community launch subsites like support.drupal.org and make of them what they could? Or launch a chat site specifically for support that had far more sophisticated features than IRC?

IMO this is good thinking.

-Randy

Just to point out, we don't need "mini modules" to accomplish this. Drupal.org, being a Drupal site, runs "real" modules. And by virtue of being on this list, we all know how to code them already. We also have a customizable dashboard in everyone's profile that reads in Drupal blocks, which is just implementing a hook in said modules. So if you want to add functionality to Drupal.org's user profiles, submit patches against http://drupal.org/project/drupalorg (most likely new modules under the "blocks_and_nodes" sub-directory there as a place to start). There's an installation profile at http://drupal.org/project/drupalorg_testing that gets you up and running with the set of modules that drupal.org runs and some basic data. On 2011-03-20, at 7:58 AM, Blake Senftner wrote:

I'd like to clarify a bit what I mean by "Facebook-ifying Drupal.org": with the Facebook API and their Apps, a large proportion of the "FB experience" is created by 3rd parties and simply available through facebook.com. If d.o were to enable people to create, contribute, load and run mini-modules that simply implement blocks for the user's d.o profile - THAT RIGHT THERE becomes the essence and "killer app" of the future of drupal support. To demonstrate some API or module feature - there's a mini-module-block with working logic. When someone has a support issue, they post a mini-module-block containing the paired down working logic of just their issue. When someone has an idea for a better rating/flagging/commenting system for d.o, they contribute a mini-module-block to d.o that implements it, where people can try it, learn from it, modify it themselves, and use it for their comments on d.o. Every API page has operating mini-module-blocks demonstrating how that API function works.

Yes, not every support issue nor every API or module feature can be demonstrated in a mini-module-block, but a huge proportion of them can, and their availability will remove an exponential amount of the new-to-drupal support issues.

I'm not thinking we'd get "MySpace"... I'm thinking we'd get "MySlashdotGeekbook" because the d.o community has broken it's learning into mini-digestible nuggets, enabling anyone curious about web development to play in our rich API sandbox, and we're all about making and showing each other how to make.

Yes, some people's profiles will be an eyesore nightmare like the worst of MySpace - but that's good because that person made it that way, and they could, and they learned from doing so.

I also think that if d.o were to do this, there's a possibility of the game developer community invading. Wanna have lot's of fun? Attract the game developer geeks to drupal. That's actually where I come from. (I was on both the 3DO and the PlayStation OS teams.) Drupal's already got everything necessary... and it's not like game developers like giving Facebook a huge chunk of their revenue.

Sincerely, -Blake bsenftner@earthlink.net www.BlakeSenftner.com www.MissingUbercartManual.com

On Mar 19, 2011, at 9:55 PM, William Smith wrote:

...

If drupal becomes another "Facebook", how soon will it be before the same issues crop up, ie; can't find what your looking for , can't get a decent support response, blah, blah, blah.... How soon will "Drupal Facebook" become "Drupal MySpace"

If subsites crop up to help with the load, whose going to be the main repository, drupal or the subsite if that's where everyone starts to go. Social networking is great for some, but I have seen many sites come and go. In the end it all boils down to the individual, what they want, how they learn, and whether they are willing to give back to the community, even if its only to say "Hey you might want to give drupal a shot."

As someone once said "everything matters", how we deal with "everything" will eventually determine the outcome of drupal and whether our community thrives.

On 3/19/2011 9:34 PM, Randy Fay wrote:

...

I agree that drupal.org becoming "facebook", where both real-time and support interactions would be welcome and managed well would be fantastic.

And we could do that with subsites that don't need such careful supervision.

Why couldn't we let members of the community launch subsites like support.drupal.org and make of them what they could? Or launch a chat site specifically for support that had far more sophisticated features than IRC?

IMO this is good thinking.

-Randy

Am 20.03.2011 17:37, schrieb Angela Byron:

Just to point out, we don't need "mini modules" to accomplish this. Drupal.org <http://Drupal.org>, being a Drupal site, runs "real" modules. And by virtue of being on this list, we all know how to code them already. We also have a customizable dashboard in everyone's profile that reads in Drupal blocks, which is just implementing a hook in said modules.

So if you want to add functionality to Drupal.org <http://Drupal.org>'s user profiles, submit patches against http://drupal.org/project/drupalorg (most likely new modules under the "blocks_and_nodes" sub-directory there as a place to start). There's an installation profile at http://drupal.org/project/drupalorg_testing that gets you up and running with the set of modules that drupal.org <http://drupal.org> runs and some basic data.

I think the proposal rather targets an open application framework approach (aka. "Apps") that is known in many different ways: - Facebook Apps - Google account services - Mozilla Firefox/Thunderbird/etc Add-ons - Browser user scripts/user styles - ... I.e., there's an unlimited amount of possible apps/plugins/modules, literally everyone can create and release new ones to their liking, and there are no changes required for the affected platform at all. Every user in the community decides which one they want to install or apply on their own. In the end, implementation functionality and maintenance burden is moved away from the primary platform, and the quality as well as usefulness of an app decides on its popularity, usage, and adoption. To a very limited extent, that's more or less what Dreditor is targeting - it tries to fulfill the needs of drupal.org "power users" without requiring any server-side changes. However, it's currently limited to pure UI tweaks that can be performed via JavaScript. Once Drupal exposes more of its resources via web service APIs (REST/JSON), Dreditor will be able to do much more - a lot more. Now, except for HTML5 Local Storage, Dreditor does not have any other means of handling user data and related information. If you'd consider that Dreditor would be available in an d.o apps directory and would have a dedicated storage space per user on drupal.org as soon as a d.o user installs it, all of your wildest dreams would become reality (and I know you have 'em too, as you already filed some crazy feature requests ;)... But that's just one of many possible use-cases. Given a proper framework and API, most of what has been mentioned and what is flowing around in terms of ideas to improve the user/support/help experience could be implemented in various ways. Why have all of those sheer endless discussions about how to do right to please everyone? Of which most still have no result after years of discussion? Just let there be 1-10 experimental apps per problem space that attempt to solve it, and while doing so, directly solve the problem for the time being. The best approach wins in the end. Bottom line: The apps approach provides many benefits. Instead of deciding top-down, the community freely decides bottom-up, without requiring a top-level decision at all. sun

As a developer of several contrib modules (previously including taxonomy_menu, a top 100 module) I agree. I'm not part of the *in* crowd and not allowed the #drupal-conttribute and do feel like an outsider. Not even letting people listen to your conversation kind of makes you look like a bunch of elitist. Another example is the creation of the D8 branch. Think of the lost opportunity to share this moment with nearly 4000 other Drupalers. Instead we got a tweet and a screenshot. I could feel the excitement of the people in the pictures and really wanted to be a part of that as I'm sure many others did. I feel like I'm on double-secret probation. Cheers, Neil On Fri, Mar 18, 2011 at 3:49 PM, Angela Byron <drupal-devel@webchick.net>wrote:

On 2011-03-18, at 8:53 AM, Daniel F. Kudwien wrote:

I agree with Angie, Cameron, and Karen. Just like we have #drupal-contribute, we could also need a clearly separated mailing list for all topics focusing on Drupal contributions. That is, regardless of whether core or contrib, or code or usability.

The separation in IRC has proven to be a good idea, as far as I can tell.

Warning: This is an off-topic rant.

No. This is actually one of the most damaging things we have *ever* done to our community's health, both in the short term, but especially in the long term.

The moment that Drupal 7 came out, this is what was happening in #drupal-contribute, faster than the speed of light:

10:20:17 PM dmitrig01: dries++ 10:20:17 PM davereid: drupal7++ 10:20:17 PM bellHead: beejeebus: Sure - that's the goal. LOC is a far easier metric. 10:20:17 PM ksenzee: liammcdermott: lol 10:20:17 PM Crell: everyone++ 10:20:19 PM Crell: everyone++ 10:20:20 PM dmitrig01: dries++ 10:20:21 PM Crell: everyone++ 10:20:21 PM carlos8f: http://drupalcode.org/viewvc/drupal/drupal/?pathrev=DRUPAL-7-0 http://drupalcode.org/viewvc/drupal/drupal/?pathrev=DRUPAL-7-0 http://drupalcode.org/viewvc/drupal/drupal/?pathrev=DRUPAL-7-0 10:20:21 PM liammcdermott: webchick++ 10:20:22 PM Crell: everyone++ 10:20:22 PM liammcdermott: webchick++ 10:20:23 PM arianek: goodness you crazies 10:20:23 PM jacine: *hugs #drupal-contribute* 10:20:23 PM Crell: everyone++ 10:20:25 PM Crell: everyone++ 10:20:26 PM hejrocker: webchick++ 10:20:26 PM Crell: everyone++

Conversely, here's what was going on in #drupal:

robbiethegeek [*~robbiethe@12.88.235.74*] entered the room. (10:34:24 AM) awjr [*~arthur@rthrrchrds.com*] entered the room. (10:34:30 AM) V1ntage [*~chatzilla@133.30-240-81.adsl-dyn.isp.belgacom.be*] entered the room. (10:34:48 AM) Stalski [*~stalski@78-21-58-227.access.telenet.be*] entered the room. (10:35:09 AM) ryanblair [*~ryanblair@216.136.44.83*] entered the room. (10:35:13 AM) Stalski left the room. (10:35:18 AM) amye [*~amye@c-98-246-185-241.hsd1.or.comcast.net*] entered the room. (10:35:19 AM) Bes` [*~Guillaume@ax313-5-78-227-128-243.fbx.proxad.net*] entered the room. (10:35:20 AM) Stalski [*~stalski@78-21-58-227.access.telenet.be*] entered the room. (10:35:25 AM) Haza`Aw is now known as Haza` (10:35:37 AM) Irishgringo [*~chatzilla@c-66-229-63-143.hsd1.fl.comcast.net*] entered the room. (10:36:13 AM) langworthy [*~langworth@96.49.144.231*] entered the room. (10:36:39 AM) 10:36:40 AM awjr: if i have a module X that calls 'module_invoke_all( 'Y' )', and module X implements hook Y, will Y in module X get invoked? gua_ould left the room (quit: Ping timeout: 276 seconds). (10:36:44 AM) ryanblair left the room (quit: Client Quit). (10:36:56 AM) pwolanin [*~pwolanin@drupal.org/user/49851/view*] entered the room. (10:37:47 AM) arianek [*~arianek@S0106001b63f4b826.vc.shawcable.net*] entered the room. (10:38:03 AM) marsilainen [*~matt@217.48.125.91.rb3.adsl.brightview.com*] entered the room. (10:38:04 AM) arianek left the room (quit: Changing host). (10:38:07 AM) arianek [*~arianek@drupal.org/user/158886/view*] entered the room. (10:38:07 AM) stella [*~stella@78.16.73.62*] entered the room. (10:38:33 AM) jjdonson [*~jjdonson@pool-108-41-8-217.nycmny.fios.verizon.net*] entered the room. (10:38:35 AM) churel_ left the room (quit: Ping timeout: 264 seconds). (10:38:39 AM) 10:39:04 AM darthsteven: Does a D7 issue that is about a test that would cause a fail if it were testing correctly count as a critical issue? iszak [*~iszak@unaffiliated/supavisah*] entered the room. (10:39:32 AM)

It's impossible to understate how fundamentally damaging this shift is.

We've relegated the architects, the builders, the collaborators, the "doers"—the people who fundamentally make the Drupal project what it is and are the heart and soul of our culture—to their own "sub" community in a hidden silo off to the side. We've taught newcomers to the project that IRC is the place to consume, to get help, to make demands, to *take*. And we've created both a physical and psychological divide between "us" and "them," where it used to be all "us". And, most distressingly, there is no longer a pathway for going between "them" and "us" because most of "us" have long since stopped going to #drupal due to the volume of support that happens there now since there is no one left to enforce the culture of getting involved.

We've repeated this "retreat into our shell" pattern over and over again. IRC (#drupal -> #drupal-contribute), mailing lists (development -> groups/issue queues), the forums (issue queues). What we're left with now is an entire "generation" of Drupal users who think Drupal.org is a place to *consume*, not a place to *participate*.

In the end, I have absolutely no idea where Drupal 9 core/contrib developers are going to come from. And that is absolutely terrifying.

-Angie

And, fwiw, I "called" this inevitable outcome back in 2009 when this shift was proposed: http://drupal.org/node/634486#comment-2272630 Bleh. :(

So apparently I had #drupal-dev and #drupal-contribute confused. Apologies on that. On Fri, Mar 18, 2011 at 4:17 PM, Earl Miles <merlin@logrus.com> wrote:

On 3/18/2011 1:12 PM, Neil Hastings wrote:

...

As a developer of several contrib modules (previously including taxonomy_menu, a top 100 module) I agree. I'm not part of the *in* crowd and not allowed the #drupal-conttribute and do feel like an outsider.

There is no hall pass to go to #drupal-contribute so if you believe you're "not allowed" this is a construct of your own mind.

Just to reiterate from earlier: #drupal-dev is closed and no one can go there. If you can get ever in there, you've got more IRC privileges than I. :) We should probably do a better job of making sure people realize that. On 3/18/2011 1:53 PM, Neil Hastings wrote:

So apparently I had #drupal-dev and #drupal-contribute confused. Apologies on that.

On Fri, Mar 18, 2011 at 4:17 PM, Earl Miles <merlin@logrus.com <mailto:merlin@logrus.com>> wrote:

On 3/18/2011 1:12 PM, Neil Hastings wrote: > As a developer of several contrib modules (previously including > taxonomy_menu, a top 100 module) I agree. I'm not part of the *in* > crowd and not allowed the #drupal-conttribute and do feel like an outsider.

There is no hall pass to go to #drupal-contribute so if you believe you're "not allowed" this is a construct of your own mind.

I'm a rabbi that found Drupal about four + years ago, I'm user 50259, fwiw. I fell in love with the process. Now I'm 65% freelance Drupal site builder, 25% stay at-home-dad, and 10% freelance rabbi. I am totally inspired by the "elite" of this community. Just read Earl's blog post from yesterday if you want to be inspired about how some of the leaders in this community solve problems, adjusting egos on the way to make room for new input: http://angrydonuts.com/views-for-drupal-7-enters-a-new-era Time out for a shout-out to Angie: the following is said with a hug and smile: D7 is out, girl. You did IT! Won't someone give you like a three month paid vacation or something? And I promise you, there will be people to work on Drupal 9. Some "elite" will want to spend time in support channels, others will not. I'm fine either way. That's where the chaos of open source works just fine. I don't want to mandate how people will help. Where I do think we could have some improvement is in dealing with the size of the community. We could be more intentional and professional. *I think it would be a great project for the Drupal Association to hire a community manager*. First the community manager would actually do some research. Ask new people about their experience. Set up automated emails that reach out to people who created user accounts at d.o. but have been absent for a while. "We see you are not around, is there anything we can help you with. Where did you get stuck." I floated an idea a few months ago about having people sign up for support shifts, you take two hours and man (person) as many support channels as possible. I think a paid community manager managing that would make it really effective. It's well know in the non-profit world that you usually get more out of volunteers if there is someone paid to provide support for them. It's been amazing how much we have gotten from volunteers with very little organization. I'm not saying we should add a lot... but a little paid leadership would go a long way. Finally, I just want to say that, in the vast majority of the questions that I have answered at support@drupal.org, the recipients of that help have been *incredibly graciou*s. I find that gratifying even if those people never contribute. Finally I'd like to return to the research issue. We have so much data at our disposal. Can't we find a Ph.d student studying online communities to evaluate posts and crunch numbers and let us know about what percent of people go on to be contributors after having been consumers of help? And maybe, "what are the factors that determine whether someone will go on to be a helper?" Pat on our collective backs everyone! Shai

...

On 3/18/2011 1:12 PM, Neil Hastings wrote:

As a developer of several contrib modules (previously including taxonomy_menu, a top 100 module) I agree. I'm not part of the *in* crowd and not allowed the #drupal-conttribute and do feel like an outsider.

On Mar 18,2011, at 1:17 PM, Earl Miles wrote:

There is no hall pass to go to #drupal-contribute so if you believe you're "not allowed" this is a construct of your own mind.

I'm amazed at the traffic this one thread has generated, and I love the fact that so many are talking about it! Merlinofchaos, your point is technically valid, yet somehow ineffective towards addressing the fundamental, underlying issue. That issue would be that we've just heard from someone named Neil Hastings who feels somehow "excluded" from certain Drupal talk & discussions, even though he's written and maintained a top 100 module. I've never written or contributed a module to Drupal in the 5+ years I've been kicking around, but I feel totally at ease popping into *any* IRC channel and conversing with anyone about any topic. Therein lies the crux; newer community participants feel 'distanced' from the *real* discussions simply because there's so many people now involved in Drupal that the founders, core maintainers, module maintainers, and the really, really, *really* good looking are trying to find a place where they can still be productive without being inundated. (copyright 2001 Zoolander) I'd venture to say that IRC is no longer the answer for official Drupal support. We've outgrown it, folks. IRC works perfectly well for two, three, or even six people to have a discussion on the merits of drupal_static or the migration of the Monarch Butterfly. It does not work well for Views support questions that only Merlin can answer because once he (or anyone else, for that matter) answers the question, NOBODY ELSE CAN LEARN what the answer is!!! Now, having said that, I feel somewhat lost by the fact that I can't just pop into IRC and ask random stuff of random people without feeling slightly guilty, but meh. I'm off to #drupal to bug Merlinofchaos about Views UI plugins. I'll just keep repeating my question until he answers, "WHATT!!!" ;) -- Joel Farris "Any society that would give up a little liberty to gain a little security will deserve neither and lose both." ~ Ben Franklin

The thing is, it's extremely irritating to be trying to work through a problem with another core contributor and be interrupted by "cweagans: how I can mine for fish? I need to do drupal" when I hadn't even been talking to them. I mean, I understand that people need support, but support is a completely different arena than development. Also, when I started using Drupal (about 2.5 years ago), it wasn't just "us". It was (at the time) "us" and "the god-like creatures that contribute to core". Now, when I /join #drupal, I see the same kind of perspective. I don't think that splitting #drupal-contribute out of #drupal was the cause of that. It seems to me that it's a natural step in the overall progression of a community's growth. Thanks, Cameron On Fri, Mar 18, 2011 at 14:26, Ted <ted-drupalists@webfirst.com> wrote:

On 3/18/2011 3:49 PM, Angela Byron wrote:

...

In the end, I have absolutely no idea where Drupal 9 core/contrib developers are going to come from. And that is absolutely terrifying.

I started developing with drupal a few years ago, and have started contributing small patches and support answers. I'm here because Drupal meets my needs much of the time, and because I have a self-interest in helping everyone else. It works for me, and I figure that's the same way developers will arrive in the future. Building the community is still a lot of work, but maybe slightly less than absolutely terrifying.

Too much to hope for?

Ted

What about a simple restructuring the mailing lists and/or chat so that they are tiered? Drive noob developers to the support list first, then use the devel list only as an escalation point. support - A list for support questions, including installation and configuration issues as well as help in developing contrib modules for drupal. Ask here first. development - A list to talk about development strategies or advanced development topics. Only ask questions here if you can't get your answer on the support forum. I don't think anyone heard me when I said that right now if you look at our mailing list page, we drive people who are doing development to this list for their support. A simple fix on that page would be to actually tell people that if you want help coding something, you should try the support list first. Myself I like XMPP better, because my work still blocks IRC for some silly reason. But that being said, I don't think chat IRC scales well for following multiple conversations. When I'm working with individual developers on a project I tend to ask them to skype chat me.

I know, trust me its not the sme experience.. Not really stable for hanging out in a chat room. IMHO Sent from my iPad On Mar 19, 2011, at 8:33 AM, Matthew Lechleider <matthew@lechleider.com> wrote:

http://webchat.freenode.net/

On 03/19/2011 10:21 AM, David Metzler wrote:

...

Myself I like XMPP better, because my work still blocks IRC for some silly reason. But that being said, I don't think chat IRC scales well for following multiple conversations. When I'm working with individual developers on a project I tend to ask them to skype chat me.

On 2011-03-19, at 1:13 AM, Gábor Hojtsy wrote:

On Fri, Mar 18, 2011 at 8:49 PM, Angela Byron <drupal-devel@webchick.net> wrote:

...

We've repeated this "retreat into our shell" pattern over and over again. IRC (#drupal -> #drupal-contribute), mailing lists (development -> groups/issue queues), the forums (issue queues). What we're left with now is an entire "generation" of Drupal users who think Drupal.org is a place to *consume*, not a place to *participate*. In the end, I have absolutely no idea where Drupal 9 core/contrib developers are going to come from. And that is absolutely terrifying. And, fwiw, I "called" this inevitable outcome back in 2009 when this shift was proposed: http://drupal.org/node/634486#comment-2272630 Bleh. :(

Angie, did this happen to Drupal 7? (Given many of the IRC, forum vs issue queue, etc. migration happened considerable time ago) I've seen lots of new faces contributing to Drupal 7, and it seemed to follow the natural way of progression as Drupal 5 and Drupal 6 went. Some people keep being in the top list and totally new faces come in, who've not even contributed to the previous version, or barely did so. If these "siloifications" did not have a clear effect so far, how do you expect them to kick in for Drupal 9?

Yes, this *absolutely* happened with D7. It was an *incredibly* small "core" group of < 20-30 people who resulted in Drupal 7 ever actually shipping. Post-code freeze, which more-or-less coincided with this IRC policy change, I can think of only a small handful of new contributors who came on board who were not already involved previously. Now, since there's really no way to quantify data around this, it's difficult to say what percentage of this lack of contributors phenomenon was related to this policy change, what was the "post-code freeze blues", how much of it is steeper requirements to get a core patch in (e.g. tests, subsystem maintainer sign-off), how much of it is the fact that certain members of our community were paid to care about bugs (e.g. Acquians and Examiner.comians) and others weren't, or what exactly the breakdown there was. I'm sure all of these, and more, were factors. But "not have a clear effect so far"? The *freaking rolling of 7.0* happened in such a silo, with not even a peep about it in the main IRC channel, for crying out loud! How much more "us" vs. "them" can you possibly get? :(

I think there are all kinds of levels of access now. There are people who come and participate (contribute) at Drupalcons, then the Drupalcamps, then the meetups, then the issue queues, then forums, then the lurkers who just consume information. The community grew big and there are just too many avenues to contribute and participate.

Bear in mind that IRC is a very special medium, though. It's far more "social" than Drupal.org is, and really the only chance you get to see the "human" side of the "rockstars" in the community outside of DrupalCons, which most of our community can't attend. I would definitely not be here if it weren't or IRC, and I imagine there are others who'd agree. There are also others who'd say IRC is a colossal waste of time, and that's fair, too. ;)

For a really small village school, all children are taught in one class room together, even their ages are spanning multiple years, and there is one teacher. As the village grows, the classes grow and it becomes impossible to fit all kids in one room and for one teacher to guide them. Then come multiple classes, one for each year, and subject expert teachers. Once the classes grew big again, then comes multiple classes even for the same year, and teachers become so numerous that you need to manage them too.

For kids, which classes they take and who gonna be their teacher is not a matter of choice, its well defined. In Drupal's case, "our kids" maybe even don't know where they need to learn or where they need help vs. where can they be teachers and guiders. I think we merely need better ways to help people get to the right place, not to unify all places and get everyone in a biiiig hallway, where it becomes a mess and impossible to guide people to the right place.

Just imagine every event of a Drupalcon happening in the keynote room. Since, ... you know ..., everybody can fit there, the keynotes proved it. Does that make it easier to help people find each other and make progress?

So, I feel like my main point is being misconstrued here. It's not the creation of separate channels for focused discussion that I think will ultimately be our demise. You're right that this is a pretty standard method of scaling out discussions. Rather, I think we're all ultimately screwed because: * we shoved our *freaking contributors* into a such a silo and made their efforts a mere "topical" channel. They used to be the front-and-center of our community. Now *consumers*, rather than *participants*, are front-and-center of our community. * there's an utter lack of cross-over, in both directions. People in #drupal are not encouraged to join #drupal-contribute, because people in #drupal-contribute don't come into #drupal anymore and talk about cool stuff they're working on, which would naturally help to pull them in. You have to be "in the know" about the separate channel to see what our innovators are doing and to join them. * the people who set the tone, carry the fundamental cultural values of our community, are all hidden off to the sidelines out of main public view. The image at http://webchick.net/node/9 that describes my first 5 minutes in #drupal is often quoted out of context (which is incredibly irritating). But *in* context, that experience taught me *a lot* about the culture of the Drupal community: that we value "doers" over "takers"; that we value mentorship and collaboration and solving problems together over striking it out alone; that there's a squishy human side to those "rockstar" names I'd seen everywhere. It fundamentally shaped my interactions with the community afterwards, and ultimately shaped the direction of my entire life. So when the current crop of contributors have all either burnt out or moved on, where will our new ones come from? And what cultural values and expectations will *they* bring to the table, since none of us were there to pass down ours? Those are the questions that I think we all should be wrestling with, and I don't have a good answer. -Angie

Overall, I think this is a great and relevant discussion, but in may ways, the problems discussed here are just a sign up 'growing pains' or simply 'growing up.' (and I don't mean that in either a good or bad way. That is just the way it is.) I have a GREAT, close family. Growing up, we ALL spent Christmas Day at Grandma & Grandpa's house... Grandma, Grandpa, their 7 kids & spouses, plus some 40 of us grandchildren. ~50 people in one small house....AWESOME! We all exchanged gifts, ate too much food, and had LOTS of fun. Those were the good old days. Now, my generation has grown up. We've gotten married. We have kids of our own. Grandma and Grandpa can't handle everyone for Christmas any more. We still have Christmas together at a large hall, but not everyone can make it for obvious reasons. It's just not the same not having Christmas at Grandpa & Grandma's house. Every one of us would love nothing more than to go back to those 'good old days.' Now, in Drupal, we find ourselves looking back at D4, D5, & even D6 and we want to hang on the those 'good old days.' Nothing wrong with that. We NEED to hold on to what made/makes Drupal great. But, we can't get stuck in the past either. We must look forward & 'flow with the times.' Dries is trying to address this same issue in D8 with his initiative leaders. I totally understand both sides of this discussion (are there two sides?)... I am only a weekend warrior with a totally unrelated day job. I remember one of the first times I logged onto IRC, I asked a question, and webchick herself actually answered! That was VERY encouraging to me, and might be one of the reasons I stayed and am now trying to learn more. I am not a coder or developer, but I do try to contribute. In my case, I have chosen to focus on the Date and Calendar modules, where I spend a lot of time in the issue queues. I even have a certified to rock score of 7. That's the same as rfay, and I would not know the first thing about building a module. (although Karen has graciously allowed me to become co-maintainer, thanks Karen!).... maybe the certifiedtorock score algorithm needs some tweaking.... I do think there needs to be some sort of hierarchical organization for support channels, but at the same time, the 'elite' need to actively foster and teach the next generation of contributors. I actually think merlin has realized this and is doing a pretty good job. Views is not just a one-man show. Merlin has a team of contributors that he can work closely with while they help bride the gap... just as Dries is planning for D8. The Views Bug Squad, and merlin's other calls for contributors are a great example of this. That does not mean that Dries or Earl are inaccessible, it just means they have some high-level help and they are fostering that help. Going back to my family analogy, I think it would be useful to follow the 'elder model' instead of the 'elite model.' In society, elders reach a point where they no longer do any work, but they are invaluable in leading, mentoring, and advising those who ARE doing the grunt work. Elders can also take a more active role in babysitting the kids. I don't have any answers to the immediate questions here (splitting dev & general groups). None of this is easy. Managing a project (or sub-project) is A LOT harder than just doing it yourself in a bubble. But, encouraging and helping and fostering a more diverse pool of contributions WILL BE worth the extra effort. I will end with one last example: Rick Warren started Saddleback church in his home with one other family. Today, Saddleback is one of the largest mega-churches in the US with multiple physical & online campuses and a staff to match. Rick has said that the growth and his resulting 'distance' from the individuals was and is one of the hardest things he has ever done...

On Sat, Mar 19, 2011 at 12:45 PM, Angela Byron <drupal-devel@webchick.net> wrote:

Yes, this *absolutely* happened with D7. It was an *incredibly* small "core" group of < 20-30 people who resulted in Drupal 7 ever actually shipping. Post-code freeze, which more-or-less coincided with this IRC policy change, I can think of only a small handful of new contributors who came on board who were not already involved previously.

Now, since there's really no way to quantify data around this, it's difficult to say what percentage of this lack of contributors phenomenon was related to this policy change, what was the "post-code freeze blues", how much of it is steeper requirements to get a core patch in (e.g. tests, subsystem maintainer sign-off), how much of it is the fact that certain members of our community were paid to care about bugs (e.g. Acquians and Examiner.comians) and others weren't, or what exactly the breakdown there was. I'm sure all of these, and more, were factors.

Ah... when I first read this it really upset me, so I went on and read some other stuff next. I tried to help out with Drupal 7 here and there... but one change wasn't wanted, and another critical issue I tried to help with - a lot of the critical issues were dreadfully complex to someone not soaking in the project - got bikeshedded to death and pushed down out of critical, so I walked away from Drupal 7 development. It's not all IRC. Some of it is just... something else. Maybe it's because I'm a shoddy person to work on core, and I need to learn more (what, I'm not sure) before I'm welcome to help out with it, but it's not all people hiding away in #drupal-contribute. -- John Fiala www.jcfiala.net

On 3/20/2011 10:00 AM, jeff@ayendesigns.com wrote:

I agree. I would have loved to contribute directly to D7. I found a level of...discomfort overall. I've was coding when many of you were first learning to count, so it's not the php I'm uncomfortable with.

I think part of it is coming upon a group that have been together so long that they're clique-ish, not meaning to be and not in a bad way, but they know their routine and topic and each other so well that everything is in shorthand, and it's great for being a voyeur but daunting to a new guy. The other part is some discomfort with the fast-paced immediacy of #drupal-contribute when combined with being a newbie to core, like jumping on a fast ride that's already moving.

I would have felt more secure about it even with something as small as some color coding on open issues that signified "this one is probably good for a core newbie."

I suppose there is some clique-ish nature to that, but it's really more about level of trust. It's fully possible to get into the trusted group. That said, it's not just about that. I find core development difficult. I'm in the group. But it's a long, tedious process and you need excellent debating skills and a lot of time that isn't spent all at once, but is spent in dribs and drabs over the life of a patch. The more complex the patch, the longer it will take. Getting a 1 line change to core is pretty easy. Changing 500 lines is pretty hard. Our review process is incredibly difficult; reviewing is boring, and tedious, and not rewarding. Not many people do it. Those who do it are reviewing code primarily for style, because that's the easiest thing to review. Doing a good code review requires understanding the bigger picture, and there isn't a bigger picture anymore. Maybe there was once, but Drupal has lost it, because there's no one who actually knows all of Drupal anymore. The bigger picture is an organic mess of Chaos and each reviewer has his or her own internal "bigger picture" that is reviewed to. Sometimes the problem is just getting a reviewer. Sometimes the problem is getting past a reviewer's pet peeves. Either way, the personal cost to code for core is high, has always been high, and only gets higher. I don't really see how that can change. Ideally we want to ensure quality contributions, and and still be receptive to all developers, and those two policies are at odds.

As a very much outsider I found contributing to core to be impossible. I found a bug in the core trigger module, created a patch to fix it and spent the next 5 months chasing head without a single other person noticing before giving up. In fact no one noticed it till at all till 11 months later and only then because of a related patch I had commented on. From that I gathered that contributing to core does in fact involve one of two things. Being "known" or marking your patch critical. I'd be thrilled to be proved wrong though. For what it's worth contributing to the the core documentation was a completely different experience. They were fast to respond and happy to accept a patch. On Sun, Mar 20, 2011 at 1:48 PM, Randy Fay <randy@randyfay.com> wrote:

Agreed: The difficulty of contributing to core isn't really about where you're accepted or how much you're on IRC or what in-group you've joined.

It's really about how hard the process is in general. You can spend an awful lot of time on something that's very small.. and it might get in or might not. Almost all my contributions were on the edge of triviality - I just found something I knew I could fix and fixed it. But they took *way* more work than a reasonable person would do to fix such a small thing.

So there are two issues here:

1. How do we welcome new people and make them a part of the community and enable them to contribute and point them in the right direction for support, etc.

2. Should the core contribution process somehow be made so it's more time-and-energy effective?

My strategy for D8 (we'll see if it holds) is to stay out of core and focus on things that I have a little more control of and therefore can do more effectively.

-Randy

On Sun, Mar 20, 2011 at 11:11 AM, Earl Miles <merlin@logrus.com> wrote:

...

On 3/20/2011 10:00 AM, jeff@ayendesigns.com wrote:

...

I agree. I would have loved to contribute directly to D7. I found a level of...discomfort overall. I've was coding when many of you were first learning to count, so it's not the php I'm uncomfortable with.

I think part of it is coming upon a group that have been together so long that they're clique-ish, not meaning to be and not in a bad way, but they know their routine and topic and each other so well that everything is in shorthand, and it's great for being a voyeur but daunting to a new guy. The other part is some discomfort with the fast-paced immediacy of #drupal-contribute when combined with being a newbie to core, like jumping on a fast ride that's already moving.

I would have felt more secure about it even with something as small as some color coding on open issues that signified "this one is probably good for a core newbie."

I suppose there is some clique-ish nature to that, but it's really more about level of trust.

It's fully possible to get into the trusted group.

That said, it's not just about that. I find core development difficult. I'm in the group. But it's a long, tedious process and you need excellent debating skills and a lot of time that isn't spent all at once, but is spent in dribs and drabs over the life of a patch. The more complex the patch, the longer it will take.

Getting a 1 line change to core is pretty easy.

Changing 500 lines is pretty hard.

Our review process is incredibly difficult; reviewing is boring, and tedious, and not rewarding. Not many people do it. Those who do it are reviewing code primarily for style, because that's the easiest thing to review. Doing a good code review requires understanding the bigger picture, and there isn't a bigger picture anymore. Maybe there was once, but Drupal has lost it, because there's no one who actually knows all of Drupal anymore. The bigger picture is an organic mess of Chaos and each reviewer has his or her own internal "bigger picture" that is reviewed to.

Sometimes the problem is just getting a reviewer. Sometimes the problem is getting past a reviewer's pet peeves. Either way, the personal cost to code for core is high, has always been high, and only gets higher. I don't really see how that can change. Ideally we want to ensure quality contributions, and and still be receptive to all developers, and those two policies are at odds.

-- Randy Fay Drupal Module and Site Development randy@randyfay.com +1 970.462.7450

On Sat, Mar 19, 2011 at 7:45 PM, Angela Byron <drupal-devel@webchick.net> wrote:

Yes, this *absolutely* happened with D7. It was an *incredibly* small "core" group of < 20-30 people who resulted in Drupal 7 ever actually shipping. Post-code freeze, which more-or-less coincided with this IRC policy change, I can think of only a small handful of new contributors who came on board who were not already involved previously.

Now, since there's really no way to quantify data around this, it's difficult to say what percentage of this lack of contributors phenomenon was related to this policy change, what was the "post-code freeze blues", how much of it is steeper requirements to get a core patch in (e.g. tests, subsystem maintainer sign-off), how much of it is the fact that certain members of our community were paid to care about bugs (e.g. Acquians and Examiner.comians) and others weren't, or what exactly the breakdown there was. I'm sure all of these, and more, were factors.

But "not have a clear effect so far"? The *freaking rolling of 7.0* happened in such a silo, with not even a peep about it in the main IRC channel, for crying out loud! How much more "us" vs. "them" can you possibly get? :(

I do think you have this feeling because you were at the helm. I don't think the small handful of people scrambling to get a release out was any different with Drupal 6 or earlier versions. Just ask chx about the form API's introduction and Drupal 4.7's release, the story will resonate very well with you :D The only difference is that we grew a huge base of followers who don't care as much. Think of a new release of Mac OS X. Many Mac users are probably in awe looking for what is coming. Now contrast that with a new release of Windows. Lots more people use Windows. Do they care about its new version? Not so much. They are content with whatever they have and its just a tool for them, not their life :) We just grew bigger and now have more of all these people. They don't *need* to be excited about our new release, and that is fine IMHO.

* we shoved our *freaking contributors* into a such a silo and made their efforts a mere "topical" channel. They used to be the front-and-center of our community. Now *consumers*, rather than *participants*, are front-and-center of our community.

* there's an utter lack of cross-over, in both directions. People in #drupal are not encouraged to join #drupal-contribute, because people in #drupal-contribute don't come into #drupal anymore and talk about cool stuff they're working on, which would naturally help to pull them in. You have to be "in the know" about the separate channel to see what our innovators are doing and to join them.

* the people who set the tone, carry the fundamental cultural values of our community, are all hidden off to the sidelines out of main public view. The image at http://webchick.net/node/9 that describes my first 5 minutes in #drupal is often quoted out of context (which is incredibly irritating). But *in* context, that experience taught me *a lot* about the culture of the Drupal community: that we value "doers" over "takers"; that we value mentorship and collaboration and solving problems together over striking it out alone; that there's a squishy human side to those "rockstar" names I'd seen everywhere. It fundamentally shaped my interactions with the community afterwards, and ultimately shaped the direction of my entire life.

So when the current crop of contributors have all either burnt out or moved on, where will our new ones come from? And what cultural values and expectations will *they* bring to the table, since none of us were there to pass down ours? Those are the questions that I think we all should be wrestling with, and I don't have a good answer.

The way I see this, there are people "filtering through" to the core team just as before, and they are shaped by the core team. As Dave Reid and Damien Tournoud were new stars in the Drupal 6 release (if I remember right), we have Jennifer Hodgdon, Christian Schmidt and Jen Simmons bringing new energy in Drupal 7 among others. The pace of change in top contributors does not seem to be different. Drupal 5 data: http://www.slideshare.net/drumm/maintaining-your-own-branch-of-drupal-core/ Drupal 6 data: http://groups.drupal.org/node/8497 Drupal 7 data: http://growingventuresolutions.com/blog/contributors-drupal-7-final-numbers So far we got lots of healthy change due to people coming and questioning the status quo. Git on drupal.org, keys for input formats, and so on and on are here because people were not content with the status quo and how the core team worked / approached problems. I think we keep getting the new blood and we integrate them in a healthy way. Looking from your POV, it seems like I'm overly optimistic, but I'm not seeing this doom... Gábor

I have yet to see a valid development discussion on this list for a while instead of support questions. To each his or her own. Dave Reid dave@davereid.net On Thu, Mar 17, 2011 at 8:32 PM, nan wich <nan_wich@bellsouth.net> wrote:

-1 for me. I have yet to find an actual discussion on SE.

*Nancy*

Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. -- Dr. Martin L. King, Jr.

------------------------------ *From:* Randy Fay <randy@randyfay.com> *To:* development <development@drupal.org> *Sent:* Thu, March 17, 2011 1:24:34 PM *Subject:* [development] Proposal: Move all dev support off this list to new StackExchange site

The new http://drupal.stackexchange.com is now live, and several outstanding Drupal contributors are monitoring and contributing to it.

It seems like we'd get better long-term use of people's time if we did development support over there, where it's searchable, and where repeat questions can be answered by an internet search instead of everybody reading and answering the same thing over and over.

And yes, I'm in favor of providing this capability on Drupal.org<http://drupal.org/>, as per http://drupal.org/node/1047632, but for now, what about taking dev support off this list since there's such a good alternative?

-Randy

-- Randy Fay Drupal Module and Site Development randy@randyfay.com +1 970.462.7450