[development] #drupal / #drupal-dev split considered harmful

[Khalid Baheyeldin]

On 7/31/07, Gerhard Killesreiter <gerhard at killesreiter.de> wrote:
>
> Khalid Baheyeldin schrieb:
> >> As I understood it was:
> >>
> >> #drupal - development focused
> >> #drupal-support - support focused - for newbies
> >>
> >
> > The problem is that #drupal  is the first place newbies will think
> > of to get support. Once they are there, they are greeted with the
> > "support?" reply telling them to go to #drupal-support.
>
> No, they actually get a message when they join and there is a topic to
> look at.


These are client dependent, and you should not assume that all people
see them. On kopete (the default KDE IM client), the channel message
just scrolls up as you get a bazillion messages saying userblah is now Away.

The title is also next to useless, since it only appears if I mouse over the

window title, and then it appears truncated on a single line.

Telling users to go get another client is not an option.

> This can be offputting and make people feel unwelcome. They
> > ask the first question and get a reply that amounts to : "we don't
> > serve your type here, buzz off!" (plagiarised from Esmerel)
>
> "You didn't read the topic or pay attention to the join message, buzz
> off" is more accurate.


And how does that reflect on the project as a whole? Not positively for
sure.

> So, I don't see why charters can change, with development
> > in #drupal-dev (and only development), then #drupal become
> > community focused, has support, infra discussions, and everything
> > else that is not development.
>
> I am not going to agree to this.


We seldom agree, so that is OK.

> Let me re-phrase that: I am not going to give up #drupal to the people
> who can't properly use IRC anyway.

Read about the September that never ended.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eternal_September
The same goes for Spam. It changed email forever.

The world changes. Our little niche gets discovered and the influx begins.
Drupal is growing, more people will come in. We have to deal with it!

If the unwashed ones are 1%, it was not a problem when the community were
only 100 people. Now with tens of thousands, they will become so.

Cheers,
>         Gerhard
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Here is another example of assuming that one's user interface is the
same across all clients: GnuPG is not interpreted by Gmail, and I just
see line noise. One can't assume everyone sees the same interface.

-- 
2bits.com
http://2bits.com
Drupal development, customization and consulting.
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