[development] Drupal Answers: A Stackoverflow/StackExchange site proposal
Shai Gluskin
shai at content2zero.com
Tue Feb 1 17:26:59 UTC 2011
What I would like to see a support team do is organize people to sign-up for
specific hours to "staff" the support channels, all of them (d.o.
support at drupal.org, g.d.o, maybe even stack overflow), answering people's
questions wherever they show up.
People would volunteer to sign up for two-hour shifts. That's only 84 shifts
a week to cover 24/7. I'm sure during busy hours we could get multiple
people to sign up for shifts.
What is so critical in support is the timelines of the response. And because
the shifts are time-bound, I'll bet we could recruit a lot of people to
sign-up who don't ever visit the forums at d.o.
I believe this kind of effort would make Drupal seem much more welcoming
than it is currently perceived by people just starting Drupal.
Shai
maybe even stack overflow as well)
On Tue, Feb 1, 2011 at 12:07 PM, Victor Kane <victorkane at gmail.com> wrote:
> On Tue, Feb 1, 2011 at 1:38 PM, larry at garfieldtech.com <
> larry at garfieldtech.com> wrote:
>
>> Uh, Victor, you are aware that Wikipedia has a "team" of editors who
>> correct, prune, and curate content far more actively than anyone on
>> Drupal.org, right?
>>
>>
> Well, that is a relatively recent development, isn't it? Their initial
> success at least was due to crowdsourcing, wasn't it? Can you prove they are
> doing better as a result?
>
> Victor
>
>
>> And you are also aware that Drupal core has appointed "leads" who are
>> extremely picky about what they allow in?
>>
>> And that PHP itself has about 1000 committers who don't have to talk to
>> each other before committing, and the result is an utter trainwreck of
>> inconsistency and people committing things in the middle of the night just
>> to avoid the fact that everyone else already said no to an idea? (True
>> story.)
>>
>> Just making sure about that...
>>
>> --Larry Garfield
>>
>>
>> On 2/1/11 6:37 AM, Victor Kane wrote:
>>
>>> I won't be able to go to DrupalCon this year, so I'll give my feedback
>>> here.
>>>
>>> One thing that's clear from the success of many open documentation sites
>>> (wikipedia, stack overflow) is that they avoid top down governance, they
>>> let the meritocracy form on the basis of what actually happens.
>>>
>>> I firmly believe that the existence of "document leads" and other forms
>>> of control have done more harm than good, despite heroic efforts from
>>> these individuals, since all that has happened over the last few years
>>> is a constant moving around of a hierarchical structure.
>>>
>>> Why wouldn't a freer, wiki like approach work?
>>>
>>> Victor Kane
>>> http://awebfactory.com.ar
>>>
>>> On Mon, Jan 31, 2011 at 8:37 PM, Randy Fay <randy at randyfay.com
>>> <mailto:randy at randyfay.com>> wrote:
>>>
>>> I don't think we can delegate any part of Drupal to something we
>>> don't control; I think that's just a non-starter.
>>>
>>> So for me, the issue is what we can learn from StackOverflow and
>>> friends - they do great stuff and end up with great content. And
>>> yes, I think we should build something on that.
>>>
>>> Who is signing up to build it? I think it's an easy sell.
>>>
>>> -Randy
>>>
>>>
>>> On Mon, Jan 31, 2011 at 4:25 PM, Dan Horning
>>> <dan.horning at planetnoc.com <mailto:dan.horning at planetnoc.com>> wrote:
>>>
>>> i have to ask ... what would we actually gain by doing this -
>>> cleanup the various methods for finding info about a given
>>> module or theme or bug a little and we far surpass this
>>> suggested tool
>>>
>>> it seems that stackoverflow is driven very highly on userpoints
>>> to control access - which while a good thing - doesn't really
>>> fit the development model we have here. there are existing
>>> processes that would have to change to fit the suggested model.
>>> I for one am more for peer reviews and leadership staff
>>> assigning access than a points system that someone could rack up
>>> points and just get access ... what's that really do for the
>>> community - seems that would be great if we were just a tech
>>> help forum - awarding points for the users that help and giving
>>> them more access - but what's that do for drupal and it's
>>> community? (i know there is a potential for this to help ...)
>>>
>>> another area of issue to me is - another login ? or would it use
>>> SSO?
>>> do the drupal leadership users and dries have admin level
>>> control...?
>>>
>>> mostly here i just don't get what adding yet another resource
>>> (like has been said before) would do to help the lead devs,
>>> module + theme devs and just supporting drupal. if i had say -=-
>>> i'd vote against this idea
>>>
>>> --
>>> Dan Horning
>>>
>>> ----- Original Message -----
>>> > From: "Victor Kane" <victorkane at gmail.com
>>> <mailto:victorkane at gmail.com>>
>>> > To: development at drupal.org <mailto:development at drupal.org>
>>> > Sent: Monday, January 31, 2011 6:01:55 PM
>>> > Subject: Re: [development] Drupal Answers: A
>>> Stackoverflow/StackExchange site proposal
>>> > I guess this is a good place to start:
>>> > http://area51.stackexchange.com/faq
>>> >
>>> >
>>> > On Mon, Jan 31, 2011 at 8:00 PM, Victor Kane <
>>> victorkane at gmail.com <mailto:victorkane at gmail.com> >
>>>
>>> > wrote:
>>> >
>>> >
>>> >
>>> >
>>> > On Mon, Jan 31, 2011 at 6:57 PM, Josh Koenig <
>>> josh at getpantheon.com <mailto:josh at getpantheon.com> >
>>>
>>> > wrote:
>>> >
>>> >
>>> >
>>> > Stew,
>>> >
>>> >
>>> > Thanks for starting this thread. This is important stuff:
>>> >
>>> >
>>> >
>>> > http://area51.stackexchange.com/proposals/2978/drupal-answers
>>> >
>>> > I want to put my support behind this proposal and explain my
>>> thinking
>>> > in doing so.
>>> >
>>> >
>>> > The Drupal community is already growing faster than Drupal's
>>> > infrastructure can easily support. With the release of D7 and
>>> all the
>>> > other associated projects getting off the ground, drupal.org
>>> <http://drupal.org> is
>>>
>>> > increasingly often a bottleneck or blocker. We have wonderful
>>> hosts
>>> > from OSUOSL, but the human resources needed to develop,
>>> maintain and
>>> > manage our own infrastructure (which is a 24x7x365 job) are
>>> limited.
>>> >
>>> >
>>> > We have to pick our battles. I much would rather see energy,
>>> effort,
>>> > attention and money poured into continuing to improve our git
>>> and
>>> > module infrastructure — which is much more deeply intrinsic
>>> to the
>>> > health and future of the project — and accept that even though
>>> we
>>> > *can* build our own StackOverflow (@eaton proved this
>>> already) that
>>> > doesn't necessarily mean it's the best use of limited
>>> resources, or
>>> > the best thing for the project.
>>> >
>>> >
>>> > Drupal can theoretically/technically solve a lot of its own
>>> problems,
>>> > but I think we often suffer from a "not built here" prejudice
>>> as a
>>> > result. In the realm of getting good quality answers to Drupal
>>> > questions out to the most people possible, I can't see how a
>>> > StackExchange site would do anything but help. I would love
>>> to see the
>>> > community embrace something really cool and useful from the
>>> wider
>>> > Internet as a way to promote the project.
>>> >
>>> >
>>> >
>>> >
>>> > You make a convincing argument Josh; my own gut feeling has
>>> been,
>>> > reading this thread, "how can we delegate something so
>>> important to
>>> > the Drupal Community as its own documentation to another
>>> party who may
>>> > or may not exist in the near/medium/long term".
>>> >
>>> >
>>> > Can someone inform somewhat on who these guys are? And why
>>> there and
>>> > not someplace else?
>>> >
>>> >
>>> > Victor
>>> >
>>> >
>>> >
>>> >
>>> >
>>> > Finally, I should say that I *do not* think a StackExchange
>>> answers
>>> > site replaces anything. It's not an issue queue, and it's not a
>>> > replacement for the dialogue that exist in the forums. I
>>> would say
>>> > it's a new resource, something that can help the 10s of 1000s
>>> of
>>> > people who will be trying to wrap their mind around Drupal in
>>> the
>>> > coming year.
>>> >
>>> >
>>> > Cheers
>>> > -josh
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> --
>>> Randy Fay
>>> Drupal Module and Site Development
>>> randy at randyfay.com <mailto:randy at randyfay.com>
>>> +1 970.462.7450
>>>
>>>
>>>
>
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