[documentation] Barriers to entry...

[Jennifer Hodgdon]

Regarding the process and getting non-programmers involved in the help 
screens and text in general in Drupal....

For this patch we're working on -- there isn't time to get a new 
process in place, because of the time frame. But I agree that there is 
a VERY high perceived barrier for non-programmers to help with 
documentation in Drupal. This is also a problem for designers who 
might want to contribute to themes.

I do have a couple of suggestions for how non-programmers can get 
involved and help out with Drupal documentation (more at 
http://drupal.org/node/540308):

a) Non-programmers can definitely contribute to the Handbook 
documentation on drupal.org. There is a suggested list of ways to 
contribute to the Handbook at http://drupal.org/node/302146 and none 
of those ideas requires you to "roll patches", work in PHP, etc.

b) If you see problems in the help text or user interface text within 
Drupal, you can file an issue. Even if you do not know how to create a 
patch, you can still give before/after text suggestions, and someone 
else can create the patch. To do that:
   - Click on "Create Content" on the sidebar on drupal.org
   - Choose "Drupal" as the project
   - Choose the Drupal version. Note that for right now, pretty much 
only 7.x issues will be addressed -- it is REALLY difficult to get 
text changes into 6.x at this point, if not possible.
   - Choose component "user interface text" or "documentation", as 
appropriate.
   - Choose category "bug report" -- text being wrong, missing, or 
unclear is a bug, not a feature request or task.
   - Make up a clear title and description, and submit your issue.

c) To help with existing issues, search the issue queue for the Drupal 
project, component "documentation" or "user interface text" or tag 
"Help text" or tag "ui-text". Be aware that most of the issues filed 
under component "documentation" are issues with the in-line programmer 
API documentation of functions in the source code (displayed on 
api.drupal.org), so if you are not a programmer, these will not be 
things you will probably want to work on. Even if you cannot write 
patches, you can still review patches and make suggestions on how to 
improve text, by commenting on issues.


Thoughts?

I was thinking maybe it would be a good idea to propose a session at 
DCSF to get non-programmers up to speed on patching, but then I read 
one of the commenters saying "no inclination" to learn that... 
Definitely, the formatting needed for the help docs is a barrier 
itself. There was a move to improve the help system for Drupal 7 (make 
it into plain HTML files), but it didn't get into core.

    -- Jennifer

-- 
Jennifer Hodgdon * Poplar ProductivityWare
www.poplarware.com
Drupal, WordPress, and custom Web programming