Raphael Hertzog <hert...@debian.org> writes: > Debian's infrastructure and processes have grown organically over the > years, with all the strengths and weaknesses that it implies. Sometimes > it's a good idea to step back and look whether some of those need > to be amended/replaced/dropped/etc. > > Based on your own experience, which infrastructure(s) or process(es) would > benefit from significant changes? > > Are there infrastructures or processes that we're (still) lacking and that > could make a significant difference in the work of Debian's contributors?
As far as infrastructures go, what I find a bit troublesome is that our tools are sometimes too diverse: too many languages, too few people to understand and improve them. This is also a project-wide problem of not being able to make use of our human resources better. This, in turn, leads to situations where some of our tools look like they're stuck in the past millennia, which is quite a bummer when it comes to attracting new contributors, especially when said tool is something they'll see early on. (Yes, I'm talking about the BTS, which is a terrific thing, and I wouldn't trade it for anything else, but from a usability point of view, it is behind times. It would help tremendously if we had more people working on it, as one person can't cover all aspects.) To attract new people, we need a bit more than technical excellence, we need to impress them, and impress them fast. This - as blasphemous as it may sound - may require our user-facing tools to look nice, and be friendly to newcomers. A big problem with parts of our infrastructure is that this is not the case. On the topic of processes, I'd emphasize mentoring & sponsoring. This is where we're... well... I'll be honest: we suck at it, in general. We do have some amazing teams that do this well, we have a lot of it going on in the background, hardly visible. BUT, we also have a lot of problems, and they are sadly far more visible, which can easily drive off new contributors. In my experience, mentoring and sponsoring over the internet rarely works effectively, due to a whole lot of things, including but not limited to language barriers, lack of knowledge (on both sides, but in different areas), noise, lack of time, impatience and so on. What does work, as far as I saw is meeting and talking in person. Things can go a lot smoother and faster in real life, as there is the personal connection. If we could have "mentoring sprints", that would be very useful, in my opinion. (Encouraging & empowering local teams to help this cause further would be an important thing.) Another area we're lacking in is recruiting non-packaging contributors. I believe that local events, much similar to the aforementioned mentoring sprints would be a great way to reach out to more people, be them technical or not. Show them how Debian makes a difference, *impress* them, and we're halfway there. -- |8] -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-vote-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact listmas...@lists.debian.org Archive: http://lists.debian.org/874ngbfvue....@galadriel.madhouse-project.org
