Re: [Foundation-l] deployment of Vector to other languages -
Amir E. Aharoni wrote: I have a few questions about the deployment of Vector in Wikipedias in other languages. Hi, Amir. Thank you for your help in contributing testing the beta, providing RTL feedback and your active feedback on the recent deployment of the user interface change to Commons and English Wikipedia. 1. When does the Foundation plan to perform the switch? I'll be coordinating the deployment schedule for the rest of the languages and other Wikmedia projects in coming weeks by monitoring the problems reported from Commons and English Wikipedia users, and coordinating the schedule with the language community and the chapter members. We do not have a specific date yet, but we hope to be able to start migrating the rest of the languages and other projects within next four weeks. 2. At least two major features which were not included in the Beta, were enabled in the English Wikipedia: the new search box with Go and Search buttons and the collapsible sidebar which hides interlanguage links by default. A significant number of users in en.wikipedia expressed their dissatisfaction with them and with the fact that they were introduced by surprise. They are still not a part of the Beta in other languages. Will they be enabled in other languages when they are switched to Vector? Yes, these new features will be enabled as a part of beta. As you reported the problems with the new search, we are adjusting the search box interaction by expanding the search suggestion field and make special search explicit. We hope to roll out the change later this week, if not we revert back to the previous search behavior. This change will be reflected across the beta for other languages. 3. Did anyone consider appointing Vector migration czars in Wikipedias in other languages? Because despite what some people might think, quite a lot of speakers of other languages don't bother looking at en.wikipedia and WMF blogs and mailing lists. I wrote a little about the good (IMHO) and the bad (IMHO) features about Vector in the Village Pumps of Wikipedias in languages that i know - Hebrew, Russian and Catalan. I can report that there are a couple of JavaScript gurus in he.wikipedia who have a positive attitude towards Vector and who gradually adapt the gadgets to it, and there are a few other JS gurus who hate Vector and who don't want to bother about it and recommend everyone to stay with Monobook. (Although my attitude may seem negative, i actually belong to the first camp.) The situation is similar in the Russian Wikipedia. As the community in various languages and the translation community have been the major force in supporting rolling out major changes to the sites, I will be reaching out to the translation community for translating the announcements, FAQ, and the feedback page to set-up the structure. Appointing ambassadors (rather than czars :-)) would be a great idea, and and it will be crucial for language communities who don't have strong presence or the communications channels to meta or to the various discussions which are taking place in English. 4. Finally, does the Foundation plan to gather any other feedback from other language Wikipedias except the Beta retention rate? We make decisions and adjustment on new features not only based on the beta retention rate[1], but also the feedback submitted from various language and project communities[2], and we set-up discussion board in Village Pump, Admin' noticeboard, and project specific feedback page prior to the switch and for the post-switch support[3]. [1] http://usability.wikimedia.org/wiki/Beta_Feedback_Survey [2] http://usability.wikimedia.org/wiki/Beta_Feedback_Survey/User_Comments [3] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:User_experience_feedback Thanks again for your active involvement and contribution in advocating the support for non-English communities and users, especially for bringing attentions to right-to-left languages. - Naoko User Experience Programs, WMF -- Support Free Knowledge: http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Donate ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] deployment of Vector to other languages -
Ziko van Dijk wrote: Hello Naoko Thank you for the explanations, by the way I find it interesting to read the feedback, the users' comments. Sometimes it is difficult for me to follow things because Vector has changed or is displayed in various projects differently. Kind regards Ziko Hi, Ziko. I agree that it is sometimes not easy to correlate the state of the beta and the feedback as the beta evolved and it was enhanced based on the feedback. One thing I can recommend is to sort the feedback by date, and read from the most recent feedback. Some of the old feedback may not be relevant any more as we provided the solution around it. For example, collapsible tabs were developed for languages with long words such as German and Greek which expands the width and overlaps the tabs. In principle all features are enabled universally across all project under the beta. We are experiencing a short window of the deviation with the deployment on English Wikipedia which had a new search and collapsible left navigation side bar. But these features will be part of the beta by next week. Cheers, - Naoko -- Support Free Knowledge: http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Donate ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
[Foundation-l] The Wikimedia Foundation: doing strategic planning the open source way
Chris Grams says in his blog today, I've gotta say. I've seen strategic planning, but I have /never/ seen strategic planning like this before. Open, transparent discussion. Broad collaboration. Deep analysis, insight, and research from the people who care most and are closest to the issues and challenges being addressed—meritocracy in action. http://opensource.com/business/10/3/wikimedia-foundation-doing-strategic-planning-open-source-way I think so too. Cheers to Strategic Planing Team, especially Eugene and Philippe! - Naoko -- Support Free Knowledge: http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Donate ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] [Announcement] Extension of user experience work
Dear Delphine, Aphaia, Mike and those who congratulated us off the list, Thank you for your kind words and encouragements. We, the user experience programs team, are very excited and grateful to be able to continue improving the usability and user experience of Wikimedia projects. The Stanton usability project is in the final phase, but we are still developing one of the most complicated features we worked so far,collapsing and form-based templates. We are faced with a lot of challenges, but we hope to be able to share the prototype in coming weeks. The success of the usability initiative so far could not have been possible without the strong support and constructive critiques from the community members who constantly participated in design discussion, prototype testing, provided feedback through the beta survey. I also want to acknowledge various community members who not only raised the usability to be address as high priority task, but actually took actions in improving the usability since 2005. To name a few, Openusability.org conducted usability study with Ellen Reitmayr in Germany in 2006 and published the result. Robert Stojnic implemented the proposed search result page in a matter of weeks after the mock-up was uploaded to the usability wiki. Kozuch and Mephiles602 constantly helped maintain the usability wiki in addition to participating the discussion of new features and designs. Nihiltres, who was the member of 2005 WikiProject Usability, reminded us when our beta stopped working on iPhone. Cbrown tested RTL display and files a bug. Aphia found a bug in Japanese prototype. Cary and Mike jumped in when there were severe incidents of vandalism on the usability wiki. They all contributed more than my simple list here, but what I want to say is they all made a difference in our project. The list goes on and on, and I am only naming a few folks here, who came to my mind while I type this email. (Forgive me for the names I have omitted here in advance.) Multimedia usability project continues while the Stanton usability team shifts the focus from simplifying the editing interface to rich text editor and a research of social interactive component of the user experience. Strategy Planning Team published rich contents under Community Health, which we will be studying carefully and determine which area we should focus first. Thanks again for your encouragements. It is great to be part of the permanent member of the Wikimedia community. :-) Cheers, - Naoko -- Support Free Knowledge: http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Donate ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
[Foundation-l] [SF] Thirsty Bear @ 5:30pm
It's Erik's birthday tomorrow, and some of us from the office are planning to take him out after work today to pre-celebrate his birthday. Join us at Thirsty Bear @ 5:30pm or whenever you can. http://biturl.cc/SlK - Naoko -- Support Free Knowledge: http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Donate ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] [SF] Thirsty Bear @ 5:30pm
Ooops, I meant to send this email to the Foundation staff list. Local folks are welcome to join us, but I understand people outside San Francisco is hard to get to this event. :-) - Naoko Naoko Komura wrote: It's Erik's birthday tomorrow, and some of us from the office are planning to take him out after work today to pre-celebrate his birthday. Join us at Thirsty Bear @ 5:30pm or whenever you can. http://biturl.cc/SlK - Naoko -- Support Free Knowledge: http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Donate ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
[Foundation-l] [Announcement] Neil Kandalgaonkar as Software Developer for Ford Multimedia Usability Project
It is my pleasure to announce that the usability team has a new member. Neil Kandalgaonkar joined the team as a software developer for the Ford multi-media usability project. Neil brings in the breadth of experience in software engineering from major social networking web sites such as Flickr and Upcoming.org. Neil oversaw improving payment system and performance of FlickrMail interface at Flickr, integrated Upcoming.org into Yahoo properties and helped expand the team. Prior to Yahoo!, Neil was with Google and his main responsibility was to enable Google Checkout system for non-US markets. Neil holds Bachelor of Arts in Communication Studies from Concordia University, in Montreal, Canada. Neil will work closely with Guillaume Paumier, who manages the product side of the project, and also Michael Dale who have been developing a ton of multi-media support software and tools already. I just posted the work in progress of the multi-media usability project for those who are curious about the development of the multi-media usability project. http://blog.wikimedia.org/2010/01/26/multimedia-usability-project-underway/ Please join me welcoming, Neil. Naoko Komura Program Manager Wikimedia Usability Initiative -- Support Free Knowledge: http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Donate ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] Dumb survey about Commons
Milos Rancic wrote: When you make a dumb survey, answers will be dumb, as well as conclusions. I am really frustrated with that survey... I wanted to help with my responses, but it seems that I am inside of unknown percentage of Wikimedia Commons users and contributors which doesn't fit into the survey. So, let's start... 1. Yes, I am using Commons regularly. 2. There are many goals when I look for free media files on Commons and I can't say which one is primary. 3. I am participating in Wikimedia Commons sometimes. 4. * 100-1000 edits * 100-1000 uploads (actually I don't have a clue how to find that fact efficiently) * I don't have a clue which percentage are my own works, let's say 10-50% * And the winner: What is my reason to participate? And there is no *my* reason, even Commons is the free content project? No reason to answer. * Then, no possibility to say that I am definitely not working on quality review, improvement promotion of featured works; just rarely; as well as that I didn't upload any animation. BTW, all types of my participation on Commons are rare. And, instead of doing that in a couple of minutes, I've spent 30 minutes in writing this email. I really don't know which answers such survey is able to give? How many Commons participants have less than 100 edits? SQL queries may be more helpful. If it is for making some decisions, it is better not to use the results because survey may give very wrong conclusions. If it is for some student work, it may be better. I don't want to say that it is possible to make a perfect survey. However, this one has ~50% of not so bright questions and/or options. Yes, there are options for other answers, but such answers will be not so informative (cf. my second answer) or they would be narrative and it won't be easy to categorize them. Those who don't want to bother themselves with other option will give wrong answers. Some brainstorming with other Wikimedians could help. It is better to have relevant than fast answers and conclusions. ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l I think the survey is a good _start_ to understand the basic user contribution level, challenges and where frustration lies, when one tries to contribute to Commons. Thanks to active and supportive translators, the survey is offered in more than twenty languages. This will also help the multi-media usability project team to understand what is the shortcomings of supporting non-English Commons, Wikipedia, other Wikimedia Project contributors, and potential future contributors. Thanks, - Naoko -- Support Free Knowledge: http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Donate ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] Why hasn't the LocalisationUpdate extension been enabled?
Hello, Waldir. Waldir Pimenta wrote: When the Vector skin became available, I tried it on my home wiki, pt.wikipedia, and noticed that a great deal of its interface was still in English. So I went to translatewiki.net and translated the remaining strings to Portuguese. Then I waited, and waited.. and I am waiting until today, and the skin still has the English strings on it. It's been almost a month. Thank you for the translation work. As a usability team leader, I appreciate your attention on Vector and the new toolbar especially. We, the usability team, get really excited when the text in UI are translated into new languages. We pushed lots of text especially for the beta landing page and survey. I see the Portuguese pages are fully translated for the survey. Thank you. Since the first release of usability features (Acai) on July 1st, there has been minimum of weekly software update to Acai. And we updated the deployment software with up-to-date translation on August 6th for all languages. In the case for Portuguese, the text for the toolbar, the beta landing page, and the survey was updated. However the translation for tabs didn't get the update. We will look into why the update didn't occur. As for LocalisationUpdate, there has been a discussion in this thread already, so I won't get into too much details. But we are planning to start testing it in the usability prototype sites for the next round of release. http://usability.wikimedia.org/wiki/Prototype It would be great if we can work with translators to test LocalisationUpdate so that the translators can actually confirm their translation appear promptly after the translation in traslatewiki.net. When you see a portion of translation does not appear in UI, please drop me a note. We often think that the translation behind, and if that is not the case we will look into why the update did not occur. Hopefully this kind of gap will be gone, once the automation via LocalisationUpdate is available. But until then, feel free to write to me directly. My email address is nkom...@wikimedia.org. Cheers, - Naoko -- Support Free Knowledge: http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Donate ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
[Foundation-l] The Wikipedia Usability Initiative is still hiring.
The Wikipedia Usability Initiative has extended the application deadline for the Software Developer position till May 30th. We are recruiting two candidates for this position. Both local applicants to the San Francisco Bay Area and remote applicants are encouraged to apply. Please help spread the word. http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Job_openings/Software_Developer_(project) Naoko Komura Program Manager Wikipedia Usability Initiative Wikimedia Foundation - Job Title Software Developer Employment Duration June 1, 2009 to April 16, 2010 About the Wikipedia Usability Initiative The Wikipedia Usability Initiative was realized by a grant from the U.S.-based Stanton Foundation. The goal of this initiative is to measurably increase the usability of Wikipedia for new contributors by improving the underlying software on the basis of user behavioral studies, thereby reducing barriers to public participation. This position is part of the program team for the initiative. For more information, please see the press release. http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Press_releases/Wikipedia_to_become_more_user-friendly_for_new_volunteer_writers Job Purpose The core responsibility of this position is to design, develop, test and deploy new features and improvements of the MediaWiki software for the the Wikipedia usability initiative by working closely with the interaction designer and peer developers of MediaWiki. Reports to Program Manager Job Summary *Propose software design solutions and obtain consensus from senior and peer tech teams *Create implementation prototypes based on design concepts *Develop, test, and deploy new features and improvements to the MediaWiki core and to MediaWiki extensions *Collaborate in designing and implementing QA processes including multi-lingual and performance tests *Work closely with operations staff to ensure proper integration with testing and production systems Required Qualifications *Computer Science degree or equivalent work experience *5+ years experience as a software developer is required *Experience with PHP development is required *Extensive experience with AJAX/HTML/CSS is required *Experience with cross-browser compatibility testing is required *Experience with security implications of JavaScript/PHP software is required *Experience with LAMP is a major plus *Experience with testing and analyzing usability and accessibility is a major plus *Experience with MediaWiki is a major plus *An understanding of internationalizing and localizing software products a major plus *Any other free/open software development experience highly welcome *Comfortable in a highly collaborative, consensus-oriented environment *Experience with wikis and participatory production environments is a plus *Understanding of the free culture movement is a plus *The ideal candidate will be creative, highly motivated, and able to operate effectively in multiple cultural and language contexts Salary The salary is in the range of $75,000 to $85,000 plus benefits, commensurate with experience. This position will be filled in June 2009. Due to the volume of responses that we anticipate we will not reply to all applications, so please do not interpret our silence as a lack of interest. Based in San Francisco, CA., but remote candidates will be considered. -- Support Free Knowledge: http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Donate ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] Usability Study Results (Sneak Preview)
I know a new GUI is being worked on. For the moment I hacked the following JavaScript suggestion: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Magnus_Manske/newbiehelp.js This adds a how? link into the edit tab, and launches a floating panel with some extremely general content: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Edit_how.png Never mind the wording, the color scheme, or important points I missed :-) If that were added for all anons by default, it might save the willing and able some grief. Just a thought. Great suggestion. One of the repeated sentiment from the study participants was what is the editing process. This will give a quick overview to anons. Will you post your idea to our project page? :-) http://usability.wikimedia.org/wiki/Main_Page Best, - Naoko -- Support Free Knowledge: http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Donate ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] Usability Study Results (Sneak Preview)
On Fri, Apr 24, 2009 at 10:26 AM, Gregory Kohs thekoh...@gmail.com wrote: Will the final report include a note about how unwelcome User:NawlinWiki made the study participants feel when he indefinitely blocked their accounts for abusing Wikipedia? We, the usability team, with lots of help from stewards and admins, worked behind the scene not to expose such blockage to study participants. I am sure NawlinkWiki was doing his part in protecting Wikipedia. We notified this list and WikiEn about the usability study and described the usage of these accounts in the user page, hoping to avoid such blockage. But some folks are double-cautious and I think that is a good thing. We confirmed that it is really the usability team of WMF doing the test, and could clear the concern. So it was not a problem. Best, - Naoko -- Support Free Knowledge: http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Donate ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
[Foundation-l] Usability study in progress
Howdy. (adding wikien-l folks to this thread. my apology for not including wikien-l with my initial email.) The usability study has started today as scheduled. The usability team is monitoring the interviews and how ten test participants interact with Wikipedia when they are asked to edit an article at the lab facility in San Francisco today and tomorrow. The remote usability study on Thursday (March 26 PDT) will be done remotely, which means we recruit participants from Wikipedia through the site notice, and connect with them through web conferencing. Therefore the site notice for recruitment will appear again on Thursday. We expect to compile the results in a few weeks and the findings with you. Naoko Komura Program Manager, Wikimedia Foundation Naoko Komura wrote: One of the important components of the usability initiative is to conduct multiple rounds of usability tests. The plan is to conduct at least three rounds of tests for qualitative usability evaluation over the span of twelve months, i) the initial evaluation, ii) the progress evaluation, and iii) the final evaluation. The initial usability test is scheduled on March 24, 25th and 26th. In-person lab tests are conducted in San Francisco at the first two days, and remote tests will be conducted on the third day. As a preparation for the initial usability test, we incorporated the recruiting tool into English Wikipedia's site notice. You might have encountered site notice inviting for the participation. The target audience of testers are Wikipedia readers who have little or no experience in editing the Wikipedia articles. The banner is displayed within the range of 1:400 to 1:100 page views, and it will continue till early next week. We look forward to learning from the usability tests and sharing the result with you. Thanks. Naoko ... on behalf of the usability team. -- Support Free Knowledge: http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Donate ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] Heads up: Usability test recruiting underway
Thomas Dalton wrote: 2009/3/10 Delphine Ménard notafi...@gmail.com: Are there any plans to have usability tests in other languages than English and other cultures than North-American? It seems to me these two factors actually would play quite a role in the way people interact with the software and probably should be taken into account. Presumable the remote tests mentioned will be non-North American, otherwise I'm not sure the point of remote tests (is there really that big a difference between the SF area and the rest of the continent?). It does seem it will be all English speaking, though, which is unfortunate. Hi, Delphine and Thomas. The Stanton Usability grant has a focus on English Wikipedia, but the usability team's intention and wish is to expand the scope so that all languages can benefit the usability improvement. Having said that , we only can allocate the research budget in conducting the usability test for English Wikipedia. The site notice you saw for the past few days were for the lab tests which take place in San Francisco on March 24th and 25th, so we only recruited people who can physically be in the lab in San Francisco on those days. For remote testing, there will be no regional constraints. However as Thomas pointed out, it will be limited for English Wikipedia. Once we establish the methodology of remote testing, we would like to share the methodology and perhaps involve chapters in funding the usability tests for other languages or find a way to conduct usability tests among volunteers. - Naoko -- Support Free Knowledge: http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Donate ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] Heads up: Usability test recruiting underway
Michael Bimmler wrote: On Tue, Mar 10, 2009 at 7:02 PM, Naoko Komura nkom...@wikimedia.org wrote: Having said that , we only can allocate the research budget in conducting the usability test for English Wikipedia. Purely out of interest: Was this a restriction of the Stanton grant or was it a decision by the WMF (usability team)? Michael Hi, Michael. The restriction is from the Stanton grant. - Naoko -- Support Free Knowledge: http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Donate ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] Heads up: Usability test recruiting underway
philippe wrote: Is there a restriction on the use of the research? I mean, is there any reason why the eventual outcomes can't be shared with the other projects, or is the propogation of that research confined to the english 'pedia? I'm fairly certain I know the answer (knowledge for ALL!) but would like to confirm that. Philippe Hi, Philippe. Just so that the audience of the list does not lose context of the original thread, I would like to reiterate the email thread between Michael and myself. Michael's question was as follows; Purely out of interest: Was this (implying the use of the usability research budget) a restriction of the Stanton grant or was it a decision by the WMF (usability team)? And my answer was; The restriction is from the Stanton grant. You are raising a different question with regards to the use of research results. There is no restriction in the use or sharing the test results publicly as long as we respect and protect privacy of test participants. We are video taping the lab test and plan to make it publicly available, as long as we have consents from the participants. I hope my answer helps to clear your concerns. - Naoko -- Support Free Knowledge: http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Donate ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
[Foundation-l] Heads up: Usability test recruiting underway
One of the important components of the usability initiative is to conduct multiple rounds of usability tests. The plan is to conduct at least three rounds of tests for qualitative usability evaluation over the span of twelve months, i) the initial evaluation, ii) the progress evaluation, and iii) the final evaluation. The initial usability test is scheduled on March 24, 25th and 26th. In-person lab tests are conducted in San Francisco at the first two days, and remote tests will be conducted on the third day. As a preparation for the initial usability test, we incorporated the recruiting tool into English Wikipedia's site notice. You might have encountered site notice inviting for the participation. The target audience of testers are Wikipedia readers who have little or no experience in editing the Wikipedia articles. The banner is displayed within the range of 1:400 to 1:100 page views, and it will continue till early next week. We look forward to learning from the usability tests and sharing the result with you. Thanks. Naoko ... on behalf of the usability team. -- Support Free Knowledge: http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Donate -- Support Free Knowledge: http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Donate ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
[Foundation-l] Introducing our Usability Team
Please join me welcoming the new members of the Usability Project Team. Arash Boostani, a fourteen-year tech-veteran from Genentech, has joined the project team as a Senior Software Developer. Arash also previously directed the development team of an environmental non-profit directory service called WiserEarth, which runs on collaborative software similar to MediaWiki. At WiserEarth, Arash led the way in making the software available as open-source software for the development community. As of February 1st, Trevor Parscal was internally transferred from the Wikimedia tech team to the position of Software Developer on the Usability project. Trevor has over eight years experience as an independent consultant in both software development and user interface design. After joining WMF, Trevor worked on data center management tools, amongst other development projects. Parul Vora, a former resident designer of the Design Innovation Team at Yahoo! (Yhaus) and researcher at Yahoo! Research Berkeley, joined the team. Parul brings a unique combined talent of user experience research, design, and technology to the team. She has worked on various research and design projects such as experimental information interfaces and an event-based media sharing application. At Intel Research Labs, she researched open-source physical computing platforms, their sensors and actuators, and visual programming languages for mobile phone platforms. We are currently interviewing candidates for the second software developer position. It is my honor and privilege to work with Arash, Trevor and Parul on the Wikipedia Usability Initiative. I am excited to have the mixture of great talents on the team. Naoko Komura Program Manager Wikimedia Foundation -- Support Free Knowledge: http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Donate ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] Why is the software out of reach of the community?
Hello, Brian. On Fri, Jan 9, 2009 at 2:00 PM, Brian brian.min...@colorado.edu wrote: Why are so few community-developed mediawiki extensions used by the Foundation? The plan for Usability Initiative includes intensive reviews of MediaWiki extensions which are already available. Then we will enable candidate extensions with some set of test data in the test and lab environment. Community involvement is essential in validating which extensions to adopt. Usability test is targeted for users with no or little experience in editing Wikipedia and the goal is to identify interactive obstacles. The proposed solution will be tested for feedback similar way as testing existing extensions. I also believe it is important to iterate the process above so that we can reach out to as many as possible. The project page is in the plan and once it is up, I hope to exchange and share ideas with the community. Best, - Naoko -- Support Free Knowledge: http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Donate ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
Re: [Foundation-l] Why is the software out of reach of the community?
On Fri, Jan 9, 2009 at 3:19 PM, mbimm...@gmail.com wrote: snip Erik/Naoko: does the Stanton grant include a condition for (external) specific program evaluation? Yes, we are required to submit a quarterly report to the Stanton Foundation to inform the project progress and status which includes financial report. Best, - Naoko -- Support Free Knowledge: http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Donate ___ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
