Re: [Toolserver-l] Survey: Moving to Labs
Hello, At Thursday 02 May 2013 15:29:07 DaB. wrote: I'm confused. I thought we were all here to support the readers, editors, researchers and developers of the Wikimedia projects? If the toolserver is empty because Labs is accomplishing the goal, isn't that a good thing? I've asked this before: why not help with Labs, rather than fighting everyone? Let's work as a team do not forget who started the fighting: The WMF. The WMF announced to WMDE that the database-replication is going to end in the near future, what caused that WMDE stopped to support the Toolserver properly. The very goal with this was to let (Tool-)Labs be the only alternative. A fair approach would have been to create Labs as an alternative to the Toolserver, letting the users (new and old) decide which system they want to use. Toolserver and Labs could have existed in coexistence, exchanging knowledge, and maybe specially in different fields after a while. But that was not what happened. Instead the WMF decided because the are bigger, have more money, servers and personal, and control the replication-data, that they just could put the toolserver to an end – what didn't work as well as expected. And now we are sitting here with confused tool-authors, annoyed tool-users and a angry root. I didn't start the fight and I am not interested in teaming-up with a party which was not interested to build a team in the very beginning when it counted. Switching or helping with Labs would signal that I'm fine with all what the WMF did – and I'm not. Sincerely, DaB. -- Userpage: [[:w:de:User:DaB.]] — PGP: 0x2d3ee2d42b255885 signature.asc Description: This is a digitally signed message part. ___ Toolserver-l mailing list (Toolserver-l@lists.wikimedia.org) https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/toolserver-l Posting guidelines for this list: https://wiki.toolserver.org/view/Mailing_list_etiquette
Re: [Toolserver-l] Survey: Moving to Labs
Hey folks, I usually steer clear of these sort of battles, but it looks like it's time to state the obvious: *we need to work together better*. We're wiki people, damn it. We're the people[1] who figured out how to build an encyclopedia through (effectively) an anonymous system when those with less imagination were skeptical what it could even work at all. Now, we're fighting against ourselves about technology to support our wiki work and it is only wasting time, energy and social capitol. DaB, I don't follow toolserver-l as well as I should. What can I do to help make sure that the Toolserver cluster is well supplied *at least* until labs meets 99.9% of tool developers needs. Do I need to lobby the WMF? WMDE? Ryan, I'm sure it was not out of some sort of malicious intent, but a large number of toolserver users and especially DaB are getting a raw deal. At some point, someone seems to have suggested that WMF Labs ought to replace the Toolserver. This is painful because, while Labs is not yet ready for us, the Toolserver is already being phased out. It's not fair to just say, Come on over to Labs and help us. I don't see how jumping ship before the next one shows up is a good idea. The majority of us are doing our work as volunteers. We can't just manifest extra maintainer hours in order to spend developer time on Labs. We're already spending more time dealing with Toolserver issues than we normally would. Finally, the Toolserver isn't just a resource. It's our community. A community is far more valuable than technology. If we don't preserve our community, we'll all lose. So please, when we're fighting each other, our first thought should be how to not need to fight anymore. So here we are. Today was wasted arguing about who was wronged. How do we work together better tomorrow? -Aaron On Thu, May 2, 2013 at 9:05 AM, DaB. w...@daniel.baur4.info wrote: Hello, At Thursday 02 May 2013 15:29:07 DaB. wrote: I'm confused. I thought we were all here to support the readers, editors, researchers and developers of the Wikimedia projects? If the toolserver is empty because Labs is accomplishing the goal, isn't that a good thing? I've asked this before: why not help with Labs, rather than fighting everyone? Let's work as a team do not forget who started the fighting: The WMF. The WMF announced to WMDE that the database-replication is going to end in the near future, what caused that WMDE stopped to support the Toolserver properly. The very goal with this was to let (Tool-)Labs be the only alternative. A fair approach would have been to create Labs as an alternative to the Toolserver, letting the users (new and old) decide which system they want to use. Toolserver and Labs could have existed in coexistence, exchanging knowledge, and maybe specially in different fields after a while. But that was not what happened. Instead the WMF decided because the are bigger, have more money, servers and personal, and control the replication-data, that they just could put the toolserver to an end – what didn't work as well as expected. And now we are sitting here with confused tool-authors, annoyed tool-users and a angry root. I didn't start the fight and I am not interested in teaming-up with a party which was not interested to build a team in the very beginning when it counted. Switching or helping with Labs would signal that I'm fine with all what the WMF did – and I'm not. Sincerely, DaB. -- Userpage: [[:w:de:User:DaB.]] — PGP: 0x2d3ee2d42b255885 ___ Toolserver-l mailing list (Toolserver-l@lists.wikimedia.org) https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/toolserver-l Posting guidelines for this list: https://wiki.toolserver.org/view/Mailing_list_etiquette ___ Toolserver-l mailing list (Toolserver-l@lists.wikimedia.org) https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/toolserver-l Posting guidelines for this list: https://wiki.toolserver.org/view/Mailing_list_etiquette
Re: [Toolserver-l] Survey: Moving to Labs
Since I evidently fail at trying to keep my thank-yous offlist: Aaron, thanks for the note. I regret that DaB. and other members of the Toolserver community have gotten changed timelines and confused and changing messages around tools support. It sounds like DaB. and other Toolserver community members are still smarting from some past miscommunications and the feeling of having something taken away from them. I am sorry for those past problems. What we all want to do is work to provide strong, well-supported places for our community to make and host bots and tools -- and WMF and WMDE have put a bunch more effort into that goal in the last half-year or so, to avoid a repeat of past problems. (I especially appreciate the work by Silke and Coren on this, just to shout out.) I'm grateful for the work DaB. has done in the past, and I think the survey data is pretty useful to help us see how to move forward -- it sounds like we'll have to contact Mono once more stuff is set up on Labs to help with the move. :) DaB. said: Switching or helping with Labs would signal that I'm fine with all what the WMF did – and I'm not. I don't think other people would read cooperation that way; I think most of us collaborate on projects where we aren't 100% in agreement with all the decisions our colleagues made, and we can balance disagreeing and working together. I hope to work with you. with regards, Sumana -- Sumana Harihareswara Engineering Community Manager Wikimedia Foundation On 05/02/2013 11:24 AM, Sumana Harihareswara wrote: Thank you, more than I can say. -Sumana On 05/02/2013 11:20 AM, Aaron Halfaker wrote: Hey folks, I usually steer clear of these sort of battles, but it looks like it's time to state the obvious: *we need to work together better*. We're wiki people, damn it. We're the people[1] who figured out how to build an encyclopedia through (effectively) an anonymous system when those with less imagination were skeptical what it could even work at all. Now, we're fighting against ourselves about technology to support our wiki work and it is only wasting time, energy and social capitol. DaB, I don't follow toolserver-l as well as I should. What can I do to help make sure that the Toolserver cluster is well supplied *at least* until labs meets 99.9% of tool developers needs. Do I need to lobby the WMF? WMDE? Ryan, I'm sure it was not out of some sort of malicious intent, but a large number of toolserver users and especially DaB are getting a raw deal. At some point, someone seems to have suggested that WMF Labs ought to replace the Toolserver. This is painful because, while Labs is not yet ready for us, the Toolserver is already being phased out. It's not fair to just say, Come on over to Labs and help us. I don't see how jumping ship before the next one shows up is a good idea. The majority of us are doing our work as volunteers. We can't just manifest extra maintainer hours in order to spend developer time on Labs. We're already spending more time dealing with Toolserver issues than we normally would. Finally, the Toolserver isn't just a resource. It's our community. A community is far more valuable than technology. If we don't preserve our community, we'll all lose. So please, when we're fighting each other, our first thought should be how to not need to fight anymore. So here we are. Today was wasted arguing about who was wronged. How do we work together better tomorrow? -Aaron On Thu, May 2, 2013 at 9:05 AM, DaB. w...@daniel.baur4.info wrote: Hello, At Thursday 02 May 2013 15:29:07 DaB. wrote: I'm confused. I thought we were all here to support the readers, editors, researchers and developers of the Wikimedia projects? If the toolserver is empty because Labs is accomplishing the goal, isn't that a good thing? I've asked this before: why not help with Labs, rather than fighting everyone? Let's work as a team do not forget who started the fighting: The WMF. The WMF announced to WMDE that the database-replication is going to end in the near future, what caused that WMDE stopped to support the Toolserver properly. The very goal with this was to let (Tool-)Labs be the only alternative. A fair approach would have been to create Labs as an alternative to the Toolserver, letting the users (new and old) decide which system they want to use. Toolserver and Labs could have existed in coexistence, exchanging knowledge, and maybe specially in different fields after a while. But that was not what happened. Instead the WMF decided because the are bigger, have more money, servers and personal, and control the replication-data, that they just could put the toolserver to an end – what didn't work as well as expected. And now we are sitting here with confused tool-authors, annoyed tool-users and a angry root. I didn't start the fight and I am not interested in teaming-up with a party which was not interested to build a
Re: [Toolserver-l] Survey: Moving to Labs
On Thu, May 2, 2013 at 8:20 AM, Aaron Halfaker aaron.halfa...@gmail.comwrote: Hey folks, I usually steer clear of these sort of battles, but it looks like it's time to state the obvious: *we need to work together better*. We're wiki people, damn it. We're the people[1] who figured out how to build an encyclopedia through (effectively) an anonymous system when those with less imagination were skeptical what it could even work at all. Now, we're fighting against ourselves about technology to support our wiki work and it is only wasting time, energy and social capitol. DaB, I don't follow toolserver-l as well as I should. What can I do to help make sure that the Toolserver cluster is well supplied *at least* until labs meets 99.9% of tool developers needs. Do I need to lobby the WMF? WMDE? Ryan, I'm sure it was not out of some sort of malicious intent, but a large number of toolserver users and especially DaB are getting a raw deal. At some point, someone seems to have suggested that WMF Labs ought to replace the Toolserver. This is painful because, while Labs is not yet ready for us, the Toolserver is already being phased out. It's not fair to just say, Come on over to Labs and help us. I don't see how jumping ship before the next one shows up is a good idea. The majority of us are doing our work as volunteers. We can't just manifest extra maintainer hours in order to spend developer time on Labs. We're already spending more time dealing with Toolserver issues than we normally would. I don't think it's necessary to lobby anyone. WMDE has agreed to continue funding TS during the transition period, and the final decommissioning date is 2014-12-31 (see http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Tool_Labs/Roadmap_en). Finally, the Toolserver isn't just a resource. It's our community. A community is far more valuable than technology. If we don't preserve our community, we'll all lose. So please, when we're fighting each other, our first thought should be how to not need to fight anymore. That's what I'm encouraging as well. I'd like the community to move intact to Labs, including DaB. Fighting each other won't get us anywhere. If we all work together to build the new environment, it'll go quicker and we'll resolve issues together. - Ryan ___ Toolserver-l mailing list (Toolserver-l@lists.wikimedia.org) https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/toolserver-l Posting guidelines for this list: https://wiki.toolserver.org/view/Mailing_list_etiquette
[Toolserver-l] Survey: Moving to Labs
Hello all, until now I had the impression that we (you, the authors, and me) fight together against WMF and WMDE for keeping the Toolserver and against Labs. Some mails and discussion in the last days gives me now the impression that this was wrong and (at least some of) you are eager to leave the toolserver as soon as possible. There is no point to beg the WMDE for new hardware and to invest much more time if 2 weeks after Labs is ready the toolserver will be empty. For this reason I created a survey at [1] that starts at midnight. Please take a moment of your time and place your nick in the section that suits you. Sincerely, DaB. [1] https://wiki.toolserver.org/view/Labs-Moving-Survey -- Userpage: [[:w:de:User:DaB.]] — PGP: 0x2d3ee2d42b255885 signature.asc Description: This is a digitally signed message part. ___ Toolserver-l mailing list (Toolserver-l@lists.wikimedia.org) https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/toolserver-l Posting guidelines for this list: https://wiki.toolserver.org/view/Mailing_list_etiquette
Re: [Toolserver-l] Survey: Moving to Labs
On Thu, May 2, 2013 at 3:53 AM, DaB. w...@daniel.baur4.info wrote: Hello all, until now I had the impression that we (you, the authors, and me) fight together against WMF and WMDE for keeping the Toolserver and against Labs. Some mails and discussion in the last days gives me now the impression that this was wrong and (at least some of) you are eager to leave the toolserver as soon as possible. There is no point to beg the WMDE for new hardware and to invest much more time if 2 weeks after Labs is ready the toolserver will be empty. For this reason I created a survey at [1] that starts at midnight. Please take a moment of your time and place your nick in the section that suits you. Sincerely, DaB. [1] https://wiki.toolserver.org/view/Labs-Moving-Survey I wish there were an option saying move when XXX and YYY features are available and / or provided better on Labs. -Liangent ___ Toolserver-l mailing list (Toolserver-l@lists.wikimedia.org) https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/toolserver-l Posting guidelines for this list: https://wiki.toolserver.org/view/Mailing_list_etiquette
Re: [Toolserver-l] Survey: Moving to Labs
+1 On Wed, May 1, 2013 at 3:02 PM, Liangent liang...@gmail.com wrote: On Thu, May 2, 2013 at 3:53 AM, DaB. w...@daniel.baur4.info wrote: Hello all, until now I had the impression that we (you, the authors, and me) fight together against WMF and WMDE for keeping the Toolserver and against Labs. Some mails and discussion in the last days gives me now the impression that this was wrong and (at least some of) you are eager to leave the toolserver as soon as possible. There is no point to beg the WMDE for new hardware and to invest much more time if 2 weeks after Labs is ready the toolserver will be empty. For this reason I created a survey at [1] that starts at midnight. Please take a moment of your time and place your nick in the section that suits you. Sincerely, DaB. [1] https://wiki.toolserver.org/view/Labs-Moving-Survey I wish there were an option saying move when XXX and YYY features are available and / or provided better on Labs. -Liangent ___ Toolserver-l mailing list (Toolserver-l@lists.wikimedia.org) https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/toolserver-l Posting guidelines for this list: https://wiki.toolserver.org/view/Mailing_list_etiquette ___ Toolserver-l mailing list (Toolserver-l@lists.wikimedia.org) https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/toolserver-l Posting guidelines for this list: https://wiki.toolserver.org/view/Mailing_list_etiquette
Re: [Toolserver-l] Survey: Moving to Labs
(anonymous) wrote: until now I had the impression that we (you, the authors, and me) fight together against WMF and WMDE for keeping the Toolserver and against Labs. Some mails and discussion in the last days gives me now the impression that this was wrong and (at least some of) you are eager to leave the toolserver as soon as possible. There is no point to beg the WMDE for new hardware and to invest much more time if 2 weeks after Labs is ready the toolserver will be empty. For this reason I created a survey at [1] that starts at midnight. Please take a moment of your time and place your nick in the section that suits you. Sincerely, DaB. [1] https://wiki.toolserver.org/view/Labs-Moving-Survey I wish there were an option saying move when XXX and YYY features are available and / or provided better on Labs. That's move as soon as possible. Tim ___ Toolserver-l mailing list (Toolserver-l@lists.wikimedia.org) https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/toolserver-l Posting guidelines for this list: https://wiki.toolserver.org/view/Mailing_list_etiquette
Re: [Toolserver-l] Survey: Moving to Labs
Hi! On 01.05.2013 22:02, Liangent wrote: On Thu, May 2, 2013 at 3:53 AM, DaB. w...@daniel.baur4.info wrote: [1] https://wiki.toolserver.org/view/Labs-Moving-Survey I wish there were an option saying move when XXX and YYY features are available and / or provided better on Labs. Actually I's say Hey, it's a wiki! or maybe I would just add your preferred option, but unfortunately I still can't login at that wiki, see https://jira.toolserver.org/browse/TS-1599 Bye seth ___ Toolserver-l mailing list (Toolserver-l@lists.wikimedia.org) https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/toolserver-l Posting guidelines for this list: https://wiki.toolserver.org/view/Mailing_list_etiquette
Re: [Toolserver-l] Survey: Moving to Labs
On Thu, May 2, 2013 at 4:05 AM, Tim Landscheidt t...@tim-landscheidt.de wrote: (anonymous) wrote: until now I had the impression that we (you, the authors, and me) fight together against WMF and WMDE for keeping the Toolserver and against Labs. Some mails and discussion in the last days gives me now the impression that this was wrong and (at least some of) you are eager to leave the toolserver as soon as possible. There is no point to beg the WMDE for new hardware and to invest much more time if 2 weeks after Labs is ready the toolserver will be empty. For this reason I created a survey at [1] that starts at midnight. Please take a moment of your time and place your nick in the section that suits you. Sincerely, DaB. [1] https://wiki.toolserver.org/view/Labs-Moving-Survey I wish there were an option saying move when XXX and YYY features are available and / or provided better on Labs. That's move as soon as possible. That's not exactly the same, especially when I add the clause provided better on Labs. When some features I require are poorly available on Labs, it's still possible to move, but in the case that, if I decide to move, I have to - for example - work around many issues on Labs, or have some more difficult development work to do in order to utilize those features on Labs, I'll still still stay on Toolserver. -Liangent Tim ___ Toolserver-l mailing list (Toolserver-l@lists.wikimedia.org) https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/toolserver-l Posting guidelines for this list: https://wiki.toolserver.org/view/Mailing_list_etiquette ___ Toolserver-l mailing list (Toolserver-l@lists.wikimedia.org) https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/toolserver-l Posting guidelines for this list: https://wiki.toolserver.org/view/Mailing_list_etiquette
Re: [Toolserver-l] Survey: Moving to Labs
On Wed, May 1, 2013 at 12:53 PM, DaB. w...@daniel.baur4.info wrote: Hello all, until now I had the impression that we (you, the authors, and me) fight together against WMF and WMDE for keeping the Toolserver and against Labs. Some mails and discussion in the last days gives me now the impression that this was wrong and (at least some of) you are eager to leave the toolserver as soon as possible. There is no point to beg the WMDE for new hardware and to invest much more time if 2 weeks after Labs is ready the toolserver will be empty. For this reason I created a survey at [1] that starts at midnight. Please take a moment of your time and place your nick in the section that suits you. I'm confused. I thought we were all here to support the readers, editors, researchers and developers of the Wikimedia projects? If the toolserver is empty because Labs is accomplishing the goal, isn't that a good thing? I've asked this before: why not help with Labs, rather than fighting everyone? Let's work as a team and have a well supported, well funded product that's run by all of us, with a larger scope that incorporates infrastructure and development volunteers. We appreciate your work on the Toolserver and would appreciate it in Labs as well. - Ryan ___ Toolserver-l mailing list (Toolserver-l@lists.wikimedia.org) https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/toolserver-l Posting guidelines for this list: https://wiki.toolserver.org/view/Mailing_list_etiquette
Re: [Toolserver-l] Survey: Moving to Labs
On 01/05/13 21:53, DaB. wrote: Hello all, until now I had the impression that we (you, the authors, and me) fight together against WMF and WMDE for keeping the Toolserver and against Labs. Some mails and discussion in the last days gives me now the impression that this was wrong and (at least some of) you are eager to leave the toolserver as soon as possible. It does look at times as if they wanted to remove the toolserver from behind us, but it shouldn't be considered a fight. In this situation, the interest for that new-über-replacement it's completely normal. It doesn't mean that they love one more than the other. There is no point to beg the WMDE for new hardware and to invest much more time if 2 weeks after Labs is ready the toolserver will be empty. For this reason I created a survey at [1] that starts at midnight. Please take a moment of your time and place your nick in the section that suits you. Sincerely, DaB. Even if labs being ready happens in 2018? ready will vary for each tool, but I foresee a process like this: 1. labs provides all the resources needed for $TOOL 2. $AUTHOR signs up in labs, gets added to the projects, etc. 3. $AUTHOR tests (benchmarks) labs and finds it acceptable for $TOOL 4. $AUTHOR learns all the labs-specific details. 5. $AUTHOR allocates some time for installing $TOOL in labs 6. Fix bugs in $TOOL when run in labs (aka. adapt $TOOL to labs) 7. (Optional) Redirect toolserver/$TOOL to labs/$TOOL For the majority of tools, we haven't reached #1 yet. Once labs provides (almost) everything available at toolserver, you can start talking about when to stop supporting TS. But doing otherwise is premature. #2 is the only step that could take place before #1. Then there is the 'lazy factor' for #2-7, although it is also known as too busy to fix this program which works ok in TS Some people may skip #3, while others will want to be damn sure that it will work correctly. The time required by #4 can be reduced making labs very similar to toolserver. If labs environment for the programs is very different, such as needing to do the joins manually inside the program, that will increase #6 a lot. ___ Toolserver-l mailing list (Toolserver-l@lists.wikimedia.org) https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/toolserver-l Posting guidelines for this list: https://wiki.toolserver.org/view/Mailing_list_etiquette
Re: [Toolserver-l] Survey: Moving to Labs
Platonides wrote: Even if labs being ready happens in 2018? ready will vary for each tool, but I foresee a process like this: 1. labs provides all the resources needed for $TOOL 2. $AUTHOR signs up in labs, gets added to the projects, etc. 3. $AUTHOR tests (benchmarks) labs and finds it acceptable for $TOOL 4. $AUTHOR learns all the labs-specific details. 5. $AUTHOR allocates some time for installing $TOOL in labs 6. Fix bugs in $TOOL when run in labs (aka. adapt $TOOL to labs) 7. (Optional) Redirect toolserver/$TOOL to labs/$TOOL For the majority of tools, we haven't reached #1 yet. Once labs provides (almost) everything available at toolserver, you can start talking about when to stop supporting TS. But doing otherwise is premature. #2 is the only step that could take place before #1. Then there is the 'lazy factor' for #2-7, although it is also known as too busy to fix this program which works ok in TS Some people may skip #3, while others will want to be damn sure that it will work correctly. The time required by #4 can be reduced making labs very similar to toolserver. If labs environment for the programs is very different, such as needing to do the joins manually inside the program, that will increase #6 a lot. Platonides: This was an absolutely wonderful e-mail. Thank you for putting it together. :-) In some ways, as others have noted, convincing people to switch to Labs earlier would slowly reduce the Toolserver's load. Or instead of convincing, forcing users who are currently using a disproportionately high amount of resources for their tools. But... I imagine most resource-intensive tools need database replication up and running. Maybe by the end of this month? Fingers crossed. MZMcBride ___ Toolserver-l mailing list (Toolserver-l@lists.wikimedia.org) https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/toolserver-l Posting guidelines for this list: https://wiki.toolserver.org/view/Mailing_list_etiquette
