Random thoughts, not terribly connected: 1) agree with developers != designers. It's like developers != release managers. We developers can often play at being a designer (or a release manager), but we've got bad tendencies that sneak in, just because we "know too much" or "know what's hard" or just start thinking about how to code something instead of how to *use* something. It's fine to use developers as short-term stand-ins for an empty slot, but we should keep in mind the dangers and compromises involved.
2) That's not to say that a lot of the basic HIG work can't be done by a developer -- or a teacher, or *anyone*, really. There's a lot of "don't want to touch that" paralysis that we should try to get over. Step 1 of a HIG update could be to import the HIG into a more appropriate non-wiki tool, or to radically restructure how it is kept on the wiki to make it more of a living document, and/or to figure out how versioning should work. Step 2 is probably to go through and red-line the existing document to describe how (and why) the existing implementation doesn't currently match the design -- with maybe a rough idea of whether its the design or the implementation that's "at fault". Both of these things don't actually need a designer, they really need *time*. A large "design team" composed mostly of folks without design training can still be of great ongoing assistance with these "paperwork" tasks. Progress can/should be made independent of finding the one perfect dictator. 3) I see a little bit of buck-passing going on, as a third-party observer. It seems like the real reason for a 3-person committee is that no one wants to actually step up and take on the responsibility of UX lead. Unfortunately, lack of clearly defined responsibility is the crux of the problem you're trying to solve, so I'm not certain that splitting the horcrux is part of the solution. Maybe it would be help to identify a single dictator and lieutenants (rather than the committee-of-3) with hat-passing as necessary -- so, for example, we can have 4 (!) design leads, but each one is ultimate dictator for one week a month. That reduces time commitment without diluting buck-stopping responsibility. 4) Agreed with the general sentiment that the best shouldn't obstruct the good. Even with the concerns I stated above about designers!=developers, having someone step up and actually start cleaning up the UX docs (and/or organizing the UX patch queue) is probably the most important thing. Dictatorship may (or may not) naturally evolve from this; if Walter and/or OLPC are going to find the perfect UX Design Dictator candidate in 2 months (say) then consider what you can do in the meantime to pave the way for the Messiah's arrival. --scott _______________________________________________ Sugar-devel mailing list Sugar-devel@lists.sugarlabs.org http://lists.sugarlabs.org/listinfo/sugar-devel