Here's my best guess, emails force everyone on the list to read it, so they have to meet a higher bar of importance?
Pure guess there, im just channeling my experiences- I dont mind mailing dev lists personally Dhruv On Thu, Jun 21, 2018 at 11:28 AM, Phillip Cloud <cpcl...@gmail.com> wrote: > Dhruv, > > I'm curious why the dev mailing list is considered intrusive. Can you > expand a bit on that? I've always thought of mailing lists to be *the* > place where people go to ask questions about a project in a way that is > open to all. They are also archived and organized in some way that makes it > easy to go back and look at specific topics without having to piece > together a topic's history from a large tapestry of interactions. If > anything, I view chat as *more* intrusive since there's IMO an expectation > of a faster response given that chat is real-time. > > On Thu, Jun 21, 2018 at 11:13 AM Dhruv Madeka <mad...@nyu.edu> wrote: > > > Not to jump in too randomly, but for jupyter-widgets/bqplot > > <https://github.com/bloomberg/bqplot> - we haven't found an optimal > > solution to this. > > > > - The dev mailing list is often considered to be intrusive > > - GitHub issues arent really used for simple questions or non-bug fixes > > - Gitter remains our most popular source of questions, which suffers a > lot > > of the problems of Slack outlined in Wes' email > > > > We're considering discuss forums, specially after the large success of > the > > PyTorch <https://discuss.pytorch.org> and MXNet < > https://discuss.mxnet.io> > > forums for building community, allowing comfort in asking simple > questions > > and being stored/googleable > > > > Dhruv > > > > On Thu, Jun 21, 2018 at 4:25 AM, Wes McKinney <wesmck...@gmail.com> > wrote: > > > > > hi all, > > > > > > I wanted to bring up some concerns I have about the Slack room hosted > > > at http://apachearrow.slack.com. > > > > > > Corporate communications have changed a lot in recent years with the > > > new wave of IRC-like chat systems such as HipChat and Slack. In many > > > companies, Slack has become a preferred form of communication over > > > e-mail or other asynchronous messaging tools. This trend is negatively > > > impacting Apache Arrow in some ways that I will explain. > > > > > > Initially we created the Arrow Slack channel as a means of secondary > > > communication, to facilitate real-time discussions and help build the > > > community. So people, particularly newcomers, are coming to the > > > project and seeing 4 ways to communicate: > > > > > > * dev@ Mailing list > > > * JIRA > > > * GitHub > > > * Slack > > > > > > As a result of broader trends in the world, they are electing to use > > > Slack as their first, primary channel to interact with the project. > > > This is bad for many reasons: > > > > > > * Slack is essentially private. While anyone can join Slack, chats are > > > not archived in any public place, nor are they searchable through > > > internet search portals. I do not think it meets the public > > > communication requirements of Apache projects in general > > > * We've exceeded the message limit for free Slack channels; upgrading > > > to a paid Slack plan for Apache Arrow, with 650+ members, would be > > > very expensive > > > * Only 3 out of the top 20 Arrow contributors (by # of commits) are > > > regularly on the Slack channel. I don't use Slack, for example, and I > > > would rather not be expected to > > > * We are geo-distributed in many time zones; even if we all used > > > Slack, synchronous/real-time chat to discuss the project is frequently > > > impractical > > > > > > Because of the "real-time" nature of IRC-like systems, people's > > > discussions and questions get intermingled, so keeping track of > > > longer-running discussions may be difficult. It's hard to know when > > > someone's question has been answered or whether people have > > > sufficiently discussed a particular topic. > > > > > > Many discussions or questions are by their nature asynchronous, and it > > > may take 24-72 hours or more for Arrow contributors to make a > > > thoughtful reply. > > > > > > As a result of all of this, we are missing opportunities to have > > > deeper discussions, develop the Arrow roadmap, create new JIRAs to > > > capture bug reports or feature requests, and other activities of > > > healthy open source communities. Additionally, the private nature of > > > Slack is causing organizational knowledge (particularly Q&A / FAQs) to > > > essentially be lost. Users with questions won't stumble on answers by > > > searching on Google (as they would with a mailing list or > > > StackOverflow). > > > > > > I don't think Slack is necessarily bad for users in a corporate > > > environment; in many companies it is expected that all people will > > > have the Slack client open at all times. This isn't the case here, > > > though. > > > > > > My strong preference in light of the activity I have been observing on > > > Slack (which I encourage you to explore yourselves) would be to close > > > the channel and direct discussions or questions take place on the > > > mailing list, JIRA, or GitHub (all of which are archived on one or > > > more ASF mailing lists). Since migrating to Gitbox, we have enabled > > > GitHub issues on the repository, which has helped lower the barrier > > > for newcomers, but a large percentage of the time GitHub issues would > > > be better as JIRA issues or e-mails (which is what the GitHub issue > > > template says, alas). > > > > > > Interested to hear the thoughts of others on this. > > > > > > Thanks, > > > Wes > > > > > >
