Am 07/13/2013 01:45 AM, schrieb Rob Weir:
On Fri, Jul 12, 2013 at 3:52 PM, Kay Schenk<kay.sch...@gmail.com> wrote:
On Fri, Jul 12, 2013 at 12:17 PM, Rob Weir<rabas...@gmail.com> wrote:
On Jul 12, 2013, at 2:26 PM, "Marcus (OOo)"<marcus.m...@wtnet.de> wrote:
Am 07/12/2013 07:18 PM, schrieb janI:
On 12 July 2013 18:49, Rob Weir<robw...@apache.org> wrote:
In the past we drafted release notes on the wiki, and then moved them
to a location on the website. I'd like to challenge our thinking on
this.
Wouldn't it be useful to keep the release notes as a "live" document
on the wiki, so we can easily update it with additional information on
known issues as they are found, especially after release?
I see your point, however I disagree.
I think the release doc. for 4.0 is part of the release and should be
frozen in svn like all other release artifacts. This is done by having
it
as a static web page.
I support the doubts of Jan.
The release notes should be seen as an artifact from a release as they
describe this. We can also go that far that we write down the SVN revision
number into the release notes. Then they are really tied strictly to this
release and nothing else.
And I did not mean to suggest anything else. The wiki page would be
tied to a specific version of AOO, a different page for each version.
But it would be updated to reflect the latest info, especially in the
"known problems" section.
We can then have a "latest information", which are live in wiki.
What about to put a link like this at the top of the release notes to
give it more visible attention:
Text: "For the latest information about Apache OpenOffice 4.0 see
this related Wiki page."
Link: http://wiki.openoffice.org/wiki/AOO400_Lastest_Info
Look at it from the perspective of the user. They want one place to go
for relevant info related to the release and problems they might
encounter. They don't want to hunt around for "old" versus "new" info.
Those distinctions are not relevant to a new user.
For example, imagine Windows 8.1 comes out and causes a problem with
AOO4, but there is a good workaround that could save the user much
frustration. But the release notes don't mention this. They just say
Windows 8 is tested. This is not very helpful.
Then new and important / noteable changes can be documented in the (more
easily accessible) Wiki.
My proposal was to handle this by keeping the release notes on a wiki
page so such changes are seen by users with the least effort for them
and us.
-Rob
Arguments either way it seems. Leaving them on the wiki would certainly be
good especially for last minute changes -- which have happened. I guess it
boils down to -- when a release is announced, where are the Release Notes
of record? and if things change -- i.e. *New* Discovered Issues, as opposed
to Known Issues in the Release Notes -- should this be kept as a separate
entity that is not part of the Release Notes of record? OK, a lot of legal
gobbly gook I guess
Two separate considerations, perhaps:
1) Whether Release Notes are updated overtime, post-release, based on
feedback from users and discovery of new issues? Or are they
frozen-in-time, snapshots that never change, but might point to a
different page that is updated.
2) What technology we use to create, publish and (if needed) update
the release notes.
It is possible to have a "living" document for Release Notes and do it
entirely in HTML on the website. It is possible to do it on the wiki.
It is even possible to do it on the committer-only CWiki. (Anyone
remember that we have that?)
Since we all seem to like drafting the release notes on the wiki, it
might reduce the work if we just keep it there. It makes it easier
for translators as well. But I'm not too concerned with the except
technology used. I'm more concerned with keeping it up to date, and
easy to understand. In other words, if we have a section called
"known issues", I want it to remain accurate as new issues are
discovered. It is 2013 and this is the internet. We shouldn't have a
"let's slip an errata sheet into a hardbound book" mentality about
this.
I personally find it annoying to get "instructions" and "issues" at a site
one day, that somehow morph into something else the next. Even if these
things are not legally binding, there's that sort of confusion factor.
I think most users consult the page rarely. They might look once when
they install initially. And then they look again perhaps, if they run
into a problem. One advantage of the release notes in particular (and
this is true of no other page) is that they tend to have higher Google
PageRank, because they are linked to from news articles. So users who
query for things like "apache openoffice 4.0 issues" will tend to find
that page high on their results list. This would not be true for
issues that we push off to another, secondary page.
I, too, really don't like the idea of anyone with a wiki account being able
to change these, especially with the possibility of no general
consultation or consensus.
There are ways of handling this that control the ACL, such as using
the OOODEV CWiki, or even using static HTML or MDText pages, if the
open access of the wiki is a concern.
For me yes, it is a concern that everybody could change a document that
shouldn't (mostly) be changed when the release is done. Of course
changes in the Wiki can be reverted (same for edits in SVN). But IMHO we
shouldn't rely on this just to be able to put text whereever we want.
So, if we could create a zone inside the Wiki with limited access, put
the release notes there and update only the sections for "Known Issues"
and others, when there is really a need for, then I would be OK to put
the complete release notes into the Wiki.
Marcus
Remember, even if the issue is not caused by AOO code, a new upgrade
to a dependent operating system or other 3rd party application can
cause new issues to appear at any time. So keeping the release notes
updated is important.
This issue is highly caused by AOO code, remember the release code is
tested with a given set of third party libraries and given versions of
the
operating systems.
Release notes reflect the environment tested for the 4.0 release,
everything that comes later should either be kept in a separate
document or
postponed to a new release.
Do we lose anything if we do this? For example, is there a concern
that the wiki can not handle the load?
Wiki can handle the load (it must because a lot of people will search
for
info).
Yes we loose trackability. Release notes is in svn (in my opinion).
Remember in wiki anybody can change, so if person X test AOO on
platform Y
should he/she then just update the release documentation, I hope not.
But again, your idea of a live document is good, I just see it as a
second
document (similar to what a lot of companies does).
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