Stephen J. Turnbull wrote:
Antoine Pitrou writes:
> Terry Reedy <tjreedy <at> udel.edu> writes:
> >
> > I watched and was greatly impressed by the video demo of Google's new
> > Wave collaborative communication system. I believe it would/will help
> > with some of the chronic problems we (and others) have.
>
> I really don't think technical systems are an answer to social
> issues. It's a flaw of the engineering mindset.
Well, its true that telephones did not cure people of dishonesty, but it
did make communication-at-a-distance, truthful or otherwise, easier.
That depends on the definition of "problem". For example, if the
problem is "half our people detest web interfaces and want to discuss
issues by email", then "Roundup: nosy list" *is* a technical system
that is an answer.
And for me, it is very helpful.
I agree that Terry wasn't particularly specific about what impressed
him and how it would help for what problem.
Right. A quick three lines plus a few more. There were several things
that Wave brings together. I will suggest specific experiments when it
is actually available for use.
> But rather than just say
"technology is not a universal answer", we should ask "what problem
does this address?"
As I said in my response to Ben Finney, two problems addressed are
1. Reading a document that has been edited since you read it last.
The old method of in-place deltas -- typically strikeout for deletions
and some other special marking for additions -- has stood that test of
time. Many word processors do this, but Waves improve on them by
individualizing the markings for the particular reader and then removing
them once read.
2. Multiple people editing a document.
One solution is the "You're it" method, whether informal by passing a
doc around either on paper or electronicly or formal by VCS checkout.
Another is edit in isolation, merge, and resolve conflicts. Waves allow
real-time simultaneous editing and merging via micro-deltas, so
conflicts are immediately apparent. This would generally work better
with text docs than with code, which needs to be frequently frozen to
run, but code might even be workable for side-by-side pair or sprint
programming.
> (Personally, I'm satisfied from the example Terry
gave that he had the "summarizing the opinions of those whose opinions
we respect in this domain" problem in mind, and I think there *are*
technical solutions to that. Terry?)
The current 'summarize opinion' system is somewhat haphazard and
informal, with no auto-tabulation. It seems to have broken-down a bit
for the ipaddr issue, at least until the last few days when the best
solution was to remove and defer. Better would have been either not add
and defer or add with generally supported revision. I speculate that if
there had been a proto-pep wave (though not then possible) with a vote
widget with buttons such as Accept as is, Probably accept after
revision, Don't know, and Reject, we might have reached a better outcome
sooner.
Terry Jan Reedy
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