Re: 5.12 release: congratulations and post-mortem

[Roman Gilg]

Regarding QA of releases there is this task now:
https://phabricator.kde.org/T7949

This will most likely touch the general release process as well.

You are welcome to join the task as subscribers or with direct input.
First we need to collect ideas how to improve our QA.

On Tue, Feb 6, 2018 at 4:54 PM, Nate Graham  wrote:
> Congrats on a fantastic release of Plasma 5.12 everybody! People are really
> gonna love it.
>
> The release process was a bit rockier than expected, and I thought I might
> do a post-mortem to see how we can make the next one smoother:
>
>
>
> Problem: Initial request for release notes was not seen by many
> ===
> Solutions:
> - Send email to kde-pr...@kde.org and kde-de...@kde.org as well
> - Use a Phabricator task instead of email to track overall work
> - Make a subtask to track gathering release notes from developers
> - Delegate a specific person (Ivanna?) to be responsible for turning the
> release notes into final marketing copy
>
>
>
> Problem: Unclear roles; nobody knew who owned the beta announcement
> ===
> Solutions:
> - Make roles and responsibilities clear to all; assign specific people to
> specific tasks
> - Make the KDE Promo crew the guardians of everything public-facing
>
>
>
> Problem: Unclear access to the kde.org website
> ==
> (At once point, changes were requested and planned, but the one person that
> everybody knew had access was on vacation)
>
> Solutions:
> - Define who should have access ahead of time
> - Get those people access to the website ahead of time
>
>
>
> Problem: Promo video produced at the last minute, gating final release
> ==
> Solutions:
> - Supply whomever is making the video with a pre-release copy of Plasma 5.12
> at least a few days in advance so that the video can be completed sooner
>
>
>
> Thoughts?
>
> Nate
>

Re: 5.12 release: congratulations and post-mortem

[Jonathan Riddell]

Plasma 5.13 kickoff meeting being scheduled if anyone wants to come along
https://doodle.com/poll/8wwrt59dt8prz6pf

Jonathan


On 6 February 2018 at 15:54, Nate Graham  wrote:
> Congrats on a fantastic release of Plasma 5.12 everybody! People are really
> gonna love it.
>
> The release process was a bit rockier than expected, and I thought I might
> do a post-mortem to see how we can make the next one smoother:
>
>
>
> Problem: Initial request for release notes was not seen by many
> ===
> Solutions:
> - Send email to kde-pr...@kde.org and kde-de...@kde.org as well
> - Use a Phabricator task instead of email to track overall work
> - Make a subtask to track gathering release notes from developers
> - Delegate a specific person (Ivanna?) to be responsible for turning the
> release notes into final marketing copy
>
>
>
> Problem: Unclear roles; nobody knew who owned the beta announcement
> ===
> Solutions:
> - Make roles and responsibilities clear to all; assign specific people to
> specific tasks
> - Make the KDE Promo crew the guardians of everything public-facing
>
>
>
> Problem: Unclear access to the kde.org website
> ==
> (At once point, changes were requested and planned, but the one person that
> everybody knew had access was on vacation)
>
> Solutions:
> - Define who should have access ahead of time
> - Get those people access to the website ahead of time
>
>
>
> Problem: Promo video produced at the last minute, gating final release
> ==
> Solutions:
> - Supply whomever is making the video with a pre-release copy of Plasma 5.12
> at least a few days in advance so that the video can be completed sooner
>
>
>
> Thoughts?
>
> Nate
>

Re: 5.12 release: congratulations and post-mortem

[Paul Brown]

On Tuesday, 6 February 2018 18:49:41 CET Luigi Toscano wrote:
> On Tuesday, 6 February 2018 18:34:34 CET Paul Brown wrote:
> > - Establish strict deadlines for suggested changes to media (texts and
> > videos) and strictly stick to said deadlines.
> > 
> > [EDIT: Ivana has also suggested this, but here are my thoughts too.]
> > 
> > So when the next-to-last draft of the announcement text or the video is
> > done, it is submitted to the peers. Peers then have say, 48 hours or
> > whatever to suggest/request changes.
> > 
> > Once the window for requests is closed only proofreading and minor
> > corrections should be allowed. 24 hours before the release, no changes
> > should be allowed at all.
> 
> Even 48 hours, in order to help translators.

Thanks, Luigi, yes. I made up the times. We would have to calculate them 
carefully.

Paul
-- 
Promotion & Communication

www: http://kde.org
Mastodon: https://mastodon.technology/@kde
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/kde/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/kdecommunity



signature.asc
Description: This is a digitally signed message part.

Re: 5.12 release: congratulations and post-mortem

[Luigi Toscano]

On Tuesday, 6 February 2018 18:34:34 CET Paul Brown wrote:
> - Establish strict deadlines for suggested changes to media (texts and
> videos) and strictly stick to said deadlines.
> 
> [EDIT: Ivana has also suggested this, but here are my thoughts too.]
> 
> So when the next-to-last draft of the announcement text or the video is
> done, it is submitted to the peers. Peers then have say, 48 hours or
> whatever to suggest/request changes.
> 
> Once the window for requests is closed only proofreading and minor
> corrections should be allowed. 24 hours before the release, no changes
> should be allowed at all.

Even 48 hours, in order to help translators.

-- 
Luigi

Re: 5.12 release: congratulations and post-mortem

[Paul Brown]

On Tuesday, 6 February 2018 16:54:19 CET Nate Graham wrote:
> Congrats on a fantastic release of Plasma 5.12 everybody! People are
> really gonna love it.
> 
> The release process was a bit rockier than expected, and I thought I
> might do a post-mortem to see how we can make the next one smoother:
> 
>.
>.
>.
>
> Thoughts?

- Create teams with a clearly designated team leader for tasks that are 
currently done by one person to avoid bottlenecks and delays.

I'm thinking of video-creation, social-media post creation, announcement 
composition, etc. Like that, you alleviate the workload of the team leader 
with researchers and "elves" than can create assets needed for the completion 
of the task.

Also, if the team leader, God forbid, should become unavailable for any 
reason, the rest of the team can pick up form where the team leader left off 
and deliver.

- Establish strict deadlines for suggested changes to media (texts and videos) 
and strictly stick to said deadlines.

[EDIT: Ivana has also suggested this, but here are my thoughts too.]

So when the next-to-last draft of the announcement text or the video is done, 
it is submitted to the peers. Peers then have say, 48 hours or whatever to 
suggest/request changes.

Once the window for requests is closed only proofreading and minor corrections 
should be allowed. 24 hours before the release, no changes should be allowed 
at all.

This would avoid the last minute hacks that are so error prone, as well as the 
"too many chefs" syndrome, that leads to everybody trying to push their own 
preference on the media.

This requires that all media is available quite in advance of the launch. But 
this should be the norm anyway.

Paul
-- 
Promotion & Communication

www: http://kde.org
Mastodon: https://mastodon.technology/@kde
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/kde/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/kdecommunity



signature.asc
Description: This is a digitally signed message part.