Todd Allen wrote: >[comments about VisualEditor] Hi Todd.
Thank you for writing this e-mail. Unfortunately I don't have a particularly unified reply to write here, but I can offer five thoughts. Regarding the specific issue you mention (the labeling of the user preference), I think there should be at least a little recognition that much more than half of the battle was getting this user preference re-added, supported for future VisualEditor releases, and appropriately positioned under the "Editing" user preferences tab rather than the "Gadgets" user preferences tab. Now that we've made forward progress on those fronts, re-labeling the user preference is a simple matter of editing the page "MediaWiki:Visualeditor-preference-betatempdisable". Broadly, looking at your e-mail, I wonder what your thoughts are on the extent to which one wiki, even the golden goose, can dictate Wikimedia Foundation product engineering and development. While the English Wikipedia is certainly a formidable force, do you think it should be capable, through an on-wiki discussion, of setting or changing high-level priorities and their implementation strategies? If so, why and how? I started <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:VisualEditor/Improvements> to discuss actionable improvements that can be made right now related to VisualEditor and its deployment. Please participate. :-) And I started <https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/VisualEditor/Complaints> to examine the pattern of complaints related to VisualEditor. Finally, and somewhat related to the complaints page, I've been thinking lately about the British and the Irish and the nature of insurgencies. I believe the VisualEditor team is now viewed by many on the English Wikipedia (and other wikis) as an occupying force. Consequently, this has created an insurgency composed of long-time editors. This isn't meant to be hyperbolic: nobody is rioting in the streets or planning warfare (yet). However, the anger felt by many in the editing community toward the VisualEditor team is very real and very worrying, as is the seemingly heavy-handed way in which VisualEditor has been deployed. Just a few weeks ago, VisualEditor was receiving accolades for the way in which it had been slowly and thoughtfully developed and deployed. However, seemingly arbitrary deadlines and a few key bad decisions have greatly hurt it. The wounds are deep, but it remains to be seen whether they will be fatal. MZMcBride _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list [email protected] Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, <mailto:[email protected]?subject=unsubscribe>
