[gentoo-dev] gentoo[.org] reorg (GDN/GUN) - the ongoing saga - part two

this is beeing posted here, to be commented by an wider audience ...
(posted on 20/September on the core ML)  
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version 0.0.3 (20/September/2002 [23h50 GMT-0] )



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this is an ongoing document intendend to smoother/accelarate/improve all
things Gentoo related... feel free to improve and smooth it Comments are
obviously welcome

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We are not talking here about a simple web site reorganization, with
nicier, cutier graphics. 

What we are, really,  talking here is about creating  a way to better
reach and serve our different audiences, either end-users, either
developers or simple curious people....  

What we want also, is in short,  better use the  Web  as a framework on
top of wich all Gentoo related developments will happen... 

this message is specialy directed to those who think of themselves on
the line : "well, i 'm a developer, so i don 't care about the web site
and documentation stuff..."

The key for Gentoo continued, and sustained growth, is comunication... 

Comunication between a (growing) developer base, Comunication between a
(growing) user base and Comunication and a true and fast flux of
information between all in the community.

In short, and again, Comunication, is the only way to assure long term
Gentoo sucess and survival... 

Rigth now we face major challenges: 
    a growing user base  (we 're already the fastest ever growing linux
    distribution in history) and as a side effect we must start to
    address the needs of those users in a serious and sustained way... 
    If we not start that now, we 're doomed to fail, as to a certain
    extent Debian already have failed... 
    
    a growing QA problem : as the number of developers increses, so
    increases the number of packages available, and the whole complexity
    of the system and, as a side effect the possibility of happening
    mistakes also increase ; 
    Since (AFAIK) neither Daniel nor  Seemant nor either of the
    developers is God or have God-like capabilities, the key to avoid
    costly mistakes, that should simply never happen, if we ever want to
    be a distro suitable, and scalable, from an appliance to a
    datacenter is, and again, communication, syncronization between all
    the moving parts and having ways to speed up the flux of the
    information (changes/news/whatever) and, in the way, improving
    productivity (by the way  of shortening development time, avoiding
    tasks duplication, etc) and quality... 
    
    The third, and perhaps, biggest, challenge we face is that the,
    current, Gentoo development process has too many single points of
    failure; 
    We are used to, simply, trust in  a few individuals to assure
    certain key areas... As a result these individuals, who are above
    all humans, get overburned, and sometimes by focusing too much on
    they 're own departments end loosing the focus to the global picture
    ... Once and again, the key here is communication.
The main goal of the proposal above is to face and win all those
challenges! 

We 're already winning on several fronts, we 're not Yet  Another RPM
Based Distro, we 're not Another Old Unix with Linux clothes, we 're
already shapping what computing will be in the near future, and we 're
beeing sucessfull on that. 

We already have an worlwide user base that in an worst case scenario is
of about 80.000 seats... But the best, could be yet to come... 

But, for that, for not defrraud the high expactations that already
thousands of users worlwide have in us, our  Internal and External
organization is fundamental because that it is the only way of assuring
fast and accurante communication between all parts... Addressing that,
the rest will be HISTORY ! 


and we must allways remember that in the start and in the end Gentoo is
about freedom: 
        * The freedom of not taking choice away from the user.
        * The freedom of not making assumptions about what the user
          wants.
        * The freedom of having everything easy to customize and extend.
Gentoo is  about the freedom to innovate, of thinking different and 
accting differentelly, but it is also about assuming that different
people may have different needs, and that different needs may have
different and equaly effective solutions. 

So if we want to be respected, we must also respect the others, let the
others be either different distributions, different  Operating systems
or even simply different points of view.



It is with the above in mind that this proposal should be re-read and
re-thinked...     


   

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Objectives/Goals:
        * have gentoo.org to function as a central hub to all our
          (growing) community
        * from an end-user perspective
        * from a developer perspective 
        * from a multilingual/multinational perpective 
        * from an OEM/ISV/VC perpective
        * from  a non  (yet) gentoo-user perpective comming from *NIX
          land
        * from a non (yet) gentoo-user perspective comming fron Win*/Mac
          ...
        * from a (mainstream/IT) press perspective
        * [insert here] from an yet not thougth perspective 
Current issues/problems
        * the current web site is confuse, graphically not very
          atractive and lacks clear focus, doesn 't even have a search
          function
        * the current web site targets (almost) only english speaking
          users
        * there isn 't a clear separation between what is information
          targeted at developers and what is information targeted at
          end-users
        * information regarding the same issues is disperse around
          several places: Mailing lists, foruns, instalation docs,
          bugzilla, etc, makind it hard to find for inexperienced users 
        * when one reach gentoo.org (non gentoo user/developer)  there
          isn 't a clear message about Gentoo nature,  and what make him
          different/better on the front-page
        * the information/structure  available is too english-centric
          wich takes to the proliferation of national/regional gentooo
          sites, which makes us loose cohesion and weakes the community
          as a whole 
        * [insert here] other issues/problems
Watching how others handle the situation ... Four case studies
        * Zope community
            * www.zope.com
            * www.zope.org
        * Microsoft
            * www.microsoft.com
            * support.microsoft.com
            * msdn.microsoft.com
        * ActiveState
            * www..activestate.com
            * aspn.activestate.com/ASPN/
        * Red Hat
            * www.redhat.com
            * www.redhat.com/apps/support/
Proposals/Remedies

split the current gentoo.org in diferent areas with clear different
focus 
        * www.gentoo.org
            * here will be all the general stuff
                * what is Gentoo (whith an high altitude FAQ)
                * Advocacy Docs
                * Social Contract
                * Important News
                * Propaganda Stuff (screenshots, users rave comments,
                  etc)
                * Press Reviews
                * Download Links
                * [insert here] other relevant topics
        * gdn.gentoo.org
            * Gentoo Developer Network (here will be loccated all the
              information relevant to developers -  a cross of ASPN with
              MSDN
                * Developer Docs
                * Bugzilla (developer side) 
                * Developers Only Knowledge Base
                * Developers Only FAQ
                * ARCH specific Documentation 
                * specific developer forums/wikis (see zope.org) 
                * developer Mailing Lists
                * Hardware Compatibilty Guide
                * i18n
                * IRC logs from #gentoo-dev and #gentoo-qa
                * roadmaps, etc
                * [insert here] other relevant topics
        * gun.gentoo.org
            * Gentoo Users Network (here will be located all the
              information relevant to end-users - a cross of
              support.microsoft.com and www.zope.org)
                * End-User HowTos
                * End-User ARCH specific Documentation
                * End-User Oriented Knowledge Base
                * End-User Oriented FAQ collection (on the style of the
                  LDP) 
                    * the three above items should be fully searchable
                      aand indexable)
                * End-User Foruns and Wikis 
                * End-User Focused Polls (usabilty, features, etc) 
                * End-User Mailing Lists
                * Hardware Compatibilty Guide (both by ARCH and by type
                  of HW (sound, networking, etc) 
                    * shared with GDN, should have relevant info
                      extracted from bugzilla, forums, wikis, etc
                      regarding Hardware issues
                * Bugzilla (end user side)
                * [insert here] other relevant topics

    * GDN could be mainly english based (as, like it or not, the English
      is the lingua franca in this world)
    * Both www.gentoo.org and GUN should/must support
      internationalization of content rigth from the start ...
    * GDN would only be accessible to registered Developers (with
      perhaps different access levels(here we mean administartive
      levels)) The vast majority of content on GDN should be read-only
      to anonimous users, but in the same way that currently the acess
      to the gentoo-core mailing list is restricted to members, the same
      should also happen in GDN on some areas)   
    * GUN would be acessible read-only to all, but to take really
      advantage users should register ... 
    * [insert here] other relevant notes


António Meireles, aka datashark at gentoo dot org

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