Thoughts on Eric Raymond's Insights

Jonathan M. Gardner jgardner at jonathangardner.net
Tue Mar 2 08:07:13 UTC 2004


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On Monday 01 March 2004 8:32 pm, Jef Spaleta wrote:
> Jonathan Gardner wrote:
> > We recruit the users (the "Eloi") and ask them to choose a project
> > they are interested in, and we hook them up with those specialists
>
> Have you looked at the fedora.redhat.com project pages...that looks
> like a recruitment effort to me..based on each project. Or are you
> talking about hiring a brass band and marching around or something
> similar? Recruitment efforts on a lot of fronts are in need of creative
> ideas. By the way, for anyone reading fedora.us QA review needs
> volunteers. So does the Fedora Core community triage effort, find me on
> #fedora-bugs on the irc network if you are interested in helping out
> with either of those efforts....
>

I think QA and usability tests are two different things. QA people go in 
with certain expectations and an understanding of the software. 
Usuability studies include people who are familiar with the software and 
people who have never seen it before, and watch how they interact with 
the software. It exposes nitpicks and spots where the users just plain 
get confused or lost. QA has already absorbed the project, they already 
undertand the quirks and have been brainwashed that it is okay, that's 
the way it is supposed to work.

I don't think the FOSS community distinguishes between these two things 
adequately. We have this view that there are developers/project managers, 
and then everybody else (documentation, QA, usuability, users, all in 
one).

> Are you keeping a running count in your head about the number of people
> you are talking about...and how much time you really expect these
> volunteers to contribute consistently? One on One sessions are
> expensive in terms of manhours...and you don't have anyone signed up
> yet..so your total number of manhours to spend are zero. Don't start
> building a process that is manpower expensive..until you have manpower
> to burn... you are going to kill the process under its own weight
> before you even get someone to volunteer.
>

So start small, introduce abstraction layers as (or if) we get bigger.

> Unless you have a commitment from the developers to buy into the
> methodology that forms the basis of the summaries...this is just going
> to lead to a lot of argument. I tell you right now, that you aren't
> likely to win over development mindshare just by handing them a
> usability summary without their involvement with outlining at least the
> methodology you layout. If you are going to experiment with this, you
> should first find a project with developers who are open to working
> with you on this to see if it really will be helpful. Pushing the
> summaries on developers for a project if they aren't interested..is not
> going to help.
>

I see your point. I'll do an experiment at home. I have a lovely wife who 
hates computers but uses them anyway. Are there any volunteers for a 
project that would be willing to take the results of a usability study 
seriously?

Some potential candidates:

1) Configuring KMail, Mozilla Mail, or Evolution to get and send mail via 
my mail server (IMAPS and Sendmail with AUTH)

2) Configuring the network to browse the internet, given the IP addresses 
provided by my ISP, using Red Hat's internet configuration tool.

I'm open to other suggestions.

> > With enough data, we should be able to identify the biggest problems
> > and work to solve them before FC3. Then, when FC3 comes out, we can
> > do this all over again.
>
> This is a very hopeful hypothesis. And I would argue, that the biggest
> problems will be defined differently by different segments of the
> userbase. It will be interesting how you build a process that matches
> biggest problems...to specific usage patterns...in an unbiased manner.
> It will be interesting to see how you guard against having your
> summaries being biased by a small vocal minority.
>

That is true. Usuability studies only render anecdotes. We never know if 
the two or three people who participate are truly representative of their 
population. But in my experience, even though they don't turn out a great 
volume of statistics with error bars or complete analysis of the target 
market, they do give a lot of valuable feedback.

I think if we are going to make Linux a serious contender on the desktop, 
we need to solve these problems sooner rather than later. In fact, I 
believe we can't conquer the desktop until we solve these showstoppers. 
We have to make Linux work for Aunt Tillie and Eric Raymond.

>
> There are LOADS of problems...loads and loads...
> i like this handbook on volunteerism
>
> http://www.sport.vic.gov.au/Web/SRV/srvimages.nsf/Images/VMPWorkbookpdf
>/ $File/VMPWorkbook.pdf
>
> The summary on the first 18 pages are so, is generally useful as a
> guideline for any volunteer process...
>

I browsed that guidebook and found it contains some knowledge I'd like to 
study in more detail. I have some familiarity with organizing people and 
such via church activities and Boy Scouts of America. Humm, maybe it is 
time to visit some friends and get their input... ;-)

- -- 
Jonathan Gardner
jgardner at jonathangardner.net
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