Mailing list reorganization summer 07, round 1

[Jeremy Katz]

On Sun, 2007-07-15 at 18:46 +0200, Thorsten Leemhuis wrote:
> Now that F7 is out, the new Board is elected and the new FESCo ready
> soon as well I'd like to restart the mailing list reorganization
> discussion that the Board asked me to handle months ago, but was first
> delayed (for the plan to have a dedicated fedora mail(man) server, which
> was dropped in between) and then not driven further by me as "the merge"
> seemed more pressing in recent months.

Thanks for taking the time to really dive into this.  I'll try to keep
comments short as overall it looks pretty good.


> === Other adjustments ===
> Short term: create a alias @lists.fedoraproject.org under which the
> current and all the new lists are accessible.

Need mmcgrath to comment on feasibility here.  Mike?

> Long term: have a own mailman frontpage on lists.fedoraproject.org that
> lists only mailing lists used by the Fedora Project.

We could also do a short-term form of this just by providing such a
page.  It could even just redirect to the wiki for now.

> == Details how to achieve that end-goal ==
> Some lists get renamed
> (http://www.python.org/cgi-bin/faqw-mm.py?req=all#4.70 ; users thus
> don't have to care about re-subscribing) and some get closed, with the
> old users invited (not subscribed) to another list.

In the past, there has been resistance to doing list renames like this.
Perhaps that's changed, but it needs investigating.  Mike -- let me know
if you want me to check into this

> === fedora-extras-commits ===
>  * Successor: fedora-pkgs-commits

Why not just move all commit mail to fedora-cvs-commits and have people
subscribe to it?  Then it's an existing list that a lot of people are
already subscribed to.

> === fedora-extras-steering ===
>  * Successor: fedora-fesco (or just fesco? but we have the fedora-prefix
> everywhere else, so better not)
>  * Adjustment strategy: rename list

Sounds good

> === fedora-maintainers ===
>  * Background: not that different from fedora-devel in topics these
> days; closed list for contributors, but has seen flamewars and noise
> nevertheless
>  * Successor: fedora-devel-list
>  * Adjustment strategy: invite people to successor-list (most are likely
> subscribed there already)

Yep.  With fedora-devel-announce, we have a different avenue to fill the
need of a "lower traffic, things that you really need to see" list.  

> === fedora-qa-list ===
>  * Background: Not much traffic. We further should be able to assume
> that all users on fedora-devel-users are kind of testers/qa, so why not
> use that list for the QA discussions as well?
>  * Successor: fedora-devel-users
>  * Adjustment strategy: close list, invite users to successor

I think Will has been trying to resurrect this somewhat to really
concentrate on QA/testing.  fedora-devel-users might be reasonable, but
then what about people that are wanting to QA/test updates for released
versions?  I wonder if we're better off trying to migrate to
fedora-test-list and then make its usage more clear

> === fedora-advisory-list / fedora-project ===
> There was the idea to rename fedora-advisory-list to fedora-project
> list. But fedora-advisory-list works well, so maybe it's better to not
> touch it... Should we nevertheless create a fedora-project list as
> discussion list for Fedora-wide things where different groups
> (packagers, art, docs, EPEL, ...) can share informations -- we don't
> have such a place currently and some people seem to miss it

As painful as it might be, fedora-devel-list really probably is that
place.  Otherwise, you end up with cross-posting with your hypothetical
fedora-project list and the devel list given the amount of cross-over.

> === fedora-desktop-list ===
> Had not that much traffic months ago, but in the recent two months it
> increased a bit again; but the stuff that got posted on this list was
> not that much different from stuff discussed on other lists. The name is
> confusing as well -- people using Fedora on their desktops now and then
> thought this is the proper list for usage questions. We could redirect
> users to fedora-devel-list and fedora-devel-users; or, if we want to
> keep the list, consider to rename it to fedora-desktop-developers.

fedora-desktop-devel seems like a reasonable compromise.  Having the
separate list for desktop development discussion is definitely
worthwhile.  Just need to make it clearer that cross-posting is grounds
for being thrown off the list  (j/k :-)

> === fedora-list ===
> This is mostly a list where users help he other. fedora-users would thus
> be a proper name that would make its use obvious. But would renaming be
> worth the trouble? Maybe keep it in mind for the longer term

fedora-list makes it match historically redhat-list and
<distroname>-list.  Which was the intent.  I don't think renaming is
really worth the trouble.

>  * Some people questioned the needs for these lists.
>   * fedora-r-devel-list

This is basically a SIG list afaik.

>   * fedora-art

This one is important to keep around as there's a fair bit of art
specific discussion that occurs there

>   * fedora-xen

Originally set up to be analogous to fedora-selinux-list.  Basically, a
good avenue for specific troubleshooting and working through things for
a new technology.  Tends to be pretty focused discussion and helpful for
people asking questions.

>  * should we have a official mailing list coordinator that has to ACK
> new mailing lists?

I really don't want to have to go to this level if we can avoid it...
in some ways, I almost want to make it easier for special interest lists
to pop up, especially ones which are going to help a specific subset of
users or around the development of something that we're the "upstream"
for.  

> === rawhide reports ===
> Send them only to one list -- fedora-devel-users.

Maybe also a copy to fedora-package-announce with a certain topic set.  

Jeremy