[TYPO3-typo3org] [TYPO3-hci] Kickoff: TYPO3 4.1 (suggestions)

[Erik Svendsen]

Hello Matthew,

> Hello Erik!
> 
> I'll pick up on the other points a different day - but I can only
> guess how much of a commitment it is to keep typo3.org running
> everyone is voluntary and funds are limited.
> 
> Yet, the TYPO3 community in general has pretty motivated people on
> board coming and going so why not make better use of that.
> 
> A simple solution would be to put editorial control of typo3.org into
> the hands of the community, What a cool idea apart for the crazy
> implications.

I think Wikipedia is the only place a community based approach really work. 
TYPO3 has it's own wiki (wiki.typo3.org) where everyone in the community 
can or should participate. With such an amount of motivated people, why aren't 
the wiki growing with tutorials, tips and tricks. The tools are there, and 
you are free to use them.

typo3.com, typo3.org (and some more), are without doubt the responsibility 
of the TYPO3 Association (and should be).
 
> Anyway the point being that:
> 
> 1) Quick/easy contributions are needed.
> 2) Distributed maintenance of typo3.org is needed to implement the
> changes.
> Something as simple as allowing page annotations on every page of
> typo3.org so anyone can just quickly add a comment or correction and
> second it provides an automatic TO-DO list for anyone with editing
> rights to just make those small HMTL changes to make it more usable.

As I know they are working on getting a bigger team with responsebility for 
typo3.org. Distributed maintance is okay, but it should be put in a system. 
I have tried it, and had to ditch it for a more strict approach. Putting 
up a team of 11 people with responsibility for different part of the specific 
website in this case. And this was in an organization with paid people (200 
of them).

Distributed maintance are can be really difficult to administrate, and may 
give a lot more overhead than a dedicated team (of the right side).

And I think the reason for the typo3.org usability "project" are to correct 
some of these gaps.

Annotations are useful on manuals, but not on every page on a site.

But it should be easier to give feedback.

> Parts of TYPO3 suffers from a pressure not to change. Too much work,
> not enough resource and so the project is full of small gaps. Despite
> the actual product being superb and is developing so fast. It's like
> everything else is left behind.

When a open source community is growing like TYPO3 has done the last few 
years, it's nearly impossible (at least it takes time) to manage every aspect 
in a way that don't have glitches and gaps. Upscaling an organization, even 
if its a open source community, is a complicated task. I can tell you that 
the Norwegian Open Source CMS system eZ publish has 75 fulltime employes. 
Of course most of them are working with the commercial part of the system 
(consulting, paid deveopment and so on), but as I know they are using about 
15 - 20 manyear on the website, community and core system. On top of this 
all the voluntary work in the community.

A way to help the community is to be a supporting member, because it's give 
the association a better funding.

> This is another opportunity for typo3.org to be the flagship
> installation of TYPO3 with distributed maintenance. If wikipedia can
> do it why can't TYPO3.
> 
> Matthew

When it doesn't work for wiki.typo3.org, I don't think it will work for typo3.org. 
Wikipedia is another world, - Wikipedia is of interest to nearly everyone 
and therefore the share base of potential contributors are multiplies of 
the persons active in the TYPO3 community. Even the numbers of real contributors 
to the Norwegian version of Wikipedia is larger than the more active part 
of the TYPO3 community. And even Wikipedia has lot of gaps.

And why not use the wiki, there are even a page to discuss typo3.org, and 
improvements for typo3.org. http://wiki.typo3.org/index.php/Typo3.org. Not 
everything are editable, because this are a team page (and because of problems 
with spam). Another opportunity is to volunter to the typo3.org team, or 
to help Stefano and Kees.

WBR,
Erik Svendsen
www.linnearad.no