IRC office hours/Office hours 2010-02-04

Feb 04 09:00:34 <cary> Welcome to today's office hours, featuring Guillaume Paumier and Neil ...
Feb 04 09:00:42 <flipzagging> Kandalgaonkar
Feb 04 09:00:46 <flipzagging> <-- me
Feb 04 09:01:12 <cary> ... Kandalgaonkar!
Feb 04 09:01:22 <flipzagging> I answer to "Neil K" or "guy working on the Commons upload interface" at the moment
Feb 04 09:01:33 <guillom> no, that's me :P
Feb 04 09:01:39 <flipzagging> oh, who am I then?
Feb 04 09:01:44 <guillom> hmm
Feb 04 09:01:54 <cary> Guillaume, if you have a few words of introduction, now would be a great time. :)
Feb 04 09:02:09 <guillom> flipzagging, "dev working on the Commons upload interface" ?
Feb 04 09:02:12 <flipzagging> Let's say I'm exactly like guillom except I code
Feb 04 09:02:26 <guillom> cary, well, I'm not even sure anyone's listening :)
Feb 04 09:02:42 <flipzagging> it's being logged though (right?)
Feb 04 09:02:47 <cary> which is why I'm about to send an email :)
Feb 04 09:02:48 <guillom> yes
Feb 04 09:03:05 <flipzagging> ok, we can work out our introductions in the meantime
Feb 04 09:03:50 <guillom> well
Feb 04 09:03:53 <guillom> so
Feb 04 09:04:19 <guillom> basically the Multimedia usability project is a special project of the Wikimedia Foundation, funded by a $300K grant from the Ford foundation
Feb 04 09:04:39 <guillom> its duration is 1 year and its goal is to increase multimedia participation on Wikimedia websites
Feb 04 09:05:23 <guillom> the team is basically 2.5 people : me as product manager, flipzagging as developer, and nkomura is overseeing the project
Feb 04 09:05:56 <guillom> I guess people know my background, perhaps flipzagging would like to say a few words about himself?
Feb 04 09:06:29 <flipzagging> Ok, I have been working in web-related development for 10 years +
Feb 04 09:07:03 <flipzagging> My last gig was at Flickr, and previous to that, another Yahoo property, Upcoming.org
Feb 04 09:07:48 <flipzagging> I am new to Mediawiki development and the WIki* community, but not to PHP or very large scale websites
Feb 04 09:08:24 <cary> So, if anyone has questions, please preface them with "QUESTION:". General chatter can take place in #wikimedia-office-talk
Feb 04 09:09:30 <guillom> well, no questions. Woohoo, we can go back to work :)
Feb 04 09:09:46 <flipzagging> QUESTION: are there going to be questions?
Feb 04 09:10:12 <guillom> usually there are too many questions
Feb 04 09:10:17 <guillom> but there are few people today
Feb 04 09:10:31 <nkomura> i'll tweet to invite more people
Feb 04 09:11:13 <Platonides> if you want questions...
Feb 04 09:11:13 <Platonides> flipzagging, which nickname will we be seeing on your commits?
Feb 04 09:11:28 <dungodung> that was a QUESTION!
Feb 04 09:12:30 <flipzagging> I'm 'neilk' in pretty much every system at WMF proper
Feb 04 09:12:53 <flipzagging> I've used this IRC nick for quite a while on freenode. Perhaps I should try to grab neilk
Feb 04 09:13:28 <nkomura> QUESTION to guillom: What was your finding from your initial user survey of Commons?
Feb 04 09:13:35 <Platonides> you seem to have both NeilK and Flipzagging at the wiki
Feb 04 09:13:40 <flipzagging> yeah
Feb 04 09:14:26 <guillom> the full results about the survey are located at http://usability.wikimedia.org/wiki/Multimedia:Initial_survey
Feb 04 09:14:26 <dungodung> flipzagging: you should get a cloak ;)
Feb 04 09:14:28 <guillom> basically
Feb 04 09:14:43 <guillom> our main finding was that Commons was not well known
Feb 04 09:14:48 <guillom> even within the Wikimedia community
Feb 04 09:15:02 <cary-office> flipzagging, dungodung can walk you through getting a cloak.
Feb 04 09:15:21 <guillom> and about half the respondents have uploaded less than 10 files to Commons
Feb 04 09:15:31 <guillom> which is verrrrry few in my opinion
Feb 04 09:15:55 <Seddon> yes im here for once :)
Feb 04 09:15:57 <guillom> as a consequence, I believe we have a large potential pool of participants to recruit directly from Wikimedians
Feb 04 09:16:29 <guillom> that doesn't mean we won't try to recruit people from outside the wikimedia community
Feb 04 09:16:50 <guillom> the survey also helped us identify the different profiles of users
Feb 04 09:17:06 <guillom> this is useful in order to design the new upload process
Feb 04 09:17:23 <guillom> next question ?
Feb 04 09:17:32 <nkomura> can you talk about the profiles you are focusing for this multi-media usability project?
Feb 04 09:17:42 <guillom> sure
Feb 04 09:17:56 <guillom> our main target is the "average Wikimedian"
Feb 04 09:18:23 <guillom> our goal is to make it easier for them to upload files
Feb 04 09:18:50 <Natalie> Seriously?
Feb 04 09:18:57 <guillom> we hope that the improvements we make will also benefit a larger pool of users, such as very active users and GLAMs too
Feb 04 09:19:07 <Natalie> You're trying to make it easier for the people who have already figured it out...
Feb 04 09:19:14 <cary-office> I'm lost with the questions, I'm hoping that guillom is versed enough in IRC to have an idea of what's next.
Feb 04 09:19:16 <flipzagging> guillom: expand GLAMs for people
Feb 04 09:19:32 <guillom> galleries, libraries, archives and museums
Feb 04 09:19:33 <Seddon> Galleries, Libraries Archives and Museums
Feb 04 09:19:45 <domas> random talk!
Feb 04 09:19:53 <guillom> Natalie, no, that's what I was saying earlier ; a lot of wikimedians don't use commons
Feb 04 09:20:15 <Natalie> How much of that do you think is related to no interest?
Feb 04 09:20:23 <guillom> Natalie, http://usability.wikimedia.org/wiki/Multimedia:Initial_survey
Feb 04 09:20:29 <Natalie> Ta.
Feb 04 09:20:41 <Platonides> guillom, have you taken into account the amount of work needed for creating an image ?
Feb 04 09:21:05 <^demon> Natalie: You can't make people interested. You can only lower the bar for those who are interested.
Feb 04 09:21:11 <guillom> Platonides, taken into account where?
Feb 04 09:21:14 <Platonides> as opposed to text, that you can more or easily make up, the way to "get an image" -for some people- is using google
Feb 04 09:21:27 <Natalie> ^demon: My point is that it should be focusing on making it easier for normal people, not Wikimedians. :-)
Feb 04 09:21:47 <guillom> Natalie, I think my definition of "wikimedians" is larger than yours, but we agree nonetheless
Feb 04 09:21:48 <flipzagging> there are a few Wikimedians who are normal people
Feb 04 09:21:50 <^demon> An improved workflow would hopefully help both
Feb 04 09:21:55 <Platonides> when counting uploads, for example
Feb 04 09:22:09 <Natalie> flipzagging: Pure lies.
Feb 04 09:22:26 <Platonides> there should be a lower number uploads than article creation per wikimedian
Feb 04 09:22:37 <flipzagging> We're trying to assume as little knowledge as possible... Guillaume's designs walk people through complicated concepts like licensing, for instance, in a much improved way
Feb 04 09:22:40 <Natalie> How will we increase the number of images of penises?
Feb 04 09:22:54 <Platonides> Natalie, we don't need more penis
Feb 04 09:22:59 <Natalie> More lies.
Feb 04 09:23:31 <guillom> Platonides, I think there are different profiles; people who think writing text is easier, and people who think taking pictures is easier ; then replace "easier" by "more fun" or any other reason they might have for contributing
Feb 04 09:24:00 <Natalie> Those are attractive graphs, BTW.
Feb 04 09:24:30 <guillom> I'm hoping to have a more detailed analysis of the survey soon
Feb 04 09:24:50 <guillom> next question(s) ?
Feb 04 09:25:05 <Natalie> What's the topic? General Commons questions?
Feb 04 09:25:18 <guillom> questions about the multimedia usability project
Feb 04 09:25:28 <^demon> guillom: What is the answer to life? The universe? Everything?
Feb 04 09:25:40 <guillom> 42
Feb 04 09:25:42 <Natalie> How much focus is being put on non-JavaScript users?
Feb 04 09:25:50 <guillom> that's a good question
Feb 04 09:25:57 <guillom> probably for flipzagging ?
Feb 04 09:26:00 <flipzagging> sure
Feb 04 09:26:09 <Natalie> And I guess how much focus is being put on things like mobile uploads.
Feb 04 09:26:16 <Natalie> Which might be related.
Feb 04 09:27:19 <flipzagging> Natalie: well, for non-Javascript users, we will have an improved flow, which, as I alluded to before, will explain things like licensing in an easier way, and also make it easier to coordinate license permissions.
Feb 04 09:27:47 <Natalie> Commons currently is simply drowning in JavaScript.
Feb 04 09:27:51 <flipzagging> Natalie: those improvements should help everyone, even if they're, for instance, visually impaired and uploading audio files
Feb 04 09:27:53 <Natalie> Not that it doesn't have its place, but good grief...
Feb 04 09:27:56 <flipzagging> Natalie: right
(Software Developer)/ *Multimedia Usability Project*
Feb 04 09:28:35 <guillom> as far as mobile uploads are concerned, this is definitely something we are considering in the medium term; the "incomplete uploads" a.k.a. "staging area" should make it easier to upload easily from mobile devices and come back later to add more information. Because basically when you upload from your phone you don't want to provide description & license information (I think)
Feb 04 09:28:42 <flipzagging> Natalie: we are planning a javascript-driven interface for most users, but we think it will be more usable, and we can take advantage of modern browser features too.
Feb 04 09:28:42 <guillom> Seddon, Product Manager, actually :)
Feb 04 09:29:12 <^demon> My question: Is all of this going to be done in core? An uploading extension doesn't help other mediawiki users
Feb 04 09:29:39 <Natalie> guillom: Aye. And previews for SVGs.
Feb 04 09:29:49 <Natalie> That's good for a staging area as well, I think.
Feb 04 09:29:50 <flipzagging> ^demon: at the moment I'm developing it to work in the Usability Extension. Whenever that goes core this will go core too.
Feb 04 09:30:11 <guillom> Natalie, we plan to have previews for all files during the upload process
Feb 04 09:30:11 <^demon> Ugh :\
Feb 04 09:30:27 <Platonides> I'd recommend it to be separate than the rest of usability extension
Feb 04 09:30:33 <flipzagging> ^demon: in order to get the widest exposure and make it easy to turn on and off I figured that was the best way... if you have a better idea, I'm interested.
Feb 04 09:30:37 <Platonides> in a branch or as a separate extension...
Feb 04 09:30:40 <Natalie> Platonides: It?
Feb 04 09:30:54 <Platonides> Natalie: flipzagging work
Feb 04 09:31:17 <flipzagging> there is some common infrastructure (particularly in JS-land) that makes it easier to bundle them together.
Feb 04 09:31:36 <flipzagging> would it be better if we gave you config options to turn one on, and not the other?
Feb 04 09:32:32 <flipzagging> one = Usability initiative editor and so on, the other = multimedia upload improvements
Feb 04 09:32:44 <guillom> next QUESTION maybe?
Feb 04 09:33:21 <Natalie> Thanks, all. I'm away.
Feb 04 09:33:34 <Seddon> is a question about svg support allowed?
Feb 04 09:33:46 <Platonides> ok, i'll talk this with flipzagging later
Feb 04 09:33:51 <Seddon> from me that is
Feb 04 09:33:53 <guillom> Seddon, sure
Feb 04 09:34:43 <^demon> guillom: How does all this play into mwEmbed/etc. We've got Michael's work there, the upload rewrite in core, and a new branch/extension for redoing the upload workflow.
Feb 04 09:35:10 <guillom> ^demon, I think that's more a question for flipzagging
Feb 04 09:35:17 <^demon> I guess my question is: are all these efforts working together, so we don't end up inventing 3 different shaped wheels?
Feb 04 09:35:22 <guillom> oh sure
Feb 04 09:35:29 <guillom> we work closely with Michael
Feb 04 09:35:43 <cary-office> ^demon: while guillom is answering that question, can you explain what mwEmbed is to the less technically inclined in the channel?
Feb 04 09:35:45 <flipzagging> ^demon: it's not actually new... most of what I am doing in the past few days, is taking js2-work branch changes and trying to make them work within the Usability Initiative extension.
Feb 04 09:36:07 <Seddon> iv noticed when uploading files that have combined raster and vector data in svg doesnt render well in different sizes from the original (the raster data becomes distorted) is this something that is an issue on our end or a browser issue, or both?
Feb 04 09:36:11 <flipzagging> ^demon: I will be writing a new upload manager interface on top of most of Michael Dale's work, according to Guillaume's new designs.
Feb 04 09:36:14 <^demon> cary-office: Michael Dale's work with commons image embedding and such.
Feb 04 09:36:28 <Seddon> sorry for the poor grammar
Feb 04 09:36:34 <Seddon> rewrote that about 3 times
Feb 04 09:36:59 <Seddon> i suppose the general question is can something be done about wider compatibility for svg
Feb 04 09:37:04 <guillom> just a quick note about Michael's work, then I move to Seddon's
Feb 04 09:37:12 <Seddon> yep :)
Feb 04 09:37:31 <Platonides> Seddon, that seems a rsvg problem
Feb 04 09:37:33 <guillom> we're working closely with Michael, but the add-media-wizard is Michael's baby
Feb 04 09:37:58 <guillom> and isn't really part of the multimedia usability project, even if we try to integrate all these tools
Feb 04 09:38:11 <guillom> Seddon, about SVGs
Feb 04 09:38:45 <guillom> I think there are lots of open bugs about SVG rendering (see http://usability.wikimedia.org/wiki/Multimedia:Back-end#SVG_rendering )
Feb 04 09:39:13 <guillom> at some point brion assigned all of them to Ariel Glenn, to see if an update of the software we use to render SVGs would solve most issues
Feb 04 09:39:23 <guillom> I don't know the status update about this
Feb 04 09:39:54 <guillom> what I know is that we should try to better support SVGs generally, and at some point I would like to be able to edit, or maybe translate SVGs online
Feb 04 09:40:14 <rama> since we have talking about supporting file format, what is the status of source image file (like GIMP's XCF) and of model images, like Blender scenes?
Feb 04 09:40:15 <cary-office> I would personally love to see "variable SVG"
Feb 04 09:40:22 <cary-office> where you can plug in a word on render
Feb 04 09:40:28 <flipzagging> localizable SVGs? That would be interesting.
Feb 04 09:40:36 <cary-office> yes, that's what I mean :)
Feb 04 09:40:51 <guillom> cary-office, / flipzagging yes this is what I mean too
Feb 04 09:40:58 <Platonides> I had long thought in a wiki editable SVG namespace
Feb 04 09:41:12 <guillom> rama, do you mean the ability to upload such files, or the ability to render them in MediaWiki ?
Feb 04 09:41:55 <guillom> basically the ability to upload them depends very much on security issues and possibilities of abuse
Feb 04 09:42:21 <guillom> rendering is much more difficult, because we need a rendering engine for each new format
Feb 04 09:42:33 <cary-office> So for http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Plinian_Eruption-numbers.svg we would have actual words in user language instead of numbers :)
Feb 04 09:42:57 <guillom> but I agree with you that we should aim to provide source files as often as possible
Feb 04 09:43:19 <guillom> and another feature on my list would be a way to somehow link between a file and its source or derivatives
Feb 04 09:43:28 <guillom> we already do that with templates, I think
Feb 04 09:43:58 <guillom> does that answer your question rama ?
Feb 04 09:45:03 <guillom> next question maybe?
Feb 04 09:45:11 <rama> guillom: yes, that is perfect. We will have to make it known that source files are uploadable, because some invaluable contributors have sources files that could be tremendously useful if accessible on Commons
Feb 04 09:46:06 <guillom> rama, I had a conversation with brion a few months ago about uploading the Scribus source file of PDF documents I created for Wikimedia
Feb 04 09:46:33 <guillom> basically it was not possible because the format didn't embed pictures, for example
Feb 04 09:46:58 <guillom> the other concern is security (e.g. we can't upload zip files, or formats relying on zip)
Feb 04 09:47:10 <guillom> in these cases there is little we can do
Feb 04 09:47:18 <guillom> except developing sanitizers
Feb 04 09:47:21 <rama> guillom: my question stems in part from this thread: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Anynobody#MOdels
Feb 04 09:48:07 <tgr> QUESTION: do you have plans for a less messy authorization process instead of OTRS?
Feb 04 09:48:15 <guillom> tgr, yes, indeed!
Feb 04 09:48:18 <cary-office> good question, tgr
Feb 04 09:48:23 <guillom> very good question
Feb 04 09:48:39 <guillom> tgr, for now we're trying to make the process more automated
Feb 04 09:48:47 <guillom> i.e. we will still rely on OTRS
Feb 04 09:48:56 <guillom> because the community still wants human review
Feb 04 09:49:02 <guillom> and a way to communicate with people
Feb 04 09:49:03 <guillom> but
Feb 04 09:49:11 <guillom> we're going to make it easier for everyone involved
Feb 04 09:49:21 <guillom> the uploader, the copyright holder and the OTRS agent
Feb 04 09:49:33 <flipzagging> We can coordinate their work MUCH more simply.
Feb 04 09:49:52 <guillom> tgr, you can take a look at http://usability.wikimedia.org/wiki/Multimedia:NewUpload#Their_author_gave_you_explicit_permission_to_upload_them
Feb 04 09:50:18 <guillom> for more details
Feb 04 09:50:22 <flipzagging> I'd like to emphasize that it's things like this that interest us the most
Feb 04 09:50:35 <flipzagging> Uploading an image to Commons these days is something like breaking into Fort Knox
Feb 04 09:50:42 <brianmc> heh
Feb 04 09:50:57 <Prodego> however, uploading an image to commons is easier than uploading an image into fort knox
Feb 04 09:51:02 <Prodego> so there is something
Feb 04 09:51:36 <guillom> next question ?
Feb 04 09:52:13 <cary-office> Jamesofur?
Feb 04 09:52:27 <Jamesofur> QUESTION: apologies if this has been asked before, somewhat related to the otrs discussion has their been any discussion on making it easier for uploaders to pick their license(s) like more options in the dropdown when uploading to start :)
Feb 04 09:52:39 <flipzagging> yes!
Feb 04 09:52:50 <flipzagging> well not more options, but fewer! ;) With more if you want them.
Feb 04 09:53:04 <Jamesofur> that would word work well!
Feb 04 09:53:21 <guillom> Jamesofur, see http://usability.wikimedia.org/wiki/Multimedia:NewUpload#License_selection for more details
Feb 04 09:53:26 <tgr> guillom, wow, it seems perfect
Feb 04 09:53:28 <Jamesofur> ooo nice
Feb 04 09:53:48 <tgr> replacing author-worded permissions with a confirmation form would be very cool
Feb 04 09:53:56 <guillom> we try to offer the main options as default
Feb 04 09:54:20 <guillom> but still offer the "more complicated" or "less regular" cases for advanced users
Feb 04 09:55:00 <Jamesofur> aye that would be best, I have heard to many people complain about the process of going back to tag their images (even users who have been around forever) and to many of them don't do it quickly (then get deleted, angry, leave....)
Feb 04 09:55:09 <Jamesofur> *too
Feb 04 09:55:24 <guillom> Jamesofur, we're also working on "incomplete uploads"
Feb 04 09:55:42 <guillom> which would be a more user-friendly way to deal with files missing mandatory information
Feb 04 09:55:57 <guillom> I don't have pretty mock-ups for that yet, because I'm working on it these days :)
Feb 04 09:55:58 <Jamesofur> ahh nice
Feb 04 09:56:25 <guillom> but basically we would keep incomplete uploads in some "quarantine" section
Feb 04 09:56:31 <cary-office> guillom is improving commons for work, doing pretty mock-ups for fun.
Feb 04 09:56:49 <guillom> whether we will show them to the general public while they're incomplete is still to be decided
Feb 04 09:57:06 <^demon> It could be worse. We could make everyone upload their files by FTP and make them use vim to edit the metadata.
Feb 04 09:57:10 <Jamesofur> but the minimum I assume would be admins/uploader?
Feb 04 09:57:11 <guillom> cary-office, I'm improving commons and doing mock-ups for fun and for work; that's the best part!
Feb 04 09:57:24 <guillom> Jamesofur, yes, uploader + 'helpers'
Feb 04 09:57:29 * Jamesofur nods
Feb 04 09:57:29 <cary-office> <3 Upload by URL
Feb 04 09:57:48 <Jamesofur> 'helpers' similar to the flikr approvers?
Feb 04 09:58:05 <guillom> 'helpers' being to be defined
Feb 04 09:58:16 <guillom> e.g. admins + flickr reviewers + others, I don't know
Feb 04 09:58:19 * Jamesofur nods
Feb 04 09:58:22 <guillom> or just any logged in user
Feb 04 09:58:31 <guillom> we have to discuss this with the community
Feb 04 09:58:52 <guillom> but basically it's just a matter of having a user right for this and assigning it to whom the community decides
Feb 04 09:58:57 <cary-office> guillom, are you guys willing to stay a bit later, given the poor, delayed announcement of the event?
Feb 04 09:58:58 <guillom> I think
Feb 04 09:59:02 <guillom> cary-office, sure
Feb 04 09:59:04 <flipzagging> sure
Feb 04 09:59:17 <cary-office> I've also voiced Michael Dale, who came a bit late :)
Feb 04 09:59:26 <mdale> sorry
Feb 04 09:59:33 <mdale> (sick) .. wont be in the "real" office today
Feb 04 09:59:37 <mdale> but I have fun things to show
Feb 04 09:59:55 <flipzagging> some people had questions about the relationship between Multimedia Usability and Add Media Wizard
Feb 04 10:00:01 <mdale> http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:Timed_Text_Demo_Page?withJS=MediaWiki:MwEmbed.js
Feb 04 10:00:50 <cary-office> Oooh, subtitles!
Feb 04 10:00:53 <guillom> I think the bottom line is that we're working closely with Michael to avoid duplicating work, but our projects (and our goals) remain separate
Feb 04 10:01:14 * awaymol greets
Feb 04 10:01:15 <mdale> that sounds about right ;)
Feb 04 10:01:57 <guillom> hi sebmol
Feb 04 10:02:01 <flipzagging> on the code side mdale has already written a lot of stuff that will be useful to the new uploader interface
Feb 04 10:02:05 <guillom> next question maybe?
Feb 04 10:02:57 <flipzagging> well, more than useful, he wrote (with other members of the community) the new upload API and ways of using it from web browsers and other clients.
Feb 04 10:04:45 <guillom> no more questions?
Feb 04 10:04:51 <Jamesofur> did someone ask about search?
Feb 04 10:04:54 <guillom> no
Feb 04 10:04:56 <guillom> :)
Feb 04 10:04:57 * Jamesofur is still reading logs
Feb 04 10:05:18 <Jamesofur> QUESTION: Are we improving search? :)
Feb 04 10:05:37 <guillom> so
Feb 04 10:05:53 <guillom> if 'we' is the multimedia usability project, then "not really"
Feb 04 10:05:54 <guillom> BUT
Feb 04 10:06:16 <guillom> we're discussing this with Daniel_WMDE , who is working on multilingual search
Feb 04 10:06:44 <guillom> I have a wishlist of features & design improvements to make search easier and better
Feb 04 10:06:59 <guillom> but for now the efforts of the wikimedia community are more focusing on multilingual search
Feb 04 10:07:03 <flipzagging> Jamesofur: perhaps you could elaborate on what you mean by improving search
Feb 04 10:07:50 <Jamesofur> it is hard to describe to be totally honest, but I have always found commons search very lacking and hard to find images that I know are there
Feb 04 10:07:52 <guillom> what we might do in the coming year is improving the UI of the search page, but we don't plan on improving the search itself
Feb 04 10:08:11 <guillom> there's a discussion on wikitech-l right now about flattening categories, for example
Feb 04 10:08:20 <flipzagging> i think improving metadata and categorization is going to improve search, well at least for new uploads.
Feb 04 10:08:21 <guillom> this is something I have heard a lot during the Research phase
Feb 04 10:08:49 <Jamesofur> I think a good portion of it is the lack of complete tags since it basically only searches the text on the page, it is also seems that the default ends up coming back with alot of "useless" non-image results
Feb 04 10:09:04 <guillom> i.e. people have to explore all subcategories of a category if they want to have all results, for example
Feb 04 10:09:06 <Jamesofur> aye flipzagging, I think improving those will help ALOT
Feb 04 10:09:18 <Jamesofur> by the way you need a cloak :)
Feb 04 10:09:31 <cary-office> Jamesofur, we've already covered that bit.
Feb 04 10:09:40 <Jamesofur> ;)
Feb 04 10:10:47 <guillom> we have time for a few more questions, if there are any
Feb 04 10:10:51 <cary-office> dungodung will be coordinating with flipzagging to get his cloak immediately after the meeting.
Feb 04 10:10:57 <guillom> héhé
Feb 04 10:11:23 <flipzagging> I just read up on them. Ok if that's important to people I'll get one.
Feb 04 10:11:33 * ^demon likes his cloak
Feb 04 10:11:56 * Philippe|Wiki wants an invisibility cloak
Feb 04 10:12:08 <guillom> as a sidenote, I would like to publicize http://usability.wikimedia.org/wiki/Multimedia:Hub ; all the documentation regarding the Multimedia usability project, the grant, the research, the mock-ups, etc. is available form there
Feb 04 10:12:40 <flipzagging> yeah. If you read this before IRC chats, you'll have much more ammunition to prove how we're ruining Wikipedia
Feb 04 10:12:47 <flipzagging> so go check it out. ;)
Feb 04 10:13:15 <guillom> and we're also available to answer follow-up questions
Feb 04 10:13:26 <guillom> flipzagging and I are always on IRC on business hours
Feb 04 10:13:49 <guillom> I'm also on IRC the rest of the time, but I try not to do work-related stuff :)
Feb 04 10:13:56 <cary-office> nkomura is available to answer any other questions about usability
Feb 04 10:13:56 * Mike||gone is now known as Mike_lifeguard
Feb 04 10:14:05 <cary-office> Well, now that Mike_lifeguard is here, we can end.
Feb 04 10:14:19 <Mike_lifeguard> \o/
Feb 04 10:14:26 <Platonides> guillom, perhaps you should clarify what are your "business hours"
Feb 04 10:14:34 <cary-office> 9 to 5 PST
Feb 04 10:14:48 <cary-office> 1700 to 0100 UTC
Feb 04 10:14:55 <guillom> I'm usually in around 8:30 PST, until 5 or 6 pm PST
Feb 04 10:14:56 <Platonides> Pacific or Pakistan? ;)
Feb 04 10:15:01 <guillom> SF :)
Feb 04 10:15:10 <Seddon> guillom, one last question?
Feb 04 10:15:14 <guillom> sure
Feb 04 10:15:15 <guillom> shoot :)
Feb 04 10:15:48 <Seddon> How can the chapters best help the usability project?
Feb 04 10:15:56 <guillom> verrrry good questions
Feb 04 10:15:59 <guillom> so
Feb 04 10:16:02 <guillom> -s
Feb 04 10:16:19 <guillom> basically, we have a huge feature & improvements wishlist
Feb 04 10:16:26 <guillom> but we're only 2 people
Feb 04 10:16:30 <guillom> and only one of us can code
Feb 04 10:16:41 * Philippe|Wiki can morse code, if that's helpful....
Feb 04 10:16:56 <guillom> so one thing I would like to do is prepare "ready-to-code" projects
Feb 04 10:17:10 <guillom> for things that we would like to do, but can't because we have higher priorities
Feb 04 10:17:10 <^demon> More devs \o/
Feb 04 10:17:19 <cary-office> \o/
Feb 04 10:17:23 <guillom> I call this our "joint projects"
Feb 04 10:17:31 <cary-office> ^demon, want to move to San Francisco? ;)
Feb 04 10:17:33 <guillom> basically I'm going to prepare all this
Feb 04 10:17:44 <guillom> and present them to the dev conference in Berlin
Feb 04 10:17:48 <guillom> & the chapters conference in Berlin
Feb 04 10:17:52 * cary-office has no influence over hiring, just as a qualifier. I'm just making comments :)
Feb 04 10:18:00 <nkomura> i'd like to mention though
Feb 04 10:18:03 <guillom> some projects can be done on a volunteer basis by individual devs
Feb 04 10:18:04 * Platonides points out that it's a reason to keep it as separate as possible
Feb 04 10:18:17 <nkomura> that French and German chapters are helping a lot in great deal
Feb 04 10:18:17 <guillom> others might require funding from chapters
Feb 04 10:18:38 <flipzagging> Platonides: by "it" you mean Multimedia Usability / Usability extension?
Feb 04 10:18:49 <nkomura> french chapter hosted the multi-media usability which was a great meeting to collect what's available and exchange ideas
Feb 04 10:19:10 <guillom> I wanted to reach out to chapters earlier, but I've had more urgent things to do
Feb 04 10:19:13 <nkomura> and german chapter helping on multi-lingual search and other aspects of usability
Feb 04 10:19:33 <guillom> but Berlin will be, I think, the real starting point of collaboration with the volunteer dev community, and chapters
Feb 04 10:20:20 <guillom> and, as nkomura , some chapters are already helping a lot, of course; I'm talking about how we can engage chapters in projects to come :)
Feb 04 10:20:31 <guillom> +says
Feb 04 10:20:51 <Seddon> guillom, at some point it would be great if you could chat on irc to the WMUK board
Feb 04 10:20:58 <guillom> sure
Feb 04 10:21:10 <guillom> I'd be glad to
Feb 04 10:21:15 <rainman-sr> is the date for dev meeting in berlin set now? should't we start getting plane tickets and such
Feb 04 10:21:22 <Seddon> yes it is
Feb 04 10:21:25 <Seddon> and yes you should
Feb 04 10:21:29 <Seddon> thanx guillom :)
Feb 04 10:21:37 <guillom> rainman-sr, you should ask Daniel_WMDE , but basically I think it's 14-15 April
Feb 04 10:21:39 <cary-office> rainman-sr, you can take the chunnel.
Feb 04 10:21:48 <^demon> Three cheers for usability :)
Feb 04 10:22:02 <cary-office> Thank you, guillom and flipzagging (Guillaume and Neil)
Feb 04 10:22:21 <guillom> np; we're available for follow-up questions later if needed
Feb 04 10:22:22 <flipzagging> thanks, it was great to meet all of you, look forward to communicating more in the future.
Feb 04 10:22:49 <cary-office> great!