Why do we have brainstorm?
 

All my bugs or feature request that i monitored in bugzilla are getting closed with the comment:

"this is to big thing for bugzilla, only small bugs should be put in there, use brainstorm


I think this is just plain wrong.

Now we have 3 things where discussions are being done..

1> bugzilla
2> brainstorm
3> talk

And how can end users of the N900 when they have a bug or it could be a missing feature (how would they know??) know what to do? Open a bugzilla? but maybe it is not small bug or even a feature request.. then they should use brainstorm...
But how would they know?

Now i have to search all over the place to see where an issue that i have could be discussed.

Why not do everything in one place and that is bugzilla? You can discuss there just fine, you can vote. You can easily switch from bug to feature request, you can use it for planning (targeting this issue for a release)

then a special forum in talk can be used to discuss something before it enters bugzilla, or we could use BrainStorm for this. But bugzilla should in my eyes always be the end point, first maybe talk about it then go make a bugzilla entry where the fix or implementation is being tracked? With a link back to the discussion?

The nice thing about bugzilla and that kind of stuff is that when for example you use Eclipse and Mylyn you have complete integration into your development environment..

Re: Why do we have brainstorm?
 

This discussion is already happening on the maemo-community list:

http://lists.maemo.org/pipermail/mae...er/003563.html

You're approaching this from the point of view of "if the enhancement request is small, well-defined and tightly scoped; why shouldn't it be in Bugzilla?"; I'm approaching it from a "good community technical solutions can't be divined by moving to a divisive vote" perspective.

Re: Why do we have brainstorm?
 

just look at what the result of this is:

https://bugs.maemo.org/show_bug.cgi?id=5300

that bug got resolved->moved
now it is reopend again.

Because it is soo confusing..

If you want to discuss in brainstorm then there should always be (or the result should be) a bugzilla issue. Pointing back to the brainstorm.

If somebody opens a bugzilla which in your eyes should first be brainstormed on. Then ok give it a state "brainstorm" or something pointing to the brainstorm topic (and the brainstorm topic should point to the bugzilla entry). So that when the brainstorm is done you go back to the bugzilla where the real stuff will then be handled in.

Re: Why do we have brainstorm?
 

We have several tools to gather feedback from the people.

Forum, Brainstorm, Bugzilla, Mailing lists

Each of them has its own scope. We just need to figure out better which one serves better for that particular purpose.

From what I see them, forum and ML mostly overlap, it's just a matter of preferences of where you want to share your thoughts on a particular topic.

Bugzilla is clearly the tool for bugs and (to me) for small enhancements to already developed tools.

Brainstorm is the tool to propose brand new ideas. It clearly overlaps a bit with Bugzilla Enhancements but we can live with that and use common sense to move enhancements between the two.
For example I have proposed a different zoom gesture. It could have been filed in as a browser enhancement, but it clearly (to me at least :) ) belongs to Brainstorm as the gesture should be made available to all applications.

So yes, I think we need all of them, but we need to clearly state their purposes on a wiki page so that the boundaries between them are better defined.

Re: Why do we have brainstorm?
 

What I don't get is all this fragmentation. Nokia expects enthusiasts and consumers to function the same way as developers and Nokia employees. Beyond getting things that should've been fixed or features that exist on every other computer/phone on the market, why do consumers even care where to go? Nokia is a big giant with a big maze of software and legal mazes to traverse, but isn't that someone they should hire to traverse and filter feedback through? Someone that understands both what consumers want and what software/hardware engineers need?

Nokia just got me used to using Bugzilla and now they want me to go somewhere else to improve their business. I'd happily do so if I was getting paid for it, but why am I helping Nokia make more money?

I know the maemo community will say, "Well, the whole process is just for programmers, developers, etc..." But if Nokia doesn't figure this out soon, step 5 of 5 isn't gonna make a difference. They need to figure out how to start interacting with consumers NOW and not wait for Maemo 6 to make that happen.

Re: Why do we have brainstorm?
 

This isn't "Nokia expects". These are decisions the community have made; pointing the finger at Nokia as some demon on which all the ills can be blamed isn't helpful.

The question is how, constructively, can we balance the various requirements; and have we got those requirements (and the balance) right yet?

[snip rest about step 5 of 5 and other stuff which isn't relevant]

Re: Why do we have brainstorm?
 

If the problem is ideas being filed in the wrong place couldn't we just make it a simple task to move them from one to the other, or maybe this is already the case?

Re: Why do we have brainstorm?
 

@freppas: right now, any bug filed in bugzilla that seems like it should be brainstormed, is requested to be manually moved over to brainstorm.

@Jaffa: Yes, the community as of right now is made up of mostly technical people. The community is sponsored by Nokia, is it not? Eventually, if Maemo and Nokia are to succeed, the community will engulf a much larger group of users...i.e. mass market consumers. If the community and Nokia don't see this, then all of these exercises are irrelevant.

Re: Why do we have brainstorm?
 

Jaffa is correct, and I want to add that a lot of what is being complained about is currently in the process of discussion, exploration and improvement-- including bug reporting and brainstorming.

There are distinct goals as anidel correctly pointed out but there's also no avoiding a degree of overlap. That is where human judgment and management come in.

Those participating in these efforts welcome input from the community and will do our best to implement what we can when we can. Just keep in mind change does not always come as quickly as some would like, and that absence of evidence (ie, activity) is not necessarily evidence of absence. Your patience is appreciated.

;)

Also, I'm inclined to merge this with the "ask your questions here" thread, where IMO it should have started.

Re: Why do we have brainstorm?
 

This was precisely one of the main reasons to push Brainstorm. Most of us agreed that bugzilla is not the most appropriate tool for non-technical contributors to propose and discuss feature requests. Then someone pointed to http://brainstorm.ubuntu.com/ and a long discussion and implementation process started. And still continues.

Re: Why do we have brainstorm?
 

The first conclusion I get from this debate is that I will think it twice before resolving a bug report as MOVED Brainstorm.

In my opinion there are cases where Brainstorm is better.

- When a feature request might have different solutions. Maybe for Nokia is a wontfix but then an alternatived solution shows up and the feature goes through implementation.

- When there is controversy also at a community level.

- When someone has a proposal about a missing feature but doesn't know much about how to implement it.

If a proposal shows up in the Brainstorm and it's actually a duplicated from an enhancement request in bugzilla, by default the resolution would be MOVED Brainstorm. There might be exceptions e.g. Ogg Support out of the box, where all possible discussion has been discussed. :)

Re: Why do we have brainstorm?
 

Indeed, nothing stops from enhancements in bugzilla to flower into a Brainstorm idea.
Nothing, also, stops the opposite from happening.

Re: Why do we have brainstorm?
 

Depends. The community gets a lot of support from Nokia, but that isn't the same as "sponsorship". Some members of the community get sponsored to travel to events like the summit; other members of the community work for Nokia; other members of the community are self-employed, but paid by Nokia, to work on maemo.org; Nokia pays the bills for maemo.org, but the vast the Maemo community have no direct financial benefit from Nokia.

Sorry, but this kind of attitude really annoys me. Do you think the members of the community who've been involved since 2005 don't realise that an increased market penetration will change things? Do you think that the vast majority of us old-timers don't want more users, more developers, more applications and more exposure for Maemo?

It's not like people are going out of their way to make things bad. Improvements are iterative. Things are sub-optimal. So, we look; assess; evaluate and suggest improvements for the next iteration. maemo.org is very much "release-early and release-often".

Re: Why do we have brainstorm?
 

Good that this is discussed a bit more and that i see i am not the only one that finds this fragmentations confusing.

Let me say that i get brainstorm. but that i just dont agree with that bugzilla is getting a resolved state (moved) to brainstorm..

I think bugzilla should be always leading and then for a brainstorm topic there should be or should end up in (if it leads to something) to a bugzilla issue (enhancement)

This way bugzilla is always leading and brainstorm is just an extra interface for the (initial) discussion. You can always have a link both ways pointing to each other.

Maybe someone could make a sync tool so that brainstorm comments are somehow also added as comments to bugzilla so that it is really in the end in 1 place?

Re: Why do we have brainstorm?
 

Resolved does not always mean "solved altogether"-- it can mean "out of scope for this environ" too. Maybe though we just need a better term for that sort of situation?

If something moves from Bugzilla to Brainstorm and then stalls, that's certainly an issue to tackle... but I don't think it negates the option of "resolving" such an issue in Bugzilla.

Re: Why do we have brainstorm?
 

I agree the current approach seems very fragmented. The need for separate logins for them all, doesn't help either (although, if I've understood correctly, work is in process to resolve this issue, which is really good :)). Anyway, here is my idea:

Why not have a separate "Idea" (or something like that) forum in Talk where anyone can post a new idea or enhancement request? After the initial discussion it could be decided whether a Brainstorm or Bugzilla should be created for it. Also there it could be pointed out that a solution already exists or it can be resolved in Talk thread with no further action required. This way the end-user who has an idea/enhancement request wouldn't need to worry where it belongs and, with a simple Talk search, he can find out quickly if it has been already discussed.

In other words:

1. End-user has an idea/enhancement request
2. He makes a search in Talk to find out if it already exists
3. Makes a new thread about it in "Idea"
4. Initial discussion to see if a Brainstorm or Bugzilla is needed
5. Opening Brainstorm or Bugzilla

Re: Why do we have brainstorm?
 

I second sasler!

I came along various threads with just requests for something, where actually no brainstorm is needed as the problem might be specific or does not need any brainstorm as the solutions are well known and it should be up to developers which they find easiest or most challenging (I know both folks...) to implement.

if its feature, program or protocol doesn't matter... e.g. I'd like to have a XMPP client capable of gpg ssl and so on and be able to use the full sized protocol... would mean we have a plugin for conversations doing that? we might but it could be solved with pidgin first and extend to be integrated later... who cares as long as something happens, we get satisfied and might be surprised as well.

As said by sasler: it might need a brainstorm/bugreport but its not a must have in many cases.

Re: Why do we have brainstorm?
 

Maybe we just create a new thread prefix for discussions in this subforum, that doesn't apply to the actual Brainstorm tool. Call it [Incubator].

If a Brainstorm emerges from an Incubator thread, great-- if no elects to take it on, then the thread is closed at some pont.

just... brainstorming. ;)

Re: Why do we have brainstorm?
 

give it cookies!

Incubator would be for brainstorming, but what to brainstorm? A problem? I see a lot of questions being posted... brainstorm should stick to the problem+solution case. I want something to be realized but don't know how or am not a coder, I dont know where it fits and dont know who to ask. There brainstorm comes to play. for example I thought of how usefull a constellation tool would be and got brainstormed, feature needs, apps that might be worth a port and so on... the same goes for my cryptography-storm! thats what brainstorm is for me...
its not the place asking for minor features or for plugins for existing frameworks, but it happens quiet a lot. Even asking questions happens from time to time, those threads need to go somewhere else.

the split between bugtracker and brainstorm is both good and bad.
maybe some bugs should be discussed in talk.brainstorm but do not need a brainstorm item.
enhancement and feature dev should go here as well; if the dev-team thinks they need some brainstorm done (crowd sourcing in some way). The thread starter must be one of the dev-team!

But some things just dont fit at the first stage! Maybe later but thats up to the developers looking in to it! Means...
App porting requests "I want that program over here could someone have a look please." maybe the answer is "We got another doing the same already! Which feature are you missing?" or "Hmm good idea I will have a look". Later on the developer starts a brainstorm item and puts in various solutions he found worth a look as well and is not sure which to choose as the features divide. Here the brainstorm item gets opened by developers and should go to under consideration instantly.

Feature requests fit to "Applications" or "Plattform". Is there a subforum needed?

just... brainstorming.

Re: Why do we have brainstorm?
 

You are about to propose what Brainstorm is supposed to do:

- Creating a new brainstorm creates automatically a new Talk thread. You call it "idea"? Fine.

- A new brainstorm/idea starts in the Sandbox. You call it "incubator"? Fine.

Note that Brainstorm is not only useful to see how different solutions are discussed and evaluated. Even if a Brainstorm has only one solution it is interesting to see whether it gets enough support to get out of the Sandbox/Incubator and then it's also useful to see when a single solution is seconded by 11 or 1011 voters, if the thumbs up/down ratio is 99%, 1% or 50% and so on.

Re: Why do we have brainstorm?
 

10 thumbs up isn't hard to reach... is it? how many users strive through brainstorm per day? how many could? sometimes the page is still that slow I klick the link and get me a fresh cup of coffee before I look at it again... some brainstorm items are under consideration without even one reply at talk or a solution posted...

Re: Why do we have brainstorm?
 

The server problems will be solved, they don't count as criteria from doing A or B with Brainstorm.

Proposals can't leave the Sandbox without at least one solution. If you know about one case then please share the URL since it's probably a bug.

All the rest is up to you (the community) to decide. If 10 votes is too low then increasing the level is peanuts.

Do you need a minimum of Talk discussion as a requirement to leave Sandbox? Many times a vote tells just as much as a Talk post. But if this wants to be set also as a requirement iot can be done, I guess.

Re: Why do we have brainstorm?
 

yeah that was a bug then I guess it was while changing to automagically go from SB to UC... never mind. For now 10 is ok I guess.

I know ;)

changing the prefix from sandbox to under cons.. is another issue I guess, such a change should bump the thread to top as well.
I dont know midgard... is it possible to link the talk thread to the brainstorm? so threads get started automagically with the brainstorm item and the first entry is only editable via brainstorm so the title gets it change from there? showing the solutions count/names in the first entry would be neat feat. too
still storming...

Re: Why do we have brainstorm?
 

This is an essential piece of the Brainstorm that is still missing and this is exactly what Oskari (Midgard) and Reggie (Talk) are after.