[wp-docs] Joining Forces: Support

Tue May 15 19:28:13 UTC 2012

I like the idea as well.

On Tue, May 15, 2012 at 2:22 PM, Lorelle on WordPress <
lorelleonwordpress at gmail.com> wrote:

> This is so exciting. The Docs team has been walking on egg shells for
> years over the confusion of the WordPress Handbook, and I'm eager to see
> new energy being sent in this direction.
>
> The close ties between the Forum and Codex have been there since the
> beginning. However, time and skills serving the Forum and the time and
> skills serving documentation are distinctive, as several people mentioned.
> I agree that there needs to be one or two people overseeing the
> organizational structure, management, and maintenance of the Codex.
>
> Having a site of our own has been essential and lacking, which is why we
> created the unofficial docs task list not long ago. It was critical that we
> find a better way of communicating and keeping our community connected than
> the mailing list. As it was "unofficial," we haven't done much to promote
> it or work with it, but it was a start. We need to have a place to support
> and educate each other on how to write for the Codex and offer task lists
> beyond those we've had in the past on the Codex, so I'm excited about
> having our own space or making the current blog on WordPress.com official.
>
> The mailing list has not been the sole line of communication either. As
> many do, I work with many people one on one to help them write and edit for
> the Codex and assign tasks, communicating with the mailing list when
> necessary for edits and such.
>
> As we struggled to understand the role the WordPress Handbook and
> WordPress Lessons played in the role of documentation in the WordPress
> Community, we've come to realize the Codex best serves the WordPress
> Community by providing support for issues found within the Forums,
> expanding upon Learn WordPress instructions for the WordPress Lessons
> section, and developing more extensive documentation and guides beyond the
> basics found within the help files, especially servicing developers and
> programmers.
>
> While melding together Forum and Codex sounds great on the surface, I
> agree with Andrea and others that we need to have one or more people
> focused on the bigger picture overseeing the Codex, thus supporting the
> overall WordPress Community better.
>
> Thanks for the survey, Jane, and for helping with all of this.
>
> Lorelle
>
>
>
>
>
> On Tue, May 15, 2012 at 8:28 AM, Andrea Rennick <andrea at ronandandrea.com>wrote:
>
>> It makes totally sense, because Support & Docs are two sides of the same
>> coin. :) If users can't understanding docs or can't find them, they post in
>> the forums. ;P
>>
>> Better docs mean less support issues, because people don't scale. And the
>> people answering questions are the first ones who see the need for new
>> docs. Because they answer the same questions over and over (and over) again.
>>
>> Getting people to read docs is a separate issue, but having support and
>> docs work hand in hand in tandem is a big first step.
>>
>> I think half the people overlap anyway, yes?
>>
>> a.
>>
>>
>> On Tue, May 15, 2012 at 11:51 AM, Chip Bennett <chip at chipbennett.net>wrote:
>>
>>> Personally, I love the idea. Speaking as a contributor group member who
>>> tries to keep in the loop regarding support and/or Codex issues that impact
>>> our group (or issues where our contributor group can be helpful), such
>>> consolidation is welcome.
>>>
>>> Chip
>>>
>>>
>>> On Tue, May 15, 2012 at 7:09 AM, Jane Wells <jane at automattic.com> wrote:
>>>
>>>> Hi everyone. The results of the recent surveys to identify active
>>>> contributors and elect team reps made it pretty clear that the docs team is
>>>> in a bit of a slump, organizationally speaking. Only 5 people from the
>>>> wp-docs post responded, and of those, 2 were new or not yet contributing,
>>>> and there was no consensus re reps among the remaining 3 respondents. It
>>>> got me thinking about how we organize contributors, what has worked well
>>>> elsewhere in the WP ecosystem and in other free software projects, and
>>>> leads me to this proposal: what if we combined forums and docs into one
>>>> Support team?
>>>>
>>>> Looking back at the Codex activity from the past six months or year,
>>>> chunks of it have been tied to forum mods (like Ipstenu and Andrea_r),
>>>> other contributor groups (like Chip on the Theme Review Team), and new
>>>> releases. Not that how Automattic/WordPress.com organizes itself should
>>>> decide anything, but their support team manages forums, email support, and
>>>> docs, and it seems to work pretty well. They have a schedule for reviewing
>>>> existing documentation so it never gets too far out of date, and the people
>>>> on the front lines with users in the forums and via email can see very
>>>> clearly where they need to beef up documentation. I'm thinking this could
>>>> work well for .org, too. Those who are strong writers and just want to
>>>> contribute to documentation could still do so, but within a context of what
>>>> our user support needs are at any given time based on the actual support
>>>> requests.
>>>>
>>>> What I'm envisioning is less siloing of contributor personnel, with one
>>>> group blog at make.wordpress.org/support that uses tags like forums
>>>> and codex to organize posts, and has pages to help orient new contributors
>>>> and get them started. These mailing lists could fade away in favor of email
>>>> subscriptions from the blog, which are more easily searchable and would be
>>>> more visible to potential contributors. Within the uber-group, some people
>>>> would naturally gravitate toward specific tasks while others would
>>>> multi-task as they have been doing.
>>>>
>>>> Over time we could expand the purview of the group to include things
>>>> like moderating instructional videos and comments at wordpress.tv (and
>>>> start embedding appropriate videos into codex), possibly helping to staff
>>>> in-person help desks in local communities and/or at events like WordCamps
>>>> and Meetups, etc. I think the prospects are pretty exciting, and I could
>>>> see this becoming the biggest and most active of all the contributor
>>>> groups, which would be awesome.
>>>>
>>>> If there are any strong objections to this approach, please reply to
>>>> this thread today so we can discuss. If not, and everyone is willing to
>>>> give this a shot and all work together (at least as an experiment for, say,
>>>> the next release cycle or two), I'll go ahead and set up the group blog
>>>> tomorrow.
>>>>
>>>> Jane
>>>> ______________________________**_________________
>>>> wp-docs mailing list
>>>> wp-docs at lists.automattic.com
>>>> http://lists.automattic.com/**mailman/listinfo/wp-docs<http://lists.automattic.com/mailman/listinfo/wp-docs>
>>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> _______________________________________________
>>> wp-docs mailing list
>>> wp-docs at lists.automattic.com
>>> http://lists.automattic.com/mailman/listinfo/wp-docs
>>>
>>>
>>
>>
>> --
>> --
>> Andrea Rennick, http://wpebooks.com and http://ronandandrea.com
>> Co-author of WordPress All-In-One For Dummies http://rml.me/aio
>>
>>
>> _______________________________________________
>> wp-docs mailing list
>> wp-docs at lists.automattic.com
>> http://lists.automattic.com/mailman/listinfo/wp-docs
>>
>>
>
> _______________________________________________
> wp-docs mailing list
> wp-docs at lists.automattic.com
> http://lists.automattic.com/mailman/listinfo/wp-docs
>
>
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.automattic.com/pipermail/wp-docs/attachments/20120515/caef735f/attachment.htm>