Wikimedia Developer Summit/2016/Collaboration

This is the session pad for the Collaboration working area (T119030), main topic Make code review not suck (T114419) slated to begin at 2:00 PM on Tuesday, January 5.

Purpose

T119030 - Working area overview: "Central problem: how do we scale editing our code up to populations similar to editing our projects, proportionally increasing our positive impact and productivity?

Main session focus:

T114419- Make code review not suck

There is enough evidence that our code review process causes frustration. How bad a problem is this? Beyond the visible symptoms, what are the root causes of the long backlogs? Which are the potential solutions worth exploring? In particular, how can we re-arrange social conventions to make Code Review run better. While solving the problem in this session is a non-goal, having people leave the meeting feeling that one day we will have solved the problem - is a goal.

Agenda

10 minutes: session introduction
25 minutes: Discussion of root problems of frustration. Or if there even is frustration
30 minutes: Discussion of potential solutions to problems
15 minutes: Conclusion. How do people feel about what's been discussed. Reflections on stuff discussed. Are there solutions that specificly excite people. Next steps.

Minutes

Etherpad

https://etherpad.wikimedia.org/p/WikiDev16-T114419

Goals

Please prepopulate this section with the goals of the meeting, and anticipate that collaborative editing around fulfillment of goals. This is a great place to capture action items from the conversation.

We have a better idea about the root causes of the problem
We have a number of ideas about how to fix the problem
[A somewhat meta goal] People feel hope that the situation will improve

Chronology

This section is where an attempt is made to capture the gist of who said what, in what order. A transcript isn't necessary, but it's useful to capture the important points made by speakers as they happen.

Session guidelines

This checklist exists to help each session at WikiDev meet the following goals:

Have productive discussion about topics that need face-to-face time

Make progress towards agreement on a solution

Document what was discussed, including areas of agreement and disagreement

Create written list of action items for follow up

Update or create Phabricator tasks as appropriate

Specific tasks:

Assign meeting roles:
Facilitator

Gatekeeper

Scribe

Timekeeper

Facilitator: run session to achieve specific goals.
State or build consensus towards meeting goal and style, referencing one of these meeting types:
Problem-solving: surveying many possible solutions

Strawman: exploring one specific solution

Field narrowing: narrowing down choices of solution

Consensus: coming to agreement on one solution

Education: teaching people about an agreed solution

Identify agenda items and guide discussion to stay on topic

Redirect participants who begin venting or discussing things that can be done online

Scribe(s): Document the session
Copy https://etherpad.wikimedia.org/p/WikiDev16-YourSession to https://etherpad.wikimedia.org/p/WikiDev16-[SESSION NAME]

Fill out the information in the template, including
Link to Phabricator task describing session

Goal as described by facilitator

Topics of discussion as laid out by facilitator

Action items and who is responsible for them

Create new Phabricator tasks as needed

At end of session, copy meeting notes into Phabricator as appropriate

Gatekeeper: Actively manage participation
Interrupt people if they are dominating the discussion

Help people who are having difficulty being heard

If the gatekeeper is talking too much, someone else should interrupt them

Timekeeper: Keep track of time left and point out time passing to facilitator
If possible, estimate time for each topic written by scribes

Let people know when a topic has gone over its time

Give a warning when 5-10 minutes are left