Re: gnustep.org domain

[David Chisnall]

On 18 Jul 2013, at 09:32, Richard Frith-Macdonald 
<richardfrithmacdonald@gmail.com> wrote:

> I kind of agree ... when I'm at the computer I'm working on something 
> (whether it's paid work or GNUstep work) and concentrating on what I'm doing. 
>  That means, for me, that instant messaging and similar social media tools 
> are horrible distractions which cause me to lose track of what I'm doing, so 
> I always have them turned off.
> Anything that can wait, I do on email. If it can't wait (or is just too 
> complicated or unclear to do in email), then text chat is far too slow for me 
> and I need speech... which in practice means phone or skype.

I believe this attitude is a great way of convincing potential users and 
developers that GNUstep is a dead project.  I am usually in the Étoilé IRC 
channel and a number of FreeBSD channels on efnet.  When people log in and ask 
a question, they may not get an immediate response, but they do get a fairly 
timely one and, more importantly, they get an impression that developers are 
active participants in the wider community.  

IRC is not a telephone call.  It doesn't need an immediate response - its major 
benefit is that it is a low-latency, lossy, asynchronous communication medium.  
If you want someone's attention, then saying their name will give them a 
notification, but (unlike a telephone call or in-person meeting) etiquette does 
not demand an immediate response from them.  All of the participants can decide 
how much or how little attention they pay.  I typically poll IRC periodically 
while code is compiling or while I'm thinking about a problem (a little 
distraction is good for letting the hindbrain work) and ignore it when I am 
focussed.  When my IRC client tells me someone said my name, I note the fact 
but typically don't interrupt my work - I just make a mental note to find out 
what they said when I next take a short break.

For FreeBSD, LLVM, and Étoilé, I would have no hesitation about recommending 
that new people connect to the IRC channels.  They'll find developers and users 
(well, not so many users with Étoilé...) and get the impression that the 
project has some kind of community surrounding it.  I would not make the same 
recommendation about GNUstep.  I stopped connecting to the IRC channel some 
time ago, because it has a toxic atmosphere: few (if any) active developers, 
and a lot of people who seem overtly hostile towards the project.  It either 
needs moderating or for us to stop recommending it and start recommending 
something else (which can just be another IRC channel).  

A successful open source project needs more than good code, it needs good 
communication and a good community.  GNUstep has a great community, but does a 
very good job at hiding this from the world.  I don't think this necessarily 
requires using XMPP (I probably won't join an XMPP chat room until Alex 
finishes implementing multi-user chat in XMPPKit, as I have failed to find time 
to do it in the last few years).  

David




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