[maemo-community] Monthly Sprint Proposal

[From: Qole]

Hi all,

These are some proposed ideas for the issues that I raised during the April
'09 Sprint Meeting on maemo-meeting.

I would assume that logs for this meeting will eventually surface on
maemo.org [1], but I don't see anything for March '09, so maybe not.
[1] (http://maemo.org/maemo-meeting/)

Basically, I got frustrated with trying to read last month's sprint page
[2]; the tasks were a sea of red (meaning "really stuck / delayed") and the
Activity Log was full of stuff that was difficult to tie to the tasks above.

[2] http://wiki.maemo.org/Maemo.org_Sprints/March_09

So I have spent many hours thinking about how it should be done. Then, in
preparation for writing this proposal, I read the maemo.org Sprints page
[3], and I realized that my proposals were mostly what was supposed to be
happening anyway.

[3] http://wiki.maemo.org/Maemo.org_Sprints

So, my proposal will start out with the simple request that the paid
maemo.org team members follow the guidelines on the Sprints page.

Next, I'll make a few suggestions for improving the process. As with all my
"suggestion packages", the ideas can be discarded, modified, or
cherry-picked as desired by those involved.

Here are a few things that I think would make things easier for community
members to follow the progress of maemo.org team members.

(1) Sprint tasks need to be bite-sized. If they will take longer than a
month to accomplish, they should not be sprint tasks; they should be put on
a separate page, "Goals" or "Long-Term Tasks" or something. The sprint tasks
can be broken out of these big goals and as they are achieved, the progress
on the big goals can be updated. The long term goals page can also have some
more explanation as to what these goals are all about. The team members
responsible for the tasks should be responsible for getting this sorted out.

The reason that the sprint tasks need to be bite-sized is because we need to
see some more green on the sprint pages. A long list of stuck tasks is
pretty disenheartening for the community, and it doesn't help the team's
motivation, either.

(2) Activity reports need to be directly tied to sprint tasks. If necessary,
the tasks can be given some sort of ID code, and the activity reports can
just reference the ID code in brackets. If you are doing something that is
related to maemo.org, but isn't a sprint task, then you should probably give
some details about how it relates to one of the long term goals, or how it
relates to your job in general. Some kind of extra explanation would be very
helpful.

If what you did isn't part of a sprint task, but you think it should be,
then I think team members should be able to add tasks mid-sprint, with the
understanding that they'll be carried over to the next sprint, where they
can be discussed more fully (in the review meeting).

(3) All team members should prepare a report at least two days before the
monthly review meeting, and they should publish it somewhere. I suggest this
mailing list, but it doesn't really matter. This report will consist of an
explanation of why sprint tasks didn't get done (the expectation is that the
tasks will get done, since they were chosen to be doable within the sprint,
and if they don't, an explanation is needed), and one or more proposed
sprint tasks for the next sprint. As I suggested in (1) above, these
proposed tasks should be doable in the next month. This report should also
have requests for community help with proposed sprint tasks. The report can
contain anything extra that the team member would like to discuss at the
sprint meeting, too.

In closing, I want to ask that the paid maemo.org team members stay
connected with the community, since they are employed by the community (even
though they are paid by Nokia). Personally, I would really appreciate seeing
them more often over in the forums, mainly because that is the place where I
"hang out" most often.

Ok, there's my "bit". Discuss!
-- 
Qole: fanboy, wacko, and maemo.org junta member
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