[maemo-developers] Extras QA checklist

[From: Andrew Flegg]

Hi,

Quim's done a sterling job producing a first draft of the Extras QA
checklist. This is the list of things which need to be checked before
an application should get a "thumbs up" in the packages UI[1]:

    http://wiki.maemo.org/Extras-testing/QA_Checklist

There are various threads on talk.maemo.org, and there's the Talk:
page in the wiki, however I think this is something which developers
should be involved, as we're the ones who will have to live up to
these standards (and I'm not sure that Talk:QA_Checklist is the best
forum for this discussion).

It can be summarised as:

  * MUST have bug tracker URL in XSBC-Bugtracker control field.
  * MUST NOT violate licences or copyright; MUST respect trademarks.
  * MUST have all core features which are advertised (and they MUST work)
  * MUST NOT promote illegal or dubious activities
  * MUST NOT have reproducible crashes
  * MUST NOT compromise system performance
  * MUST NOT waste space in the rootfs and SHOULD use /opt as much as
    possible.
  * MUST NOT waste battery life when in background or in "normal" use.
  * MUST NOT introduce security risks.
  * SHOULD have good, complete user-facing meta-data such as package
    description, XB-Maemo-Icon-26 etc.
  * DON'T CARE about UI optimisation.
  * DON'T CARE about visual style.

Having reviewed the list to write the above, I have three issues:

BUG TRACKER
~~~~~~~~~~~
My own issue is the XSBC-Bugtracker requirement. Some applications
really are trivial and having this as a blocker doesn't make sense to
me; after all, testers can leave comments against a specific version
in the packages UI and most end-users don't raise bugs IME:

    http://wiki.maemo.org/Talk:Extras-testing/QA_Checklist#Bug_tracker

"DUBIOUS" CONTENT
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The phrases here include "promote or endorse the misuse of alcohol,
tobacco, illegal drugs or other addictive substances" and "promote
gambling". These are weasel words. What about "Dope Wars"[2] or a
simulated gambiling poker application? What about an actual online
gaming application?

I think this should be a SHOULD NOT and contain "excessive" and/or
"likely to cause offense".

META-DATA
~~~~~~~~~
  * I think a good package description should be a MUST.
  * I think XB-Maemo-Icon-26 should be a SHOULD.
  * I think XB-Maemo-Display-Name should be a SHOULD (there are apps,
    like vim, which don't require any capitalisation or spacing
    changes over and above the package name).

Comments welcome.

Cheers,

Andrew

[1] http://maemo.org/packages/repository/qa/fremantle_extras-testing/
[2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dope_Wars

-- 
Andrew Flegg -- mailto:andrew at bleb.org  |  http://www.bleb.org/