[Desktop 13.04-Topic] Discussing PS-related product processes

[Jeremy Bicha]

Adding ubuntu-doc to the CC list as this seems more a FF/UIFE
discussion than a -desktop discussion.

On 15 October 2012 03:43, Didier Roche <didrocks at ubuntu.com> wrote:
> Hey everyone,
>
> as you probably know already, PS is our upstream for a lot of desktop
> components nowadays (Unity, compiz, webapps, indicators, multi touch
> stack…).
> The past cycle has been a real ride in term of features, which spawn the
> release team, translation team and documentation team with FFe/UIFe. We need
> to discuss a way to ease the process in both ways with all involved parts.
>
> Seeing the importance of those components on our stack today, I think for
> instance that having a standing FF/UIF exception as we have for GNOME
> components in ubuntu will make sense. However, the counter-part will be that
> PS will work on getting things landing only when they are ready, to avoid
> further and further refinements (and additional documentation changes) as we
> had in the past just to "match the date gate". So this one can clearly be a
> win-win situation.

I believe standing feature freeze exceptions need a history of "doing
the right thing", which is not how I would describe what happened for
quantal. Otherwise, it seems to me that giving the developers and
designers more official permission to break the freezes they are
already breaking would make the problems worse.

Or to put it another way, PS really really needs to land these
features closer to the beginning of a cycle in the regular archives
(not a PPA) to get near-real-world testing so that there is time for
polishing. I wonder if the emphasis on keeping Ubuntu+1 working has
gone too far and if we are actually pushing Ubuntu developers to land
new features late.

> Also, I want to discuss about what can land in a SRU. Little (few pixel
> move) change, not really impacting the documentation may want to be
> considered. We currently have 2 examples we can discuss in the session:
>
> - https://bugs.launchpad.net/unity/+bug/1043808 (Dash: Preview activation
> doesn't have instant feedback). Design worked on a spinner to partially
> address this one. This is a behavior change in some way, for a transient
> state, however it can be completely acceptable in a SRU as it will make the
> quantal experience better and don't change doc/add new strings, and so on.

Adding a "busy" spinner seems harmless enough and wouldn't impact docs
or translations. I don't think it would make much of a difference for
video reviews. On the other hand, I wouldn't want to see animations
change near Final Freeze or after.

> - Another one is the ribbon on the application lens for software-center
> content. This one is giving (due to pixelized images with the magazines) a
> lot of headaches to design and they would want to remove it. This specific
> case is an UI change, but doesn't seem it would impact the understanding of
> the lens.

I need more information about that issue.

> We can base the UDS discussion on those examples to see how we can get the
> process smoother and more reliable for everyone in the next cycle and going
> on. :)
>
> Cheers,
> Didier

Thanks,
Jeremy