Re: UI Review

[Luis Villa <luis villa gmail com>]

On 2/8/06, Calum Benson <Calum Benson sun com> wrote:
> On Tue, 2006-02-07 at 10:25 -0700, Elijah Newren wrote:
> > On 2/7/06, Calum Benson <Calum Benson sun com> wrote:
> > > > Uh, we're just over a week *past* UI freeze.  ;-)
> > >
> > > I know, but didn't we always do UI reviews after the freeze, with
> >
> > s/the freeze/a freeze/
> >
> > > maintainers having special release team dispensation to change stuff
> > > after that that the UI review recommended?
> >
> > Yes, but didn't we used to have a soft UI freeze + a hard UI freeze,
> > with the UI review coming in between? (e.g. see
> > http://www.gnome.org/start/2.5/).  We're almost to the time of what
> > would have been the hard UI freeze in such a schedule.
> >
> > Anyway, I think it'd make sense to probably approve stuff that was
> > changed in response to UI review recommendation, if done soon, but
> > given that it is later in the release cycle we do need to weigh it
> > against possible work caused to the documentation or release notes
> > writers as well as possibility for instability if the changes are not
> > small.  So, I'd probably lean towards approving such stuff, but I
> > think it's too late to give blanket approval to changes made in
> > response to UI review at this point.
>
> Ok, well... what I'd suggest then is that we[1] maybe try and do a UI
> review of the components whose maintainers have expressed an interest in
> being reviewed (or who express such an interest in the next day or two),
> and just seek approval for those changes.  And then do it properly again
> next time :)

Just wanted to say, Calum (and perhaps others listening in) that I
firmly believe that, done right, the UI reviews can be very, very
useful. It is clear that we're not doing it very well, though- perhaps
it needs to be more proactive, and earlier in the cycle? I'm not sure
exactly what an ideal process would look like, but it is clear that we
need one- this is really critical, important, sadly vasty
underappreciated work.

Luis