[tor-dev] Survey on Tor Trac usage and how you manage your tasks

[Karsten Loesing]

On 8/22/11 2:29 PM, Karsten Loesing wrote:
> Hi everyone!
> 
> At the last annual dev meeting in Waterloo we had a very productive
> discussion about managing the various channels of Tor communication:
> 
> 
> https://trac.torproject.org/projects/tor/wiki/org/meetings/2011TorAnnualDevMeeting/FirehoseOutput
> 
> Related to that discussion, we should talk about how we use Tor's Trac
> system, or more generally how we manage our Tor tasks.  We use Trac as
> issue tracker, wiki, and for project management.  But it seems that
> everyone uses Trac slightly different and has their own expectations how
> other people use it.  This can slow us down.  In addition to that, some
> people may not know how Trac can solve their problems.  Knowing how
> others use Trac might help them manage their tasks more quickly.  Let's
> conduct a survey!
> 
> The survey below consists of two parts:  The first part focuses on
> Trac's features and whether you're using them or not.  The second part
> is about managing your tasks in general, either with or without Trac.
> 
> If you are a Tor developer or volunteer or think you have some input on
> the topic, please fill out this survey until
> 
>   Sunday, August 28, 2011
> 
> and send it either to this list or to me.  I'll try to summarize what
> was said and send the survey results to this list, hopefully before the
> end of the month.

So far, 7 people replied to the survey and I got 1 request to extend the
deadline.  I think it's best to wait for another week if that means
we'll get feedback from more Tor developers and volunteers.  After all,
we might use the survey results to discuss changes to using Trac in the
future.

The new deadline is

  Sunday, September 4, 2011

Dear Tor developers and volunteers who haven't responded yet: If you
have an opinion on using Trac, please let us know!

Thanks,
Karsten



1 Using Trac features

1.1 Which of the reports (stored ticket queries) do you use most often?

1.2 What are typical custom queries that you run?

1.3 How do you use milestones and roadmaps?

1.4 Are you subscribed to tor-bugs and/or tor-wiki-changes, and how do
you use the mails sent to these lists?

1.5 Which wiki pages do you read/edit most often?

1.6 How do you search for wiki pages?

1.7 What are typical search terms that you use when using the search
features?

1.8 Do you use keywords and the tags page, and if so, what are keywords
that you typically use?

1.9 How relevant are the following ticket fields for you?

1.9.1 Reported by

1.9.2 Owned by

1.9.3 Priority

1.9.4 Milestone

1.9.5 Component

1.9.6 Version

1.9.7 Keywords

1.9.8 Cc

1.9.9 Parent ID

1.9.10 Points

1.9.11 Actual Points

1.10 How relevant are the following ticket statuses for you?

1.10.1 accepted

1.10.2 assigned

1.10.3 closed

1.10.4 needs_information

1.10.5 needs_review

1.10.6 new

1.10.7 reopened

1.11 What other features do you use in Trac?

1.12 What features are you missing in Trac?

1.13 What features would you want our Trac not to offer anymore, because
they're making things only more confusing for you (and for people who
are new to Tor)?

2 Solving typical software development tasks

Note that the questions below don't just focus on Trac, but on any tools
or communication media you use for solving a task.

2.1 How do you decide what to work on, both when fixing bugs or when
implementing new features?

2.2 How do you keep track of what things you're supposed to do for
sponsors and for when?

2.3 How do you memorize new ideas to work on when they come up?

2.4 How do you coordinate working together with someone on something?

2.5 How do you learn who you could work together with on something?

2.6 What other software development tasks do you have that may be
supported by Trac or a Trac-like system?