Meeting to discuss Preview non-code deliverbles

• Attendees: Katie, Sheila, Mimi, Priscilla, Philippe, Pieter, Jared, Ted, Aparna

Discussion Notes

• Goals
  • get everyone thinking about this
  • get a sense of people's expectations - what they think is important
  • tease out giant list of questions
  • brainstorm list of ideas

• Philippe:
  • developer documentation - not a blocker
  • not critical for release
  • it's about end user documentation - what is necessary to download and explore
  • we could get some beta user feedback on that

• Pieter:
  • Preview for end users
  • user manuals - icons, widgets mean, how to scenarios
  • based on use cases ie: if you are a hub, cc, here is what you do
  • end user documentation based on use cases, end user scenarios
  • screen casts are still important
  • do we need to do better than we have now?
  • how many users do we want to get?
  • service is targeted at 10000 users

• Katie:
  • assumption: architecture level documentation
  • from a pr perspective - important to show long-term plan
  • multiple screen-casts - picking work-flows
  • document around migrating data

• Mimi:
  • Preview is a good opportunity to consolidate the landing pages
  • link to the wiki
  • probably not realistic to maintain the design and polish of non end-user stuff
  • what does this icon mean...probably don't have time for this
  • this stuff will likely change before it's read
  • we want to find out some of this stuff - what is confusing

• Ted:
  • different assumptions about what this release is for
  • also our chance to build on the developer community
  • before we can get to the details we need to decide on priorities
  • doesn't want us to delete developer documentation
  • thinks the vision document is really important

• Jared:
  • need to think about configuration of clients to access the service

What we agreed on

• Goal of Preview - start getting users outside of OSAF
• Low priority on dev docs
• Low priority on internationalization
• End user documentation
  • We can all agree on the handful of screen casts
  • We can agree on some high-level feature description and vision document
  • How much more detailed workflow UI do we need to provide?
  • How to download it, how to setup accounts, how to backup your data.
  • Pieter could make a list of the stuff that he thinks are important.
  • Document the top 4-5 scenarios. Have a FAQ that others can contribute to ie: Philippe modified the troubleshooting pages
  • Need to figure out what are the top 6 use case scenarios we want to document
  • We can start from the existing specs that we have today
  • Stamping storyboards, collaborating on an item
  • Dashboard - triaging and iterating
  • CC collaborating on an item
• Wiki good enough to manage FAQs and information
• Get at least 10 users for dogfooding - some casual collaborators
• Another period after this - after release but before a lot of publicity - to get more feedback. Soft launch.

Things we need

• FAQs updated - need to have this
• Prioritizing things that block people from getting started and using it
• Haven't been using our blog very well
• The launch is transitional - pay more quality attention to the first signing up and address them
• Help menu
• Metrics, feedback that we are getting.
• FAQ vs Troubleshooting pages
• Known bugs page
• Cosmo - request on the list - help portal page - points to other docs - people can contribute to this.
• Aparna: links to getting involved - should be part of the basic user documentation

Questions/Issues:

• How many web presences do we need?
• Issue - we don't all agree about the level of documentation.
• Pieter: when are we going to extend Preview to non-english
  • Who is going to do the non-english documentation
  • We aren't going to put any more energy into this further
  • Google - has sites that translate the documentation
• Priscilla - process for responding to users - dealing with outside questions
  • Chandler user list - on in the next few days
  • We should except that we are doing the customer support
  • List of deliverables - train people to do customer support
  • Figure out who is writing the responses
  • How are we going to provide support for new end users trying to use the desktop?
  • What about support for downloading Cosmo - running an instance and hosting their own.
  • Downloading SNARF, Cosmo is for early adopters, adventurous users
• Should we consider a staged rollout?
  • Staged rollout means more functionality in the server and we haven't planned for that
  • Invitations do end up generating more buzz
  • Can we tolerate the support load? This would be the only reason not to do it. Can go from 0-10000.
• Do we want to craft a FAQ for stuff that isn't done ie: mobile FAQ.
• Do we want to have a voluntary registration process for people downloading the desktop?
  • Katie: goes against the brand a bit. People feel it's an intrusion just like advertising. Not pro-social behavior.
  • Aparna: Are we doing a Beta before Preview - what are the QA expectations.
  • Katie: We will have 10 dogfooders before Preview.

Next Actions

• Sheila to start putting together a complete non-code deliverables page for all projects
• Mimi and Pieter will work together on identifying the top work-flows
  • Next action: Mimi will compile a list of possible scenarios
• Jared: need a license for trademark and graphical assets - branding committee will need to discuss this.
• Jared: terms of service - next action for Jared to draft this
• Chandler.org - Pieter and Mitch working on this one
• Trademark search - Pieter coordinating
• How many international domains - put together a list of prices and choices. Pieter will have a discussion with the lawyer and they probably have this information.

-- SheilaMooney - 26 Jan 2007