Comment by jonobacon
10 years ago
Hi Adam, Addy, Andreas, Ariya, Forbes, James, Henry, John-David, Juriy , Ken, Nicholas, Pascal, Sam, Sindre,
My name is Jono and I started as Director of Community back in November at GitHub. Obviously I am pretty new at GitHub, but I thought I would weigh in.
Firstly, thanks for your feedback. I think it is essential that GitHub always has a good sense of not just what works well for our users, but also where the pain points are. Constructive criticism is an important of doing great work. I appreciate how specific and detailed you were in your feedback. Getting a good sense of specific problems provides a more fruitful beginning to a conversation than "it suxx0rs", so I appreciate that.
I am still figuring out how GitHub fits together as an organization but I am happy to take a look into these issues and ensure they are considered in how future work is planned. We have a growing product team at GitHub that I know is passionate about solving the major pain points that rub up against our users. Obviously I can't make any firm commitments as I am not on the product team, but I can ensure the right eyeballs are on this. I also want to explore with my colleagues how we can be a little clearer about future feature and development plans to see if we can reduce some ambiguity.
As I say, I am pretty new, so I am still getting the lay of the land, but feel free to reach out to me personally if you have any further questions or concerns about this or any other issue. I am at jono@github.com.
An open question is how the community should provide feedback. Trello provides a decent example of how to do it well [1], but GitHub feels like a black box. I've been on GitHub since 2008 and I have been paying every month for years, but other than emailing support I have no idea how to vote for a feature request.
My personal pet peeve is not being able to mark a public repo as 'deprecated'. There are a lot of other people with the same frustration [2], but we have no idea how to get that on GitHub's roadmap.
[1] http://help.trello.com/article/724-submitting-feature-reques... [2] https://github.com/isaacs/github/issues/144
An open question is how the community should provide feedback.
Perhaps if Github used their own issues system to gather feedback on Github itself, they'd more rapidly improve it. I'm sure they'd feel a lot of these pain points in a far sharper, more visceral way if they were subjected to them daily.
Yes it is fairly bizarre that Github don't dogfood the issues function. I'm sure they have an internal system that they prefer, but even that internal system could have a public interface. Also, if the internal system is superior then its superior features could be added to the public system so that we could all benefit.
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But then they'd be spammed with useless +1 comments
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> My personal pet peeve is not being able to mark a public repo as 'deprecated'.
What I came up to work around this is:
- Create an org named <YOUR-USERNAME>-deprecated - Move the projects to the organization - Set the avatar of the organization to your avatar, with desaturated colors (purely cosmetic, optional)
https://github.com/coreh-deprecated
I normally put a big "[DEPRECATED]" notice at the beginning of the README. This normally doesn't go unnoticed.
Another good example is harthur's "[UNMAINTAINED]" [1]
[1] https://github.com/harthur/brain
I watch the project and did not see "UNMAINTAINED", cause i scroll automatically on github projects down to the readme.
I search and then i see it in the title.
Better would be an Option in Github to set a project to unmaintained or deprecated, with an optional link to the new project (if some exist).
Github could then change the background color from white to an other color or add a border around the page, so that it is really obvious that this project es EOL.
Have a look at the trending erlang repositories[0]. You will always find, near the top, basho/rebar. However, the subject on this reads:
The same advice is in the README.
What this tells you is that enough people are not only using this repository, which was last updated in August 2014 with a change to the README directing people at the new source, but people are giving it stars this week such that it shows up as "trending" higher than the correct repository.
There has to be something wrong with the deprecation process if this happens. [0]https://github.com/trending?l=erlang
> I normally put a big "[DEPRECATED]" notice at the beginning of the README.
Aye. Some folks in the discussion linked to by krschultz complain that "People sometimes don't read the README and -thus- don't notice deprecation warnings.". To them I ask: "What makes you think that those sorts of people will notice anything less than an overlay that prevents them from interacting with the Github UI for that particular repo?".
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My primary use case would be searching projects and filtering out deprecated ones.
Someone came up with http://unmaintained.tech/ for exactly this reason. You can add a badge to your README.
I've had pretty good success with feature requests in Github – but I agree that it at least _feels_ like it depends on who is replying to you (or even what state of mind they're in; copy paste responses has been had).
Anyway, a good example of a successful feature request – shared since it might help others in their quest for success – included me attempting to reduce the problem, scoping it and suggesting a solution. If you can find examples of this problem over multiple open source repositories (in my case nodejs) it seems to contribute to it getting fixed.
As a software engineer, I am reminded of when I go to Home Depot and ask someone for help and they say, "Oh, I do not know. I am new here...". I think it is best to come prepared with the right answers. As you can see from the doc, there are a lot of maintainers who have signed this. Perhaps:
- Note the feedback.
- Bring in the right folks to consult with on your end.
- Write a public response with concrete information (should be first interaction).
- Finally, reach out to the authors of this post. Perhaps, getting them more clarity on your roadmap and your thought process will go a long way in resolving matters like this with high profile maintainers.
My main goal in responding was to acknowledge the issues. This is just the start of the process, and by no means the end.
The next step, as you mention, is to bring the right people in. This is why I want to ensure this is raised with our teams inside GitHub to explore ways to rectify some of these concerns.
I'm glad to see someone from github is actually replying on HN and not ignoring this. Thumbs up
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You did the right thing, fast feedback of "We are looking at it" is often better than later feedback of we did "X".
Linode could take a leaf out your book in terms of dealing with people not entirely happy (if I'm been kind) with the way they deal with stuff.
It's much better for Jono to quickly reply and ack the issue, rather than radio silence while we want for them to completly solve the issue.
I personally prefer someone to at least acknowledge someone now owns the issues than to wait in silence while they gather the right people and formulate a concrete response. That doesn't happen quickly in some cases and the silence can exacerbate the issue, which ironically is why this hit HN in the first place.
I appreciate the prompt response. Face-to-face at Home Depot you know the message was received. Online it's nice to get an immediate read receipt with the real reply coming later.
Promises about the future about Github’s roadmap is understandably difficult to make, besides by a very small number of people at the top. I don’t think this is the expectation. But visibility into past failure to address these concerns and the current status is long overdue. I assume when these maintainers reached out in private channels, they were equally detailed, and have waited years.
At present, I’m not sure how this response is different from the "empty response" that motivated the publication of this document in the first place, except that this response is also public. Comments like "happy to take a look into these issues", "considered in how future work is planned" and "ensure the right eyeballs are on this" uses a lot of words to say nothing. If the community department is not the right place, maybe it’s time to walk over to where the the product group sits and ask. They probably read Hacker New too.
I’ll also highlight a possible theory: the right people at Github have already looked at these requests and decided that is not what Github Issues is for. Perhaps Issues is prioritized for the masses, not the small minority of very popular projects (but not resourceful enough that they have staff). Each of these feature requests do add friction (if only in complexity) and the majority of projects that do not need and should not utilize them. Hopefully someone at Github will quash this theory but it is consistent with events so far.
GitHub has settings for individual repos. People can opt to turn the issue tracker off completely.
Why not have the option to enable issue voting? It could be as easy as stars for issues.
Custom issue instructions would be trivial to tuck away in the settings page or associate with a specially named markdown file. They turn a wiki on by default, but you can't instruct users about the info you expect in their issue on the page where they create the issue. Documentation is very effective when it is inline with the system it is describing.
Custom issue fields with validation is a little more complex. Punt.
You can't fully disable the issue tracker: Pull requests can't be disabled and each PR becomes an issue.
One thing I would love to see for my own projects is a way to temporarily completely block off contributions on threads by people who only watched/starred the repository for less than 48 hours or something like this.
When people submit your issue tracker to hackernews/reddit/twitter all hell breaks lose and time gets wasted for nothing.
Interesting idea, but I wonder what the right metric is to determine legacy vs. new users. I certainly haven't starred/watched every package I've ever `npm install`ed.
Respectfully Jono, I think your reply is symptomatic of the issues at the heart of the matter. GitHub is, whether it expected to be or not, whether it wants to be or not, now at the heart of the OSS community. For the "Director of Community" at a company which plays such an important role in the OSS community, which itself plays an enormously important role in the broader software and civic communities and is populated by abnormally high numbers of passionate and talented contributors, to respond to a HN story with such a high profile by:
1) apologizing for being new
2) extending borderline patronizing praise (the OP likely wanted a response to the issues put forth, not your approval)
& 3) a promise, which you can't necessarily keep, to put eyes on the issue instead of speaking to the issues raised directly.
It's not what I would expect from someone in that role at that sort of company. It's, unfortunately, what I would expect from a company that had the sort of issues raised by the OP.
Your response, specifically #3, makes me wonder if you have ever worked in a medium to large business. Forgive me if I read it wrong. I think his response is solid and the best that one could expect from his role. I could not imagine some director from a different department by passing the product team and coming to my development team and saying, "stop what you are doing, and handle my request! I read something on HN! I need a plan of action that directly addresses issues that were raised!". I would, however, expect him to say that he knows or can find out (he is new still) who needs to see this and make sure the discussions happen to ensure that product team has the information required to make an informed discission allowing for a roadmap to be formed that could be shared with the community. He can totally guarantee the right people see it. He can't ensure they do anything about it, but he can champion the issue. I would hope/expect to hear back after all this has happened. What's wrong with saying he is still getting an understanding of how things work at github? And what approval are you dismayed with? His acknowledgment that feedback is important? That was just civility.
I have indeed worked at a very large (both capitalization and payroll wise) company. I've also worked at small and medium sized companies. But, as relates to my experience at the very large one, this guy would have been eaten alive for putting out that response. Perhaps your definition of large is different from mine. However, my point had nothing to do with the size of the company and everything to do with the role the company plays within the OSS movement.
At least he responded, and promptly. Let's not jump to conclusions just yet.
One suggestion is to improve the permissions system. For example, third-party github plugins that interact with the github system (e.g., setting labels, responding to comments) require "write permissions" which gives those systems "push" access to the underlying repo. Simply separating the git repository access control from the github UI / issues / pull requests access control system would be very helpful. I'm sure there are many other examples of where the permissions system needs some finer-grained access.
Edit: Essentially the same as reported here: https://github.com/isaacs/github/issues/268
Perhaps Github Issues itself should be available as a mechanism for people to provide feedback about Github itself.
Hypothetical link: github.com/github/github/issues
I've been personally paying for a couple of years, and the SAAS company I work for (~50 engineers) has committed to moving away from Github for some of these (and other) reasons.
Here are some of my fave :+1:-a-thons that help demonstrate when the issue system starts to be less useful, and the Github acknowledgement seems sparse:
* https://github.com/isaacs/github/issues/18
* https://github.com/isaacs/github/issues/215
Also, you might consider empowering your social media team. I see Github as a pretty cool company. And when I sent this tweet, I was expecting to have a bit of a shared chortle with this tweet as I know I would of had with @SlackHq:
https://twitter.com/Ash_Coolman/status/670595632659206146
But instead I got nothing, except a vague sense of having offended someone (sorry BTW, it was only a joke! :'()
I've witnessed Jono's outstanding work at Canonical/Ubuntu, and as you can see from his comment above he's a great guy. No matter what you think of Github, I think you should appreciate this.
There appears to be a need for some a different class of repository for larger open source software.
Similar to the way twitter provides verified accounts maybe GitHub should consider a tagging these popular repositories to allow for more advanced control over the collaboration project.
When I first read the letter I was a little bit disappointed, one thing I've enjoyed (to an limited extent) is the low barrier of entry to pull requests. The spring boot team especially are extremely patient and understanding when it comes to pull requests.
Hopefully there's enough community will in this to encourage GitHub to make the change, if it does really come down it not being worth the money it would be a disappointing sign.
Are you THE Jono Bacon of Ubuntu fame? If so, I have the best of hopes for Github. Best of luck in your new position and I hope we'll get to see many great new features on the platform.
There are more authors on the second page.
That's why you shouldn't use Google Docs for such an article (even if it comes in the form of a letter). Nobody expects the concept of pages on the web (as in books, not as in web page).
Comments like these baffle me and I have to wonder
* Are "we" in such a huge hurry that we don't look at our scrollbar to see if there's more to the document that we're viewing?
* How did "we" get so incurious that we don't even attempt to scroll down to see if there's more information to read?
I mean -seriously- the intended audience for this particular open letter is technical people.
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Oops: I posted too quickly. Updated.
Not sure you'll read this but I'd love a tagging feature for starring. Sorting on code isn't good enough.
+1
Nice to meet you Jono. I maintain a similar list, albeit a bit more focused on GHE. https://github.com/kevinSuttle/github/issues
@jono Will you be able to answer, if github has any plans in the roadmap to open source the code in 1-2 years and develop in open instead of closed rooms.
Given many open source project adopting it for their code repository its important question to be answered.
Otherwise sourceforge.net story will repeat again, this time with github. Many projects adapted it when it was closed source and then when they open source it slowly and later due to falling revenues just started crumbling.
Problem with them open sourcing their platform is that the platform base is used in enterprise and how the bulk of their revenue is made... Who wants to buy milk when the cow is being given away?
They are getting hosting deals for many of these companies themselves. Why spin up your own github clone when you can just use github?
And gitlab is now 99% feature-compatible with github. If you aren't using the developer ecosystem of github.com, you are not missing much using the free software option already.