On Wed, 2006-11-29 at 00:43 +0100, Norbert Hartl wrote:
> On Wed, 2006-11-15 at 15:25 -0600, Ken Causey wrote:
> > We now have 342 users registered at
> > 
> > http://people.squeakfoundation.org
> > 
> > of those 68 have never been certified by anyone and I suspect a large
> > number of those are invalid/non-Squeak community accounts.
> > 
> 
> Hi, 
> 
> I spent a little time the last week looking at people.squeakfoundation.
> I'm a developer which has now about 12 years of experience in 
> programming. I'm monitoring squeak since 1998. And now I got the
> chance to do a real project with squeak, seaside,....
> 
> My experience with people.squeakfoundation is the following. I
> don't remember when I signed up.

You signed up on the 18th which you can tell from the entry in the
Recent People Joining list (as long as it remains in the list of course:

18 Nov 2006 noha 

> Signing up is exciting every
> time you do because you like to be a part of it.
> But in my opinion people.squeakfoundation is very frustrating
> at first place. You can sign up easily but then you are stuck.
> You can do nothing being an Observer. Why should I come back?
> I recognized this reading your article complaining about the actual
> status of the site. Being an Observer I couldn't post an answer
> to your article. Why should I use the side? Should I come back
> every week looking if someone was willing to raise my status? But
> then I write down which projects I like while I'm not able to 
> click on the projects as you suppose being an Observer.

OK, first of all, I won't deny that there is little immediate
gratification.  I think you've noticed that you can at least use the
diary (since you added an entry, blank though it is) immediately.  To a
large extent you have to be patient.  Not a lot of us are actively
watching for new people and certifying.  On that note though I
distinctly remember going through the list since the eighteenth and
while I can't specifically remember looking at your entry, if I missed
it it was accidental.  Also, if you had the information then that you
have now I would certainly have given you Apprentice status (which I
have now done).  If you did then I have to apologize for missing you
somehow.  Also it's probably been nearly a week since I last checked.

> You wrote about the misuse of the login name. But then why is 
> there a choice for the username? Wouldn't it be feasible to 
> use the combination FirstnameLastname as login account? For
> me I find your critics right but I can't change my username
> to something more known (ok I'm still unknown :) ). I think the
> only thing people know is the email address and possibly the
> real name of other people. This is my guess thinking that most
> of the people know each other from the mailing list.
>
> I think there is more to fix then the usage of the users.

I certainly won't deny that there is a LOT that could be better about
people.squeakfoundation.org.  You're not going to find me (or the person
who originally set it up) defending it as the be-all end-all of social
sites.  This site is more or less a quick setup of the Advogato system
(an old Apache 1.x module VirguleDb written in of course C).  Since it
is C most of us cringe when we thing about modifying it.   A Squeak
based replacement has certainly been discussed.  But the reality around
here is that there are always more ideas than time.  So in practice we
just do the best we can with what we have and try to prioritize.  I
can't say that an improved system is a terribly high priority at this
time.

As far as the issue of your username.  If you really wish to have it
changed let me know to what you would like it changed and I will see
what I can do.

> My two cents,
> 
> Norbert

Thanks,

Ken

P.S. Certification updates are done by a cronjob and so don't occur
immediately.  If you check it and are still an Observer, be patient and
check back again later.
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