Re: [UG-ADMINS] Re: ZendCon Panel and Next Steps

I've done a couple of sites that needed the cooperation of multiple  
non-professional groups.  You must plan for the fact that the groups  
are chaotic.  The groups persist, but the contacts for those groups  
change frequently, without notice, and almost always without any sort  
of plan for smooth transition.  They also are rarely interested in  
your problems.  Sometimes, the group entries are just abandoned, but  
there are sometimes disturbingly loud conflicts and power struggles  
over them, which have absolutely nothing to do with you or your  
purpose.  This can throw your simple contact list mechanism into  
complete chaos.

A) I know that fully automated systems are what we all desperately  
want (since our real lives always get in the way of the fun stuff),  
but it almost always results in entries that are obsolete or  
deliberately deceptive.  Requiring someone's conscious approval  
before an entry comes online is a strong deterrent to misuse and  
almost always guarantees validity coming in.  Once they are in the  
system, there is less chance that people will play games, automate  
everything you can.  If you have to automate the process of approving  
entries, make certain there is a responsive dispute mechanism so that  
dead or contested links can be pulled offline quickly.  (Case in  
point, I've been trying to get an entry corrected on PHP.net's  
calendar for three years, but I didn't submit it, he's off the grid  
now, and an update protocol is practically non-existent.)

B) Active groups are proactive about promoting their existence.  They  
won't mind responding to a periodic email asking "Are you still  
there?"  It's also easier to get them to update their info if they  
don't have to remember to visit and log in to your site on their  
own.  An authoritative email contact is mandatory, a secondary email  
contact is preferred.  Instead of an entirely login driven system,  
make use of a timed-access email-invitation system.

C) PLEASE PLEASE Make entries expire unless they are confirmed via  
the people who submitted them. Don't rely on a web page test  
mechanism - web pages can stagnate for years, transfers of authority  
and administrative access to those sites are not always seamless, and  
internal disputes within groups are not uncommon, let alone unheard  
of.  Set up plans for changing of administrative contacts, especially  
the circumstance where the original registrant drops off the face of  
the earth with no warning.  (example: if a group leaves meetup.com,  
any other meetup.com registrant can claim their name with no  
warning.  I've seen it happen with a couple of different web design  
groups in the Dallas area.)

BAD DATA IS FAR WORSE THAN MINIMAL DATA.

Tim Stiles,
Co-Organizer, DallasPHP
WatchMaker, Icomex.com



On Oct 25, 2008, at 5:16 AM, Rafael Dohms wrote:

> I have incorporated some of the suggestions given here, but i've  
> added a
> automatic layer on top of it, so that most of the time no human  
> interaction
> will be needed, but we will still have the humam factor for lat case
> scenarios, before we pull the plug.