What could be done to improve the OM development process?

[Carsten Haitzler (The Rasterman)]

On Thu, 14 Aug 2008 00:29:44 +0100 tim <tim at timwise.co.uk> babbled:

> An idea I came across recently that seems like a good idea is a hybrid 
> approach, where the devs passively observe /all/ traffic from users 
> (irc, mailing lists, support mailboxes, bug trackers etc), and can pick 
> out bits that are useful, and then there are additional people paid to 
> respond to all the rtfm type questions. That way you get the best of 
> both worlds. The techies don't have the most valuable information lost 
> in translation, and the more demanding users get the support they desire 
> without wasting valuable coding time.

i've been doing this for a decade... sit on irc - watch mostly passively what
the major bitching/complaining seems to be. watch email - and just scan most
mail so you know what the major issues seem to be. a lot are RTFM-like. ignore
those (except the first few times you see them - let community repeat what you
said earlier for you). watch bug tickets and at lest get a gist for that's up
at the moment. respond to things you directly know about and can do something
about (or know you can't), and from that snarf a TODO list. generally this
should keep you busy 24/7 given a large enough project :)

-- 
Carsten Haitzler (The Rasterman) <raster at openmoko.org>