samvara | Archive of Our Own and AD&T

I kind of fail at writing up my most recent couple of AD&T meetings, is being ridiculously busy an excuse?

These are not official communications, this is me keeping a diary and being open about what we do. People are welcome to ignore the fandom:archive and otw tag if it's not interesting to you, or to come chat about stuff if it is :)

I'm still making every other meeting since I can't quite face those Sunday 5am ones.

This week was a discussion of release 0.8.14, a short release that will contain the User Stats page and email batching - we talked about coordinating the testing and how to make it easier for the Testing team - User Stats should be OK, but hearing astolat can speed up the batching process so we don't have to wait about for them was nice :) We'll also make what small changes we can based on responses to the draft post that went up earlier and are collated on the github wiki.
852 Prospect (a Sentinel archive) is the next candidate for importing, we're looking at learning from the Smallville Slash import experience and fining up who handles which bit (Open Doors, Support and AD&T).
We're looking at Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) for the Archive and improving the metadata our pages - and building it into future page design so we do it all the time.
There's also been some discussion around minor improvements we can make to the user profile (which I'm sad to say many people do not know exists - this is my profile in case you are one of them and want to know where they hide). We're agreed to add fields to the profile so you can link to various other accounts (LJ, DW, FF.net, Tumblr etc.) and once we've figured out how to make it pretty we're thinking a Transformative Work statement that says you allow Remix/Podcast/Translation would be good too.
Operation Cobra is powering along - it's a 'clean up the google code issues' project and mostly involves looking at old issues, checking if they are still relevant, closing ones that aren't, making decisions on difficult ones and even fixing ones that are fixable!
My project is starting to develop, it's ultimately aimed at usability improvements for Challenges but right now it's me wading through all the FAQ, the Tutorials the internal docs (text also moved to github wiki which is public, have not moved images though), getting better at understanding the Challenges feature and getting to know the Docs Working Group and introducing myself to people I'd like to collaborate on this with. Feel free to volunteer by the way :) I've also been creating a Collection on the TestArchive and mapping out how it works to get a sense of it.

All in all there's a lot happening and that's just in my little part of the OTW world.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

(I hope it's okay to leave a comment here. If it's not, I'm really sorry. So if you'd prefer I could use the feedback form on AO3 and send it there.)

What I would really, really like is some way to give credit to the icon-makers who made the icons I'm currently using. Right now I've added this info to my profile page and "My Pseuds" page. (This is my profile page on AO3.)

Is there any way to follow the discussions regarding improvements to the profile page?

There is a comment line for icons which is intended for such use, but I think it's currently not getting displayed anywhere. It's on the icon edit page under the alt text field.

but I think it's currently not getting displayed anywhere
That is the problem. I have two pseuds and I have uploaded one icon per pseud. Now both icon-makers have asked that people give credit if they use their icons, so I need the credit to be visible. Thus right now I'm using my profile page and "My Pseuds" page. :)

It is totally OK and welcomed :) What I would do is pass it on via the feedback form so please send it there - then you're in the loop for responses as well :)

Anon is correct, there's a field for it called "Icon comment text" and it's hidden here: http://archiveofourown.org/users/samvara/pseuds/samvara/edit for me. I don't think that information is then displayed anywhere... planning ahead but not quite there yet methinks.

In the same way that I'm starting a project to review Challenges for ease of use, the User Profile is also due for a review - we don't have a project as such for it, but if a person was interested in starting that project they would receive love, support and enthusiasm *hints shamelessly*. They would also not be alone!

Thanks. :)

What I would do is pass it on via the feedback form so please send it there
I'll do that, thanks.

Anon is correct, there's a field for it called "Icon comment text
Yeah, I know about that. I've replied to anon's comment so, if you'd like, please read that to see why I need credit to be visible.

but if a person was interested in starting that project they would receive love, support and enthusiasm *hints shamelessly*.
Are you asking me? Haha. If you are, I'm not sure how I can help. I'm just your average AO3 account holder.

Hurrah! And thank you, feedback is one of the ways we work out what needs to be fixed or rebuilt and how urgent it is.

Are you asking me? Haha. If you are, I'm not sure how I can help. I'm just your average AO3 account holder.

Our average AO3 account holders tend to be passionate, creative and not unfamiliar with remix ;)

It depends on what you want to do... if you want to think about where that icon comment text should be displayed, and maybe what it might look like and share it with me (as a representative of AD&T), that's wot we in the biz call 'design work.' It is useful and we can take that and use it.

The sophisticated and highly complex output of THAT process is you maybe taking a screen shot of the page you want the icon comment info to show on, and drawing a big red arrow of where you want it to display. If you're feeling super enthusiastic, you could write some text that says 'I think it should go here because that's where I think people would look for it, it's where *I* look for it."

I do a lot of my design work using the Print Scrn button, MS Paint, little notes in garish colours and giant arrows.

Think of it as fan art or a remix of the existing profile page :)

As a larger project, looking at the User Profile as a whole is exactly the same thing except with more pictures and text. Do I like how my profile looks? Can I get to it easily? Does it display information I like? What is it missing? What would be really cool to have? How come [this other site] has this thingie and we don't?

...I'm just making these questions up as I go by the way, there's no sekrit society that produces them, doesn't tell you and then judges you. If you were interested in this kind of project I'd probably get you access to our coder chat room so you can hang out, meet people, ask questions and bounce ideas around - it's more fun that way!

Here's an example of a brand new design doc for an entire new feature.

Anyway, I've rambled on rather a lot here. It's your call, it's meant to be fun so if it's not your cup of tea, or not your cup of tea right now than no pressure :)

Sorry, sorry, I meant to reply sooner. I've sent the feedback/suggestion.

Actually, I'm a former tag wrangler. I had quit because I needed to focus on RL. My situation hasn't changed so I can't volunteer. I'm sorry, and thanks for the explanation.

*beams* thank you for the feedback sending and good luck with RL :)

Thank you. :)

So happy you're thinking about Challenges! And everything else, of course, but... \0/ (I totally volunteer, but I suppose we will talk internally!)

Starting to think about it! And I would love to hear your thoughts :)

No specific ideas, just a strong desire to have proper documentation! :P

I am *so* with you on that

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