DeveloperCommunication

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Keeping the project transparent
List of Mailing lists

Keeping the project transparent

The Ubuntu Contributor team has grown a lot since warty and it's almost impossible to keep on top of everything that's happening. Therefore it's important that if you plan big changes (in terms of its impact on other packages and contributors and users), that you let the appropriate people know to avoid surprises, breakage, doubled efforts or anything else we don't want. Smile :-)

Things that are worth an announcement

Events: if you plan an event that affects contributors, you want to let them know well in advance about it.
Processes and Procedures: if they change, make it known well before-hand to avoid surprises. (For development-related processes, ubuntu-devel-announce is the best place.)
Announce changes in core teams, like the release team, archive admins, MIR team, etc. so people know who to talk to. If you're going to lead a team, introduce yourselves and your ideas. A quick introduction and some reasoning for the change will give more insight into the reason of the change and how the team works.
Elections / Nominations. Make sure everybody knows.
If you merge big changes (be it from Upstream or from Debian) that affect a lot of other packages.
Huge UI related changes might be important to the Docs team, users and other depending packages.
UDS and Meeting outcomes. Even if it's a quick summary, it'll help to keep everybody updated.
Big package transitions, their impact and suggested fixes. (Make sure the changes are well documented and well explained. Update UbuntuPackagingChanges)
New Release announce!

How

Be elaborate, explain in detail.
Check dates and times twice.
Be sure to document big changes appropriately in UbuntuPackagingChanges.
Explain the impact for users and developers.
Every developer can be expected to read the ubuntu-devel-announce@ list. If your announcement is important enough, send it there.
If you are unsure which list to send your mail to, have a look at the list below.
A good way to reach interested parties that are not part of the core set of developers, you might want to consider blogs, microblogs and other media. CommunityTeam/KnowledgeBase has some information on building buzz around intiativies and efforts.

Tips about email syntax

Use a revealing Subject: line to make the announcement easily findable.
Wrap the lines at 72 chars. It really makes a difference for people reading it.
The first paragraph should be a good summary of the content of the email.
When including URLs, include them indented and on their own line.
If there is actually a set of steps or things to do, outline it as a set of bullet points.