Re: [xwiki-devs] [Proposal] Do not write pure-developer release notes

On 25 Jan 2019, at 09:31, Vincent Massol <vincent(a)massol.net> wrote: Hi devs, Context ======= It’s been since we’ve deviated from the original purpose of the Release Notes by also adding developer-oriented release notes. The goal of the Release Notes was to **highlight** important novelties for our **users**, because looking at the JIRA list is too technical (otherwise we could simply use the Release feature of JIRA! :)). So you may ask why we do have a “Developer” Category in the RN app. These were not for pure developers but for XWiki users who are more advanced and can write scripts in wiki pages. And when it’s the case we **must** add examples, otherwise, it’s completely useless. For example this morning I saw this RN added: https://www.xwiki.org/xwiki/bin/view/ReleaseNotes/Data/XWiki/11.0/Change004/ This is typically something that has very little value to me: * It’s for pure developers (java devs) * It’s not understandable by anyone except the person who coded it or participated to the dev mailing list discussion about it * It doesn’t say more than what’s in the JIRA issue so what’s the point? * There are no examples at all in it! * Real developers can simply look at the reference documentation or can read the JIRAs. We always link the JIRA issues in the RN anyway (it was for this reason that we’re listing them). * It takes time to write RN items and thus it needs to have high value Proposal ======== * Go back to the original idea and only list developer RN items when they are for scripting users and not APIs. For example, document some new script service or some additions to existing script services. Of course Groovy would allow you to call any API so being able to use it from Groovy is not a good criteria. I’d say that the criteria should be whether the Release Note Change is useful for Velocity users. * Rename “Developers” into “Scripters” or or “Advanced Users” (any better name?) * Always put an example when writing a “developer” change and take the time to explain properly what it’s about. WDYT? Thanks -Vincent