Wikimedia Apps/imported/Retrospective-September 18 2014

Previous Retrospective Actions

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  • Set up quarterly "unstructured sprint" [Kristen/Dan] not urgent, will carry over. Quarterly planning sprint may be our unstructured sprint :-)
  • Give Vibha & Moiz iTunes account login access [Tomasz]; Waiting on Design iTunes account [Vibha] DONE
  • Give Vibha & Moiz access to data about user actions [Dan] OBSOLETE
  • Set up monthly apps data review meeting [Dan/Vibha] will be resch'ed
  • Blog post and social media to recruit testers [Monte/Vibha/Moiz/Dmitry]
  • Explore paid testing services [Tomasz] to be continued
    • we will also likely be getting 1 FTE QA tester within a month
    • what will iOS/Android split look like? TBD


Worked Well

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  • Nearby feature completed+1
  • Beta/prod releases of Android app continue to be painless
  • Android Alpha self-update notification http://tools.wmflabs.org/wikipedia-android-builds/ Instructions on how to use the testing stuff for Android: https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Wikipedia_app+1
  • iOS 8 fix sprint got a lot of stuff done
  • Team flexibility about dropping all our work to do iOS 8 compatibility fixes+1
  • Hijacking app release notes to recruit beta testers!+1
    • 20 -> 160 testers!!
    • we will switch to official open beta channel when available
  • 3.5 stars
  • Dan's hacking on the Android code base+1+1
  • Starting bimontly guerilla research

Worked Poorly

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  • iOS 8 fix sprint delayed other stuff
  • god damn Apple took forever to get that update out and now is sitting on the next one. Grr! +1
  • Lack of certainty about access to analytics -- led to unnecessary work (session eventlogging)+1+1+1+1
    • Had a story about logging a normal user session
    • implemented with eventlogging, but this info is available via Analytics, duplication of effort
    • don't think this will happen again with Analytics; Toby is aware of issues with getting access
    • issues around mobile/analytics have been clarified
    • Maryana is mobile single point of contact/Dario is analytics single point of contact
  • Activity based work must be limited, we need to switch to goal based models
  • If mockups exist please link to them from the Trello cards. That should happen BEFORE we estimate the card, not after I'm halfway done with implementation.+1+1+1
    • Bernd learned that there was a design available after he already implmented the card
    • there is a board with 'latest designs', but it's a big board
    • make sure we link to design board from actual task
    • Design review meeting: invite all, move a little earlier? [Dan]
  • Short-term cancellation of meetings is pretty annoying. Don't wait until last second to move it.
  • Need more Android-specific designs. I know there is a tendency to apply a one-fits all design for all platforms but it may not always be appropriate. +1+1+1+1+1
    • specifically ToC
    • Dan and Vibha agree
    • second design iteration worked
    • create designs fro both platforms (even if one is not goign to work on it) [Vibha]
  • Copy and pasting retrospective notes changes the font. :(
  • Feedback from extra beta testers through TestFlight now means we have one too many feedback channels (ship it to OTRS!)+1+1
    • Can we get feedback from testflight -> OTRS? [MONTE/DAN]
    • If not, we need to figure out how to handle the channels
  • Violating apple's/Testflight's ToS :) (whoops!)
  • Delay before we learn about how users are behaving+1
    • does anyone care about the numbers after we release stuff?
    • need a single page to get these numbers easily, resistance from analytics
    • or we need to get more resources
    • get clarification from Howie about how we operate [Vibha]
  • Things sititng in beta without concrete plan +1+1+1
    • things that are almost there, but we lose track of them (eg disambiguation)
    • need to keep better track of this
    • what does it take to get something to production?
    • what does Dan need to verify readiness?
    • software testing AND usability testing (separate issue, QA can help!)
    • let's meet to come up with a plan to tackle this problem/figure out our team practices [Kristen]

Confuses Us

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  • How do we collect/review suggestions and issues from reviews and beta feedback?
  • What else might Google want, in terms of improving the app in order to be Featured? (I guess better tablet specific design)
  • Apple
  • When are we getting back to goal based work
  • IOS developer