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Suggestion Name: Development progress

 

Suggestion Description:

Let the community in on the current development progress! What I mean by that, is that you should make a pinned topic, or something along those lines, where you give us a clear overview on how the development of the mod is going. I know we have a forum section where you can read through numerous of accepted or rejected suggestions, but there are a lot of the same suggestions with small variations, and overall slightly messy. (In my opinion). 

In the topic or post or whatever is chosen, I suggest you put a list of features you are planning on implementing, and maybe even give a percentage next to each feature to show what's being worked on, and how far it's come. 

 

Any example images:
This is an example from the old forums, which in my opinion was great to have.

I2dONz7.jpg

Why should it be added?

Mainly to give the community something to keep an eye on. First of all, I think this will prevent a lot of already accepted suggestions to be made twice, considering they will have a well structured overview of what is to come. Personally I love to watch how the mod is developing, and will also stop people from complaining about something that is known, and being worked on. Also, as a side note, when a new update is released, it would be great to know what had actually been done, as "Fixed bugs" is not really informative. Even though bugs have been fixed, it would be nice to know which bugs have been fixed. Let me know what you guys think!

Thanks for reading!

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Assuming the devs work with sprints (or milestones), maybe it is possible to add a (readonly) guest user which can only view the issues attached to upcoming release(s).

I think indeed that it will prevent duplicate suggestions.

 

On the other hand it appears that a small portion of the forum visiters have a hard time using the search feature. Maybe it is not big enough or too complicated. I don't know..

510 Horses and one lucky bird at work


Simulators: Prepar3d V4, X-Plane 11, DCS 1.5 + 2.x, ETS2, ATS, Farming Simulator 17, Omsi 1 + 2

System: Intel i7-6700K @ 4700Mhz, 32GB DDR4 Corsair Vengeance LPX, GTX970,  HP LP2475w monitor (1920x1200)
Devices: Logitech G27, SKRS Shifter, CH Products Throttle Quadrant, Trustmaster Hotas Joystick, TrackIR
Storage: 2 x SM961 - 250GB (raid 0), Samsung 850 pro 1TB disk, Samsung 850 EVO 2TB disk.

 

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I'm not really sure if I understood your post. What do you mean by adding a readonly guest user?

There are a lot of issue trackers that provide readonly (view) guest rights to view the workitems (tasks, issues, bugs, etc).

For instance Microsoft provides with Visual Studio Online a free (for up to 5 developers) environment which both support Team Foundation Server or git. But as it support unlimited stakeholders, they can create a 'community' stakeholder account that can only view work items. Github provides similar features, but does provide a fee (code) repository for closed source projects, but BitBucket does.

 

 

 

As for the search function, I do believe it works alright, yet it does get bugged at times. 

You might want to check many suggestions are create in duplicate. So clearly the search function is too complicated to use..

510 Horses and one lucky bird at work


Simulators: Prepar3d V4, X-Plane 11, DCS 1.5 + 2.x, ETS2, ATS, Farming Simulator 17, Omsi 1 + 2

System: Intel i7-6700K @ 4700Mhz, 32GB DDR4 Corsair Vengeance LPX, GTX970,  HP LP2475w monitor (1920x1200)
Devices: Logitech G27, SKRS Shifter, CH Products Throttle Quadrant, Trustmaster Hotas Joystick, TrackIR
Storage: 2 x SM961 - 250GB (raid 0), Samsung 850 pro 1TB disk, Samsung 850 EVO 2TB disk.

 

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There are a lot of issue trackers that provide readonly (view) guest rights to view the workitems (tasks, issues, bugs, etc).

For instance Microsoft provides with Visual Studio Online a free (for up to 5 developers) environment which both support Team Foundation Server or git. But as it support unlimited stakeholders, they can create a 'community' stakeholder account that can only view work items. Github provides similar features, but does provide a fee (code) repository for closed source projects, but BitBucket does.

 

You might want to check many suggestions are create in duplicate. So clearly the search function is too complicated to use..

Aah, now I get what you're saying. I do think it may be easier to just create a regular topic that can be pinned and edited, as thing progresses though. If I understood properly, you're suggesting using a third party service to do this, which is fine, but then I think it should somehow be integrated to the forums, where most users will see it. (If that's even possible. I'm not going to pretend that I know what I'm talking about here  :P )

I do realise that many suggestions are duplicated, as mentioned in my original post, I just don't think the search function itself is the problem. The problem is the people not using it. They just glance across recent topics, and if nothing looks similar, post a topic. Ofcourse, I'm sure also the search function could be improved, but not really sure what should be changed.

 

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The devs need a priority list anyways to know what they're working on and in what order. Issue trackers were designed for this task. With the rise of open source software mid 90s there was also a need to have an 'open' website where people could check on progress. It's very hard to indicate progress of a certain work item in a forum. Once a suggestion is accepted, it is now send to the devs. Currently It probably ends up in a private issue tracker. Now the team member that accepts the suggestion, bug report, etc can add a link to the issue.. Whether the bug tracker is hosted by ets2mp self or they use a (free) service doesn't really matter.. 

 

 

 

 I just don't think the search function itself is the problem. The problem is the people not using it. They just glance across recent topics, and if nothing looks similar, post a topic. 

Hence my remark that people have troubles using the search function. Maybe the forum moderators should issue warnings to people that create a new suggestion topic which is still open or recently closed.

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510 Horses and one lucky bird at work


Simulators: Prepar3d V4, X-Plane 11, DCS 1.5 + 2.x, ETS2, ATS, Farming Simulator 17, Omsi 1 + 2

System: Intel i7-6700K @ 4700Mhz, 32GB DDR4 Corsair Vengeance LPX, GTX970,  HP LP2475w monitor (1920x1200)
Devices: Logitech G27, SKRS Shifter, CH Products Throttle Quadrant, Trustmaster Hotas Joystick, TrackIR
Storage: 2 x SM961 - 250GB (raid 0), Samsung 850 pro 1TB disk, Samsung 850 EVO 2TB disk.

 

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Sorry for not replying, was a tad busy. I do agree however. If issue trackers is the best way to go, then I'm all for it. 

 

It's very hard to indicate progress of a certain work item in a forum. 

Is it though? I guess it depends on what specifically we're talking about. As for the developer himself, I'm sure that the issue trackers is far more convenient, and all in all smarter and better to use, no doubt. What the post would contain in the forum is basically a "todo-list", where people can read about what's planned further down the road. In this list, I would agree it would be tedious to have every single small bug in it, as that would probably also make an enourmous list. For that, the issue trackers would be much better. But to get back to the list on the forum, I'm thinking they can add all the major features they are planning. Such as synchronized weather, railroad crossings, and construction work lights. It would also contain the newly announced admin policecar, as well as the double trailers, and an estimate of how much of the beforementioned is completed. 

I hope that was understandable, as I had some trouble finding the right words  :lol:

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What do you think, he Is Doing that:

 

What about multiplayer?

We still try to implement quite interesting features, which will improve the gameplay, will bring new experiences. 

 

One of such features is a police car, which is being made from scratch by one of our admins - szeryf. 

 

post-9-0-70421800-1430431721_thumb.jpg  post-9-0-39423800-1430431722_thumb.jpg

 

At the beginning of tests it will be available only for administrators, but after a certain period of time it will be available for you as well. When will it happen? Nobody knows yet.

Tag Line: Want to Have fun, join Trucking World at ETS2, ATS and TruckersMP.

 

Respected Member of the Arab Community and TMP
Former: Forum Moderator, Support Team & Game Moderator

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I am aware of that post, and if you read mine, you would see that what I'm suggesting is not the same. My suggestion is to make a topic, sort of like RootKiller did (picture in my first post), that is continuously updated when progress is made, when new features is planned, or even when previously planned features get scrapped. While that post (mwl4's "It's been a year" post) did contain news, (which is great) I'm still missing a place to go to, that shows us currently how things are moving along. For instance, it's been a long time since we heard anything about weather synchronization. Is it still being worked on? Did they scrap that plan? Is it low priority? Such information would be nice to have, and that is what I'm suggesting should be made official.

I hope that cleared it up :)

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Is it though? I guess it depends on what specifically we're talking about. 

Hard as in almost impossible to maintain the current status of each bug/suggestion on the forum accurate. Let's look at a life cycle of a work item (todo item, bug, task, wish, etc). First the work item is accepted on the forum and the work item is send to the developers. This is where usually updates about progress end up till the point a new ets2mp version is released and in the changelog is specified that certain work items are resolved. But the fact that a work item is accepted, does not mean development on the work item start right away.. But at some point they start development on the work item and when the item is finished it will be tested. I don't know is the ets2mp plugin supports all the languages that ETS2 does. So after the code is finished, translations are needed. The code needs to be tested and at some point it will be assigned to a release. Sometimes work items are held back because they're part of a larger group of related work items. Only after a work item is released into production the developers are 'done' and the issue can be closed. 

 

As the developers work on multiple issues you can imagine that it is very feasible that updates are not send back to the forum topic.  

 

What the post would contain in the forum is basically a "todo-list"

That is not always possible. As far as I know, there is currently one developer, so I don't think that issue/patch management is at the top of his list. However, priorities change all the time. That is why agile development methods became very popular as they make it easier to roll with the changes. 

 

In this list, I would agree it would be tedious to have every single small bug in it, as that would probably also make an enourmous list. For that, the issue trackers would be much better. But to get back to the list on the forum, I'm thinking they can add all the major features they are planning. 

So, now we are updating half of the issues on the forum. You can't do things half way. Once the ets2mp team decides to report progress on work items, you should either report everything or none. Because every suggestion or reported bug is important to someone, otherwise the topic wouldn't be created in the first place. To know what features they're planning in the feature, I suggest you check the 'accepted suggestion' sub-forum.

 

Point is that updating both a issue tracker (the devs need to know what the status is of each issue internally) and on the forum is double work. As mwl4 is doing pretty much al the coding, he can spend his time better than constantly updating forum posts..

510 Horses and one lucky bird at work


Simulators: Prepar3d V4, X-Plane 11, DCS 1.5 + 2.x, ETS2, ATS, Farming Simulator 17, Omsi 1 + 2

System: Intel i7-6700K @ 4700Mhz, 32GB DDR4 Corsair Vengeance LPX, GTX970,  HP LP2475w monitor (1920x1200)
Devices: Logitech G27, SKRS Shifter, CH Products Throttle Quadrant, Trustmaster Hotas Joystick, TrackIR
Storage: 2 x SM961 - 250GB (raid 0), Samsung 850 pro 1TB disk, Samsung 850 EVO 2TB disk.

 

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Well, I can't really argue with that. I truly agree with basically everything you said, and I'll admit that I may not have thought the whole process through. Let's say then, that we are using the issue tracker for everything, and leave my suggestion of a topic on the forum, would you say that makes more sense? I also realised, now that you have elaborated so much, I think I thoroughly understand your very first post. 

 

Assuming the devs work with sprints (or milestones), maybe it is possible to add a (readonly) guest user which can only view the issues attached to upcoming release(s).

I think indeed that it will prevent duplicate suggestions.

And I must say that I do agree with this. At least this way we will be able to peek a bit under the hood. 
 

 

 As mwl4 is doing pretty much al the coding, he can spend his time better than constantly updating forum posts..

I totally agree with this, but do you think he is the only one who can keep the community updated? Isn't this where the community manager or project manager comes in? I'm now assuming that more people than mwl4 has knowledge of how the mod is progressing, as I believe the ets2mp team communicates internally and discusses the different issues that comes along. My point is that I never meant for mwl4 himself to keep updating posts, but rather someone who is capable of the same. The development itself is ofcourse always the most important thing, but I'd believe that keeping the community up to date, won't affect the development much. 

 

So, now we are updating half of the issues on the forum. You can't do things half way. Once the ets2mp team decides to report progress on work items, you should either report everything or none. Because every suggestion or reported bug is important to someone, otherwise the topic wouldn't be created in the first place.

While I agree with this, I can't really see the problem. There will always be someone who is left out in one way or another. If we were to have a forum post including "half of the issues", it would be the issues that is important to the majority of the community. The so to speak "big" features. I'll refer to my first post and how RootKiller decided to do it. He put up the features that, in his opinion, was the most important ones. Then he crossed them out eventually as they were implemented. While your exact feature is not on the list that were to be made, it would still be more than nothing. And something is always better than nothing in my opinion.

My arguments may not be as good as yours, I'll admit, I'm just curious on what's coming. I also admire your way of discussing this, politely and thorough, and very well written, so I thank you for that! :)

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I totally agree with this, but do you think he is the only one who can keep the community updated? Isn't this where the community manager or project manager comes in?

To a certain degree yes, I think that the project managers more or less know what issues mwl4 has worked on. While ideally the project manager know exact what the status is of every work item. In reality this is not always the case. 

 

That is why project managers (and other stakeholders) have an important role in the SCRUM development method. Developers in general have a hard time communicating what they're working on. Those talks are the 'How are you?" conversations at birthdays. Pretty much everybody says, "Yeah, I'm great" and than the conversation ends. That is mainly because developers and project managers have different meanings of the word 'problem'. Ask any developer if he experiencing any problems any 99% of the time (s)he will reply "nope, no problems". Developers don't have problems, they see challenges. That is why the daily scrum is a good tool to ensure better communication and consist of three questions:

  1. What have you done yesterday?
  2. Did you experience any delays?
  3. What are you going to work on today?

The second question is the most important for project managers. Delays are what 'normal' people can 'problems'. 

 

Another benefit of a (partially) public issue tracker is that is easy to create a changelog by just querying all items related to a release. 

The thing is that there are nor unimportant issues. In fact, a bug who is preventing someone to play ETS2MP can be considered more important that let's say a speed limiter modification. 

That one player can just track a single work item (and maybe even involved at some time in the testing phase), while others might want to track the status of future development like support for weather sync or VTC support.

 

Another benefit of using a public issue tracker is people have a better understanding how much work items is done in a release. 

510 Horses and one lucky bird at work


Simulators: Prepar3d V4, X-Plane 11, DCS 1.5 + 2.x, ETS2, ATS, Farming Simulator 17, Omsi 1 + 2

System: Intel i7-6700K @ 4700Mhz, 32GB DDR4 Corsair Vengeance LPX, GTX970,  HP LP2475w monitor (1920x1200)
Devices: Logitech G27, SKRS Shifter, CH Products Throttle Quadrant, Trustmaster Hotas Joystick, TrackIR
Storage: 2 x SM961 - 250GB (raid 0), Samsung 850 pro 1TB disk, Samsung 850 EVO 2TB disk.

 

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You're bringing a lot of things on the table that I have never even heard about, nor thought about. I wouldn't be able to tell you how the developers are communicating with the other team members, nor a better way of doing so. I looked briefly at your link on SCRUM, and I'll agree that it sounds like a good way to communicate. As you say, this will give the project manager what he/she needs to know. 

 

It seems like our common conclusion here is that a public issue tracker is the way to go. I can't disagree with what you're saying, and it seems like this solution would make most people happy. It would also cover all the issues, so no one feels left out, and they can track what is important to them. Your final statement is very true. If people were to see just how much work has been put into a new update, maybe there would be less complaining about things that didn't make it into given update. There is a lot of complaining going around on the forums, that I think can be handled by giving the community more information. Less complaining equals a more thriving environment for the community, the moderators, the different managers, and last but not least, the developer(s). 

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