User group meeting & agenda 2 December 2008

Proposing ideas for this agenda
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Administrative items

 * 1) Assignment of time keeper and note taker
 * 2) Introduction of new members: 10 seconds for name and desired takeaways.
 * 3) Prayer --
 * 4) Review of Minutes
 * 5) Today's agenda preview

Information items

 * 1) Current functionality is being tested regarding the way e-mail notifications work. We're testing to see how the system works now, whether it works according to current settings or is buggy, and how we might want to change settings in the future. A discussion on the topic in the forums can be found here. (Kip)
 * 2) Status of the "Secure/insecure" popup bug. (Chris or Jim)

Carryover from Previous Meetings

 * 1) Some guidelines about addition of religious images have been added to FamilySearch Wiki:Image use. (Michael Ritchey)
 * 2) Now that the forums are hosted on the Amazon EC2 cloud, the new address is http://forums.familysearchsupport.org/ Mollie has fixed the link on the wiki's navigation bar. Some user group agendas and minutes link to forum posts that discuss the issues raised in user group. Are those all fixed, or would someone like to go in and change those links on the agenda pages?

Minutes
Facilitator was Michael Ritchey, Note taker was Jimmy Parker, Time keeper was [noone appointed].

Prayer by Michael Ritchey.

This week, there are now 5,719 registered users of the FamilySearch Wiki. That is an increase of 77 new registered users over last week's figure of 5,642.

Attendees
Michael Ritchey, Anne Roach, James Anderson, Stephen Bobowski, Baerbel Johnson, Jim Greene, Jimmy Parker, Joan Healey, Kep Enger, David Crowther, Diane Loosle.

Remote Attendees
(Anne Roach), (Michael Ritchey), (Mollie), Francisco Javier, Thomas Lerman, Sister Edward

Items Discussed
Information Items:


 * The functionality of the system is now being tested by a dedicated tester. The team has recently obtained the services of an individual whose main assignment is to run tests on the system.
 * The Secure/Insecure popup seems to have been fixed.

Carryover and New Items:


 * Some guidelines for adding "Religious Images" to pages have been added to the page entitled "Policy:Image Approval Policies." Most of what has been added deals with religious images, such as pictures of temples and the appropriate use of those images. Reaction from the users group is being sought. It was suggested that perhaps some positive examples of the appropriate use of religious images in the Wiki could be included.
 * A user has placed a biographical sketch of an ancestor on the Research Wiki for "Gottfried reinholt." This led to a discussion about how to handle the adding of material outside the intended scope of the Research Wiki. What do we do about such material? Do we leave the article on and add a flag to the article that says it will be removed? Or do we add the comments about why the article is being removed in the "Discussion Page"? Or do we remove the article and email the contributor that it has been removed. Some contributors have not verified their email nor do the uave a User Page, which makes it very difficult to communicate with them. The initial feeling of the Users Group was to leave a non-offensive article on the Wiki for a short period of time with a notice that it does not belong on this particular Wiki and then remove it. If an article is added with inappropriate content (meaning sexually explicit or other patently offensive material, it will be removed immediately.


 * Personally, I would not call this a biographical sketch, but rather giving information and requesting help. Thomas Lerman 18:17, 3 December 2008 (UTC)


 * The above question led to a discussion of what kind of flags should be used for problem articles. How many choices of flags for articles should be allowed? And where should they be placed? Examples of flags were discussed from such sites as KSL.com, Wikia.com and others.


 * Another example is CraigsList. Thomas Lerman 18:17, 3 December 2008 (UTC)


 * A question was added about creating a FamilySearch toolbar, like the Yahoo or Google ones, that could be downloaded by a user as their default toolbar. While the idea was met with some enthusiasm, it is low on the priority list for now, but something to be considered for the future. If someone outside of the administrative team wanted to engineer such a toolbar and present it for approval, that would be encouraged.


 * Also, Google Gadgets. It would be best to discuss the look and functionality in the forums. Thomas Lerman 18:17, 3 December 2008 (UTC)


 * Ideas concerning the functionality of the system should be presented on the Wiki Feedback Forum where they can be discussed and thoroughly vetted.
 * The new URL address for the forums have been added to the agenda (see above). The old instance of the forums should have now been shut off completely.


 * The "new" URL has always been working and was just redirecting to the "old". I have put suggestions in the Forum. Thomas Lerman 18:18, 3 December 2008 (UTC)

Action Items

 * For next week's meeting, a demonstration on how to flag and article and how to explain why that page was flagged will be made.
 * For next week's meeting, good and bad examples of the use of religious images could be presented.