[RFC] Git User's Survey 2007

[RFC] Git User's Survey 2007

[Jakub Narebski]

It's been more than a year since last Git User's Survey. It would be
interesting to find what changed since then. Therefore the idea to
have another survey.

First there is a question about the form of survey. Should we use web
based survey, as the survey before (http://www.survey.net.nz), sending
emails with link to this survey, or perhaps do email based survey,
with email Reply-To: address put for this survey alone?

Second, what questions should be put in the survey, and in the case of
single choice and ultiple choice questions what possible answers
should be? Below are slightly extended questions from the last
survey. Please comment on it.

Third, where to send survey to? I was thinking about git mailing list,
LKML, and mailing list for git projects found on GitProjects page on
GIT wiki. Do you want to add some address? Or should info about GIT
User's Survey 2007 be sent also to one of on-line magazines like
LinuxToday, or asked to put on some blog?

References:
  http://marc.info/?l=git&m=115116592330648&w=2
  http://marc.info/?l=git&m=115364303813936&w=2
  http://git.or.cz/gitwiki/GitSurvey

----
About you

    1. What country are you in?
    2. What is your preferred non-programming language?
    3. Which programming languages you are proficient with?
       (zero or more: multiple choice)
    -  C, shell, Perl, Python, Tcl/Tk

Getting started with GIT

    1. How did you hear about GIT?
    2. Did you find GIT easy to learn?
    -  very easy/easy/reasonably/hard/very hard
    3. What helped you most in learning to use it?
    4. What did you find hardest?
    5. When did you start using git? From which version?

How you use GIT

    1. Do you use GIT for work, unpaid projects, or both?
       work/unpaid projects/work
    2. How do you obtain GIT?  Source tarball, binary package, or
       pull the main repository?
    -  binary package/source tarball/pull from main repository
    3. What hardware platforms do you use GIT on?
    *  examples: i386, x86_64, ARM, PowerPC, Alpha, g5, ...
    4. What OS (please include the version) do you use GIT on?
    *  examples: Linux, MS Windows (Cygwin/MinGW/gitbox), 
       IRIX, HP-UX, Solaris, FreeBSD, ...
       (please give kernel version and distribution for Linux)
    5. How many people do you collaborate with using GIT?
    6. How big are the repositories that you work on? (e.g. how many
       files, how much disk space, how deep is the history?)
    *  number of files in repository: "git ls-tree -r HEAD | wc -l"
    *  pack size of freshly cloned fully packed repository
    *  number of commits in straight line, number of commits in branch
       ("git rev-list --first-parent HEAD | wc -l", 
        "git rev-list HEAD | wc -l")
    7. How many different projects do you manage using GIT?
    8. Which porcelains do you use?
       (zero or more: multiple choice)
    -  core-git, cogito, StGIT, pg, guilt, other
    9. Which git GUI do you use
       (zero or more: multiple choice)
    -  gitk, git-gui, qgit, gitview, giggle, other
   10. Which git web interface do you use for your projects?
    -  gitweb/cgit/wit (Ruby)/git-php/other
   11. How do you publish/propagate your changes?
       (zero or more: multiple choice)
    -  push, pull request, format-patch + email, bundle, other
   12. Does git.git repository include code produced by you?
    -  yes/no

Internationalization
    1. Is translating GIT required for wider adoption?
    -  yes/no/somewhat
    2. What do you need translated?
       (zero or more: multiple choice)
    -  GUI (git-gui, gitk, qgit, ...), git-core messages,
        manpages, other documentation
    3. For what language do you need translation for?

What you think of GIT

    1. Overall, how happy are you with GIT?
    -  unhappy/not so happy/happy/very happy/completely extatic
    2. How does GIT compare to other SCM tools you have used?
    -  worse/equal (or comparable)/better
    3. What do you like about using GIT?
    4. What would you most like to see improved about GIT?
       (features, bugs, plugins, documentation, ...)
    5. If you want to see GIT more widely used, what do you
       think we could do to make this happen?

Documentation

    1. Do you use the GIT wiki?
    -  yes/no
    2. Do you find GIT wiki useful?
    -  yes/no/somewhat
    3. Do you contribute to GIT wiki?
    -  yes/no/only corrections or spam removal
    4. Do you find GIT's online help (homepage, documentation) useful?
    -  yes/no/somewhat
    5. Do you find help distributed with GIT useful
       (manpages, manual, tutorial, HOWTO, release notes)?
    -  yes/no/somewhat
    6. Do you contribute to GIT documentation?
    -  yes/no
    7. What is your favourite user documentation for any software
       projects or products you have used?
    8. What could be improved on the GIT homepage?

Getting help, staying in touch

    1. Have you tried to get GIT help from other people?
    -  yes/no
    2. If yes, did you get these problems resolved quickly
       and to your liking?
    -  yes/no
    3. Do you subscribe to the mailing list?
    -  yes/no
    4. Do you read the mailing list? What method do you use?
    -  subscribed/news interface/RSS interface/archives/
       /post + reply-to request/digests/I don't read it
    5. If yes, do you find it useful?
    -  yes/no (optional)
    6. Do you find traffic levels on GIT mailing list OK.
    -  yes/no? (optional)
    7. Do you use the IRC channel (#git on irc.freenode.net)?
    -  yes/no
    8. If yes, do you find IRC channel useful?
    -  yes/no (optional)

Open forum

    1. What other comments or suggestions do you have that are not
       covered by the questions above?

-- 
Jakub Narebski
Poland

Re: [RFC] Git User's Survey 2007

[Nguyen Thai Ngoc Duy]

On 7/27/07, Jakub Narebski <jnareb@gmail.com> wrote:
> First there is a question about the form of survey. Should we use web
> based survey, as the survey before (http://www.survey.net.nz), sending
> emails with link to this survey, or perhaps do email based survey,
> with email Reply-To: address put for this survey alone?

Unless you have tools to auto-process email replies

> Third, where to send survey to? I was thinking about git mailing list,
> LKML, and mailing list for git projects found on GitProjects page on
> GIT wiki. Do you want to add some address? Or should info about GIT
> User's Survey 2007 be sent also to one of on-line magazines like
> LinuxToday, or asked to put on some blog?

lwn.net. It would be great if we have the survey announcement on
popular planet sites such as planet gnome, kde, mozilla....
-- 
Duy

Re: [RFC] Git User's Survey 2007

[Andy Parkins]

On Friday 2007 July 27, Jakub Narebski wrote:

> Getting started with GIT
>
>     1. How did you hear about GIT?
>     2. Did you find GIT easy to learn?
>     -  very easy/easy/reasonably/hard/very hard
>     3. What helped you most in learning to use it?
>     4. What did you find hardest?
>     5. When did you start using git? From which version?

The primary assumption of the survey seems to be that the responder is already 
using git.  What about some questions for people _not_ using git; things like 
(badly written I'm sure, but you get the idea):

Not using GIT

  Have you heard of git?  i.e. do you know what it's for?
  Do you already use a VCS?  Which one?  Are you happy with it?
  If not, would you like to use a VCS?
  If you don't use a VCS already and don't want to - why not?
  If you do use a VCS already, but it's not git - why not?
  Would you like to use git but git doesn't supply a feature you need?
  What would you require from git to enable you to change?


> What you think of GIT
>
>     1. Overall, how happy are you with GIT?
>     -  unhappy/not so happy/happy/very happy/completely extatic

"extatic" should be "ecstatic"


Andy

-- 
Dr Andy Parkins, M Eng (hons), MIET
andyparkins@gmail.com

Re: [RFC] Git User's Survey 2007

[Jakub Narebski]

On Friday, 27 July 2007, Andy Parkins wrote:
> On Friday 2007 July 27, Jakub Narebski wrote:
> 
> > Getting started with GIT
> >
> >     1. How did you hear about GIT?
> >     2. Did you find GIT easy to learn?
> >     -  very easy/easy/reasonably/hard/very hard
> >     3. What helped you most in learning to use it?
> >     4. What did you find hardest?
> >     5. When did you start using git? From which version?
> 
> The primary assumption of the survey seems to be that the responder
> is already using git.  What about some questions for people _not_
> using git; things like (badly written I'm sure, but you get
> the idea): 
> 
> Not using GIT
> 
>   Have you heard of git?  i.e. do you know what it's for?
>   Do you already use a VCS?  Which one?  Are you happy with it?
>   If not, would you like to use a VCS?
>   If you don't use a VCS already and don't want to - why not?
>   If you do use a VCS already, but it's not git - why not?
>   Would you like to use git but git doesn't supply a feature you need?
>   What would you require from git to enable you to change?
 
Well, it is meant to be Git _USER'S_ Survey.  The rest of questions
wouldn't have much sense if responder is not familiar with Git.

But I'd like to add the following questions about foreign SCM/VCS
to the survey:

-- >8 --
Other SCMs

    1. What other SCM did/do you use?
    2. What other SCM do you use as a main SCM for your project
       instead of git, if any? Why?
    *  example: Mercurial, better MS Windows support
    3. Do your git repository interact with other SCM? Or what SCM
       did you import from? What tool did/do you use?
    *  examples: CVS, import fromcvs, interaction git-cvsserver;
		 Subversion, git-svn

-- >8 --
 
> > What you think of GIT
> >
> >     1. Overall, how happy are you with GIT?
> >     -  unhappy/not so happy/happy/very happy/completely extatic
> 
> "extatic" should be "ecstatic"

Thanks. That reminds me to spellcheck the survey before 
posting/creating it.

-- 
Jakub Narebski
Poland

Re: [RFC] Git User's Survey 2007

[Andy Parkins]

On Friday 2007, July 27, Jakub Narebski wrote:

> > Not using GIT
> Well, it is meant to be Git _USER'S_ Survey.  The rest of questions
> wouldn't have much sense if responder is not familiar with Git.

Of course; the rest of the question would be left unanswered in that case.  
I suggested it because if you are going to go to the effort of spreading a 
survey as far and wide as you suggest (and you included some places that 
aren't known users of git - like mozilla) it seems wasteful not to get some 
information about the non-users of git - and more importantly what git 
doesn't do and why they aren't using it (madness presumably).


Andy

-- 
Dr Andy Parkins, M Eng (hons), MIET
andyparkins@gmail.com

Re: [RFC] Git User's Survey 2007

[Paolo Ciarrocchi]

On 7/27/07, Jakub Narebski <jnareb@gmail.com> wrote:
> It's been more than a year since last Git User's Survey. It would be
> interesting to find what changed since then. Therefore the idea to
> have another survey.

Hi Jakub,
sorry for the late answer, I've been away from my PC having fun on a
beach for a few days.
I'm now back home, I have my Menabrea beer with me so I can try to
provide some useful comments :-)

> First there is a question about the form of survey. Should we use web
> based survey, as the survey before (http://www.survey.net.nz), sending
> emails with link to this survey, or perhaps do email based survey,
> with email Reply-To: address put for this survey alone?

I vote for the survey.net.nz approach. I think that from a user
prospective that's the right thing to do, we can have "multiple choice
questions" and avoid some of the more common mistakes.

> Second, what questions should be put in the survey, and in the case of
> single choice and ultiple choice questions what possible answers
> should be? Below are slightly extended questions from the last
> survey. Please comment on it.
>
> Third, where to send survey to? I was thinking about git mailing list,
> LKML, and mailing list for git projects found on GitProjects page on
> GIT wiki. Do you want to add some address? Or should info about GIT
> User's Survey 2007 be sent also to one of on-line magazines like
> LinuxToday, or asked to put on some blog?

I think that one of the mistakes I did when I sent out the first
survey was to not contact any magazines and blog.

> References:
>   http://marc.info/?l=git&m=115116592330648&w=2
>   http://marc.info/?l=git&m=115364303813936&w=2
>   http://git.or.cz/gitwiki/GitSurvey
>
> ----
> About you
>
>     1. What country are you in?

I know that lot of people will disagree with me but from a pure
statistical prospective I'd like to add a couple of questions about
gender and age.
I understand very well that these questions will not be useful for
making git any better but it will be interesting to have a better
picture abut the git customer base.

>     2. What is your preferred non-programming language?
>     3. Which programming languages you are proficient with?
>        (zero or more: multiple choice)
>     -  C, shell, Perl, Python, Tcl/Tk
>
> Getting started with GIT
>
>     1. How did you hear about GIT?
>     2. Did you find GIT easy to learn?
>     -  very easy/easy/reasonably/hard/very hard
>     3. What helped you most in learning to use it?
>     4. What did you find hardest?
>     5. When did you start using git? From which version?
>
> How you use GIT
>
>     1. Do you use GIT for work, unpaid projects, or both?
>        work/unpaid projects/work
>     2. How do you obtain GIT?  Source tarball, binary package, or
>        pull the main repository?
>     -  binary package/source tarball/pull from main repository
>     3. What hardware platforms do you use GIT on?
>     *  examples: i386, x86_64, ARM, PowerPC, Alpha, g5, ...
>     4. What OS (please include the version) do you use GIT on?
>     *  examples: Linux, MS Windows (Cygwin/MinGW/gitbox),
>        IRIX, HP-UX, Solaris, FreeBSD, ...
>        (please give kernel version and distribution for Linux)
>     5. How many people do you collaborate with using GIT?
>     6. How big are the repositories that you work on? (e.g. how many
>        files, how much disk space, how deep is the history?)
>     *  number of files in repository: "git ls-tree -r HEAD | wc -l"
>     *  pack size of freshly cloned fully packed repository
>     *  number of commits in straight line, number of commits in branch
>        ("git rev-list --first-parent HEAD | wc -l",
>         "git rev-list HEAD | wc -l")
>     7. How many different projects do you manage using GIT?
>     8. Which porcelains do you use?
>        (zero or more: multiple choice)
>     -  core-git, cogito, StGIT, pg, guilt, other

git-gui ?

>     9. Which git GUI do you use
>        (zero or more: multiple choice)
>     -  gitk, git-gui, qgit, gitview, giggle, other
>    10. Which git web interface do you use for your projects?
>     -  gitweb/cgit/wit (Ruby)/git-php/other
>    11. How do you publish/propagate your changes?
>        (zero or more: multiple choice)
>     -  push, pull request, format-patch + email, bundle, other
>    12. Does git.git repository include code produced by you?
>     -  yes/no
>
> Internationalization
>     1. Is translating GIT required for wider adoption?
>     -  yes/no/somewhat
>     2. What do you need translated?
>        (zero or more: multiple choice)
>     -  GUI (git-gui, gitk, qgit, ...), git-core messages,
>         manpages, other documentation
>     3. For what language do you need translation for?
>
> What you think of GIT
>
>     1. Overall, how happy are you with GIT?
>     -  unhappy/not so happy/happy/very happy/completely extatic
>     2. How does GIT compare to other SCM tools you have used?
>     -  worse/equal (or comparable)/better
>     3. What do you like about using GIT?
>     4. What would you most like to see improved about GIT?
>        (features, bugs, plugins, documentation, ...)
>     5. If you want to see GIT more widely used, what do you
>        think we could do to make this happen?
>
> Documentation
>
>     1. Do you use the GIT wiki?
>     -  yes/no
>     2. Do you find GIT wiki useful?
>     -  yes/no/somewhat
>     3. Do you contribute to GIT wiki?
>     -  yes/no/only corrections or spam removal
>     4. Do you find GIT's online help (homepage, documentation) useful?
>     -  yes/no/somewhat
>     5. Do you find help distributed with GIT useful
>        (manpages, manual, tutorial, HOWTO, release notes)?
>     -  yes/no/somewhat
>     6. Do you contribute to GIT documentation?
>     -  yes/no
>     7. What is your favourite user documentation for any software
>        projects or products you have used?
>     8. What could be improved on the GIT homepage?
>
> Getting help, staying in touch
>
>     1. Have you tried to get GIT help from other people?
>     -  yes/no
>     2. If yes, did you get these problems resolved quickly
>        and to your liking?
>     -  yes/no
>     3. Do you subscribe to the mailing list?
>     -  yes/no
>     4. Do you read the mailing list? What method do you use?
>     -  subscribed/news interface/RSS interface/archives/
>        /post + reply-to request/digests/I don't read it
>     5. If yes, do you find it useful?
>     -  yes/no (optional)
>     6. Do you find traffic levels on GIT mailing list OK.
>     -  yes/no? (optional)
>     7. Do you use the IRC channel (#git on irc.freenode.net)?
>     -  yes/no
>     8. If yes, do you find IRC channel useful?
>     -  yes/no (optional)
>
> Open forum
>
>     1. What other comments or suggestions do you have that are not
>        covered by the questions above?

How about adding a question about whether the user migrated from a
different SCM?
If so, from which SCM and why?

Regards,
-- 
Paolo

Re: [RFC] Git User's Survey 2007

[Paolo Ciarrocchi]

On 7/29/07, Paolo Ciarrocchi <paolo.ciarrocchi@gmail.com> wrote:
[...]
> >     1. How did you hear about GIT?
> >     2. Did you find GIT easy to learn?
> >     -  very easy/easy/reasonably/hard/very hard

A comment that applies to a lot of the suggested answers that I've got
from private email when I was working on the first survey:

 I used to do phone surveys. It often helps for people to qualify how
 much they like something..
 eg. on a scale of 0 to 10 where 1 use bad and 10 is excellent
 or.. I dont mind, I like. I prefer. etc.
 or on a scale of 1 to 5 etc. prefer not an number dividable by 2.

I think that was a really good suggestion.

Regards,
                          Paolo

Re: [RFC] Git User's Survey 2007

[Jakub Narebski]

Paolo Ciarrocchi wrote:
> On 7/27/07, Jakub Narebski <jnareb@gmail.com> wrote:

>> First there is a question about the form of survey. Should we use web
>> based survey, as the survey before (http://www.survey.net.nz), sending
>> emails with link to this survey, or perhaps do email based survey,
>> with email Reply-To: address put for this survey alone?
> 
> I vote for the survey.net.nz approach. I think that from a user
> prospective that's the right thing to do, we can have "multiple choice
> questions" and avoid some of the more common mistakes.

I think it also better (especially that I started devising questions
with multiple-choice and single-choice answers in mind...).
 
>> Third, where to send survey to? I was thinking about git mailing list,
>> LKML, and mailing list for git projects found on GitProjects page on
>> GIT wiki. Do you want to add some address? Or should info about GIT
>> User's Survey 2007 be sent also to one of on-line magazines like
>> LinuxToday, or asked to put on some blog?
> 
> I think that one of the mistakes I did when I sent out the first
> survey was to not contact any magazines and blog.

Any proposals? Besides LWN, NewsForge, Slashdot?
 
>> ----
>> About you
>>
>>     1. What country are you in?
> 
> I know that lot of people will disagree with me but from a pure
> statistical prospective I'd like to add a couple of questions about
> gender and age.
>
> I understand very well that these questions will not be useful for
> making git any better but it will be interesting to have a better
> picture abut the git customer base.

I'm not sure it would add any important informatant information;
although "age" (years, or age bracket?) could be useful.
 
>> How you use GIT

>>     8. Which porcelains do you use?
>>        (zero or more: multiple choice)
>>     -  core-git, cogito, StGIT, pg, guilt, other
          IsiSetup

> git-gui ?
> 
>>     9. Which git GUI do you use
>>        (zero or more: multiple choice)
>>     -  gitk, git-gui, qgit, gitview, giggle, other
          tig, instaweb, (h)gct, qct, KGit

I consider git-gui an UI (like qgit or tig), not a porcelain. To be
a porcelains tool need to add some SCM functionality not present in
git-core.

> How about adding a question about whether the user migrated from a
> different SCM? If so, from which SCM and why?

I have added, suggested [somewhat] by Andy Parkins, the following
set of questions:

----
Other SCMs

    1. What other SCM did you use?
    2. What other SCM do you use currently?
    3. What other SCM do you use as a main SCM for your project
       instead of git, if any? Why?
    *  example: Mercurial, better MS Windows support
    5. What would you require from git to enable you to change,
       if you use other SCM for your project?
    4. Do your git repository interact with other SCM? Or what SCM
       did you import from? What tool did/do you use?
    *  examples: CVS, import: fromcvs, interaction: git-cvsserver;
		 Subversion, git-svn
----

-- 
Jakub Narebski
Poland

Re: [RFC] Git User's Survey 2007

[Shawn O. Pearce]

Jakub Narebski <jnareb@gmail.com> wrote:
> Paolo Ciarrocchi wrote:
> > git-gui ?
> > 
> >>     9. Which git GUI do you use
> >>        (zero or more: multiple choice)
> >>     -  gitk, git-gui, qgit, gitview, giggle, other
>           tig, instaweb, (h)gct, qct, KGit
> 
> I consider git-gui an UI (like qgit or tig), not a porcelain. To be
> a porcelains tool need to add some SCM functionality not present in
> git-core.

Odd.  I consider git-gui to be a porcelain, just as I consider
tig and qgit to also be porcelain.  Though I think git-gui is more
of a porcelain than the others, as it tries to rely *less* on the
core porcelain and just on the plumbing.  I don't always succeed,
but I'm heading in that direction.

To me a porcelain is any tool that layers over the plumbing and makes
it easier for the end-user to operate it.  Early git only had things
like read-tree/write-tree/commit-tree.  Tying that all up into a neat
"Commit" command for the end-user is the job of porcelain.

Anyway.  Just so long as git-gui is included in the survey.  I'm
interested in seeing how many people use it, because I know it has
a pretty decently sized userbase.  Which is probably going to grow
in the future with the i18n work going on.

Do we have any questions in the survey about the user's native
language?  About their desire to have git translated into their
native language?  Folks are now working on translating git-gui,
and that work will be in git-gui 0.9.x, if not 0.8.1/2.  So it may
be nice to know what languages our users are interested in.

-- 
Shawn.

Re: [RFC] Git User's Survey 2007

[Paolo Ciarrocchi]

On 7/30/07, Jakub Narebski <jnareb@gmail.com> wrote:
> Paolo Ciarrocchi wrote:
> > On 7/27/07, Jakub Narebski <jnareb@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> >> First there is a question about the form of survey. Should we use web
> >> based survey, as the survey before (http://www.survey.net.nz), sending
> >> emails with link to this survey, or perhaps do email based survey,
> >> with email Reply-To: address put for this survey alone?
> >
> > I vote for the survey.net.nz approach. I think that from a user
> > prospective that's the right thing to do, we can have "multiple choice
> > questions" and avoid some of the more common mistakes.
>
> I think it also better (especially that I started devising questions
> with multiple-choice and single-choice answers in mind...).
>
> >> Third, where to send survey to? I was thinking about git mailing list,
> >> LKML, and mailing list for git projects found on GitProjects page on
> >> GIT wiki. Do you want to add some address? Or should info about GIT
> >> User's Survey 2007 be sent also to one of on-line magazines like
> >> LinuxToday, or asked to put on some blog?
> >
> > I think that one of the mistakes I did when I sent out the first
> > survey was to not contact any magazines and blog.
>
> Any proposals? Besides LWN, NewsForge, Slashdot?

www.osnews.com and I can contact a few Italian portals.

> >> ----
> >> About you
> >>
> >>     1. What country are you in?
> >
> > I know that lot of people will disagree with me but from a pure
> > statistical prospective I'd like to add a couple of questions about
> > gender and age.
> >
> > I understand very well that these questions will not be useful for
> > making git any better but it will be interesting to have a better
> > picture abut the git customer base.
>
> I'm not sure it would add any important informatant information;
> although "age" (years, or age bracket?) could be useful.
>
> >> How you use GIT
>
> >>     8. Which porcelains do you use?
> >>        (zero or more: multiple choice)
> >>     -  core-git, cogito, StGIT, pg, guilt, other
>           IsiSetup
>
> > git-gui ?
> >
> >>     9. Which git GUI do you use
> >>        (zero or more: multiple choice)
> >>     -  gitk, git-gui, qgit, gitview, giggle, other
>           tig, instaweb, (h)gct, qct, KGit
>
> I consider git-gui an UI (like qgit or tig), not a porcelain. To be
> a porcelains tool need to add some SCM functionality not present in
> git-core.
>
> > How about adding a question about whether the user migrated from a
> > different SCM? If so, from which SCM and why?
>
> I have added, suggested [somewhat] by Andy Parkins, the following
> set of questions:
>
> ----
> Other SCMs
>
>     1. What other SCM did you use?
>     2. What other SCM do you use currently?
>     3. What other SCM do you use as a main SCM for your project
>        instead of git, if any? Why?
>     *  example: Mercurial, better MS Windows support
>     5. What would you require from git to enable you to change,
>        if you use other SCM for your project?
>     4. Do your git repository interact with other SCM? Or what SCM
>        did you import from? What tool did/do you use?
>     *  examples: CVS, import: fromcvs, interaction: git-cvsserver;
>                  Subversion, git-svn

Fine with me. Thanks for you work Jakub.

Just a general comment, let's try to avoid as much as possible
multiple questions in a single question. It tends to confuse people
when they are answering to the survey.

Ciao,
-- 
Paolo

Re: [RFC] Git User's Survey 2007

[Jakub Narebski]

Paolo Ciarrocchi wrote:
> On 7/30/07, Jakub Narebski <jnareb@gmail.com> wrote:
>> Paolo Ciarrocchi wrote:
>>> On 7/27/07, Jakub Narebski <jnareb@gmail.com> wrote:

>>>> Third, where to send survey to? I was thinking about git mailing list,
>>>> LKML, and mailing list for git projects found on GitProjects page on
>>>> GIT wiki. Do you want to add some address? Or should info about GIT
>>>> User's Survey 2007 be sent also to one of on-line magazines like
>>>> LinuxToday, or asked to put on some blog?
>>>
>>> I think that one of the mistakes I did when I sent out the first
>>> survey was to not contact any magazines and blog.
>>
>> Any proposals? Besides LWN, NewsForge, Slashdot?
> 
> www.osnews.com and I can contact a few Italian portals.

Thanks.

I try to send the information about Git User's Survey 2007
to few Polish Linux-related portals: 7thGuard, LinuxNews.pl,
Linux.pl.

[...]
> Just a general comment, let's try to avoid as much as possible
> multiple questions in a single question. It tends to confuse people
> when they are answering to the survey.

Thanks for the advice. Will apply.

I'll try to send revised version of survey here for final comments,
and try to send survey sometimes next week, with 3-4 weeks time to
fill survey.

-- 
Jakub Narebski
Poland

Re: [RFC] Git User's Survey 2007

[Jakub Narebski]

Shawn O. Pearce wrote:
> Jakub Narebski <jnareb@gmail.com> wrote:
>> Paolo Ciarrocchi wrote:

>>> git-gui ?
>>> 
>>>>     9. Which git GUI do you use
>>>>        (zero or more: multiple choice)
>>>>     -  gitk, git-gui, qgit, gitview, giggle, other
>>           tig, instaweb, (h)gct, qct, KGit
>> 
>> I consider git-gui an UI (like qgit or tig), not a porcelain. To be
>> a porcelains tool need to add some SCM functionality not present in
>> git-core.
> 
> Odd.  I consider git-gui to be a porcelain, just as I consider
> tig and qgit to also be porcelain.  Though I think git-gui is more
> of a porcelain than the others, as it tries to rely *less* on the
> core porcelain and just on the plumbing.  I don't always succeed,
> but I'm heading in that direction.
> 
> To me a porcelain is any tool that layers over the plumbing and makes
> it easier for the end-user to operate it.  Early git only had things
> like read-tree/write-tree/commit-tree.  Tying that all up into a neat
> "Commit" command for the end-user is the job of porcelain.
> 
> Anyway.  Just so long as git-gui is included in the survey.  I'm
> interested in seeing how many people use it, because I know it has
> a pretty decently sized userbase.  Which is probably going to grow
> in the future with the i18n work going on.

Well, if we use the notion that porcelain are tools which provide
high level access to core git, making SCM from git plumbing, then
being porcelain and being git UI are not mutually exclusive.

Nevertheless I'd rather keep them separate, and put git-gui in UI
camp, while egit (which I have forgot about) in the porcelain camp.

Or should I use "version control interface layers" instead of 
"porcelains"?

> Do we have any questions in the survey about the user's native
> language?  About their desire to have git translated into their
> native language?  Folks are now working on translating git-gui,
> and that work will be in git-gui 0.9.x, if not 0.8.1/2.  So it may
> be nice to know what languages our users are interested in.

----
About you

    1. What country are you in?
    2. What is your preferred non-programming language?

[...]

Internationalization

    1. Is translating GIT required for wider adoption?
    -  yes/no/somewhat
    2. What do you need translated?
       (zero or more: multiple choice)
    -  GUI (git-gui, gitk, qgit, ...), git-core messages,
       manpages, other documentation
    3. For what language do you need translation for?
----

Do you want other questions about internationalization and translating
git into one's native language?

-- 
Jakub Narebski
Poland

Re: [RFC] Git User's Survey 2007

[David Kastrup]

"Paolo Ciarrocchi" <paolo.ciarrocchi@gmail.com> writes:

> Fine with me. Thanks for you work Jakub.
>
> Just a general comment, let's try to avoid as much as possible
> multiple questions in a single question. It tends to confuse people
> when they are answering to the survey.

I find that the survey lacking in community questions, like

Do you frequently read the mailing list?
Frequently post?
Other sources of information?
How helpful are the answers you get there?
How pleasant is the atmosphere?

And so on.

-- 
David Kastrup, Kriemhildstr. 15, 44793 Bochum

Re: [RFC] Git User's Survey 2007

[Junio C Hamano]

David Kastrup <dak@gnu.org> writes:

> "Paolo Ciarrocchi" <paolo.ciarrocchi@gmail.com> writes:
>
>> Fine with me. Thanks for you work Jakub.
>>
>> Just a general comment, let's try to avoid as much as possible
>> multiple questions in a single question. It tends to confuse people
>> when they are answering to the survey.
>
> I find that the survey lacking in community questions, like
>
> Do you frequently read the mailing list?
> Frequently post?
> Other sources of information?
> How helpful are the answers you get there?
> How pleasant is the atmosphere?
>
> And so on.

Good point, except that "answers" is probably not a community
question but a helpdesk question.

Also if they have visited #git channel at freenode.net might
also belong to this set of questions.

Re: [RFC] Git User's Survey 2007

[Nguyen Thai Ngoc Duy]

On 7/27/07, Jakub Narebski <jnareb@gmail.com> wrote:
> It's been more than a year since last Git User's Survey. It would be
> interesting to find what changed since then. Therefore the idea to
> have another survey.

I am probably going a little far here. I think we should include
briefly in the survey announcement what git has achieved since the
last survey. We want to know what changed from users. Maybe users also
want to know what changed from git since then. Also it would be good
advertisement if it gets posted on online magazines and popular sites.

-- 
Duy

Re: [RFC] Git User's Survey 2007

[Jakub Narebski]

On Mon, 30 July 2007, Nguyen Thai Ngoc Duy wrote:
> On 7/27/07, Jakub Narebski <jnareb@gmail.com> wrote:

>> It's been more than a year since last Git User's Survey. It would be
>> interesting to find what changed since then. Therefore the idea to
>> have another survey.
> 
> I am probably going a little far here. I think we should include
> briefly in the survey announcement what git has achieved since the
> last survey. We want to know what changed from users. Maybe users also
> want to know what changed from git since then. Also it would be good
> advertisement if it gets posted on online magazines and popular sites.

Well, there are in the survey questions about changes in GIT:
----
Changes in GIT (since year ago, or since you started using it)

    0. Did you participate in previous Git User's Survey?
    -  yes/no
    1. What improvements you wanted got implemented?
    2. What improvements you wanted didn't get implemented?
    3. How do you compare current version iwth version from year ago?
    -  current version is: better/worse/no changes
    4. Which of the new features do you use?
       (zero or more: multiple choice)
    -  git-gui, bundle, eol conversion, gitattributes,
       submodules, worktree, release notes, user's manual,
       reflog, stash, shallow clone, detached HEAD, fast-import,
       mergetool, other (not mentioned here)
    5. If you selected "other", what are those features?
----

Regarding announcement of what git has achieved since last survey:
I'm not sure what is the full list. RelNotes are fairly recent,
unfortunately...

-- 
Jakub Narebski
Poland

Re: [RFC] Git User's Survey 2007

[Jakub Narebski]

David Kastrup wrote:
> "Paolo Ciarrocchi" <paolo.ciarrocchi@gmail.com> writes:
> 
> > Fine with me. Thanks for you work Jakub.
> >
> > Just a general comment, let's try to avoid as much as possible
> > multiple questions in a single question. It tends to confuse people
> > when they are answering to the survey.
> 
> I find that the survey lacking in community questions, like
> 
> Do you frequently read the mailing list?
> Frequently post?
> Other sources of information?
> How helpful are the answers you get there?
> How pleasant is the atmosphere?

I think the most important ones are there:
----
Getting help, staying in touch

    1. Have you tried to get GIT help from other people?
    -  yes/no
    2. If yes, did you get these problems resolved quickly
       and to your liking?
    -  yes/no
    3. Do you subscribe to the mailing list?
    -  yes/no
    4. Do you read the mailing list? What method do you use?
    -  subscribed/news interface/RSS interface/archives/
       /post + reply-to request/digests/I don't read it
    5. If yes, do you find it useful?
    -  yes/no (optional)
    6. Do you find traffic levels on GIT mailing list OK.
    -  yes/no? (optional)
    7. Do you use the IRC channel (#git on irc.freenode.net)?
    -  yes/no
    8. If yes, do you find IRC channel useful?
    -  yes/no (optional)
----
-- 
Jakub Narebski
Poland

Re: [RFC] Git User's Survey 2007

[David Kastrup]

Jakub Narebski <jnareb@gmail.com> writes:

> David Kastrup wrote:
>> "Paolo Ciarrocchi" <paolo.ciarrocchi@gmail.com> writes:
>> 
>> > Fine with me. Thanks for you work Jakub.
>> >
>> > Just a general comment, let's try to avoid as much as possible
>> > multiple questions in a single question. It tends to confuse people
>> > when they are answering to the survey.
>> 
>> I find that the survey lacking in community questions, like
>> 
>> Do you frequently read the mailing list?
>> Frequently post?
>> Other sources of information?
>> How helpful are the answers you get there?
>> How pleasant is the atmosphere?
>
> I think the most important ones are there:
> ----
> Getting help, staying in touch
>
>     1. Have you tried to get GIT help from other people?
>     -  yes/no

[...]

Well, I have a winning streak of stupid oversights right now.  You are
quite right.

-- 
David Kastrup, Kriemhildstr. 15, 44793 Bochum

[RFC} Git User's Survey 2007

[Jakub Narebski]

It's been more than a year since last Git User's Survey. It would be
interesting to find what changed since then. Therefore the idea to
have another survey.

I have put the survey on Survey.Net, but *please* don't fill it yet.
Please check out the questions and answers, and note if there are
any mistakes, missed possible answers, or bad type for a question
(for example shorttext vs textarea).

I am planning to send the info below to git projects' mailing lists
(see below), git mailing list, LWN, NewsForge and Slashdot. If you
think of place to send information about git survey to, please do
comment.

Please also comment (and correct) on the form of this survey
announcement (which basically is stolen from Paolo, from previous
survey).


Pasky, could you please put info about git survey (when it would
start of course) on git homepage, perhaps on git wiki front page,
and in #git channel description?


References to be:
  http://git.or.cz/gitwiki/GitSurvey2007
  http://thread.gmane.org/gmane.comp.version-control.git/53665
----
Linux-MIPS, Linux-NFS, OpenVZ, Agave, collectd, CRUX Linux, dash
DirectFB, Eddt, Elinks, LilyPond, Herrie, netconf, KDbg, Palava,
Paraslash, OLPC, Sidestep, SourceMage Linux, Tangram 2,
Thousand Parsec, U-Boot, X.Org, XCB, D-Bus, HAL, Cairo, Mesa3D,
WINE, XMMS2, XStrikeForce (XSF).

Some of the projects I cannot send email to, because their lists
are subscribe only (e.g. itools, Openbox). For some I haven't found
email/mailing list.
----
Hi all,

We would like to ask you a few questions about your use of the GIT
version control system. This survey is mainly to understand who is
using GIT, how and why.

The results will be published to the GIT wiki and discussed on the git
mailing list.

We'll close the survey in three weeks starting from today, <date>.

Please devote a few minutes of your time to fill this simple
questionnaire, it will help a lot the git community to understand your
needs, what you like of git, and of course what you don't like  of it.

The survey can be found here:
  http://www.survey.net.nz/survey.php?94e135ff41e871a1ea5bcda3ee1856d9
----
About you

   01. What country are you in?
   02. What is your preferred non-programming language?
   03. How old are you?
   04. Which programming languages you are proficient with?
       (The choices include programming languages used by git)
       (zero or more: multiple choice)
    -  C, shell, Perl, Python, Tcl/Tk

Getting started with GIT

   05. How did you hear about GIT?
   06. Did you find GIT easy to learn?
    -  very easy/easy/reasonably/hard/very hard
   07. What helped you most in learning to use it?
   08. What did you find hardest?
   09. When did you start using git? From which version?
    *  (date, or version, or both)

Other SCMs

   10. What other SCM do you use?
   11. Why did you choose GIT?
   12. Why did you choose other SCMs?
   13. What would you require from GIT to enable you to change,
       if you use other SCM for your project?
   14. Did you import your repository from foreign SCM? Which SCM?
   15. What tool did you use for import?
   16. Do your GIT repository interact with other SCM? Which SCM?
   17. What tool did/do you use to interact?

How you use GIT

   18. Do you use GIT for work, unpaid projects, or both?
       work/unpaid projects/both/none(*)
       (*)I use git to interact with some project I'm interested in
   19. How do you obtain GIT?  Source tarball, binary package, or
       pull the main repository?
    -  binary package/source tarball/pull from main repository
   20. What hardware platforms do you use GIT on?
    *  examples: i386, x86_64, ARM, PowerPC, Alpha, g5, ...
   21. What OS (please include the version) do you use GIT on?
    *  examples: Linux, MS Windows (Cygwin/MinGW/gitbox), 
       IRIX, HP-UX, Solaris, FreeBSD, ...
       (please give kernel version and distribution for Linux)
   22. What projects do you track (or download) using GIT
       (or git web interface)?   
   23. How many people do you collaborate with using GIT?
   24. How big are the repositories that you work on? (e.g. how many
       files, how much disk space, how deep is the history?)
    *  number of files in repository: "git ls-tree -r HEAD | wc -l"
    *  largest file under version control
    *  pack size of freshly cloned fully packed repository
    *  number of commits in straight line, number of commits in branch
       ("git rev-list --first-parent HEAD | wc -l", 
        "git rev-list HEAD | wc -l")
   25. How many different projects do you manage using GIT?
   26. Which porcelains do you use?
       (zero or more: multiple choice)
    -  core-git, cogito (deprecated), StGIT, guilt, pg (deprecated),
       my own scripts, other
   27. Which git GUI do you use
       (zero or more: multiple choice)
    -  CLI, gitk, git-gui, qgit, gitview, giggle, tig, instaweb,
       (h)gct, qct, KGit, git.el, other
   28. Which (main) git web interface do you use for your projects?
    -  gitweb/cgit/wit (Ruby)/git-php/other
   29. How do you publish/propagate your changes?
       (zero or more: multiple choice)
    -  push, pull request, format-patch + email, bundle, other
   30. Does git.git repository include code produced by you?
    -  yes/no

Internationalization

   31. Is translating GIT required for wider adoption?
    -  yes/no/somewhat
   32. What do you need translated?
    *  examples: git-gui, qgit, git messages, manpages,
       user's manual
   33. For what language do you need translation for?

What you think of GIT

   34. Overall, how happy are you with GIT?
    -  unhappy/not so happy/happy/very happy/completely ecstatic
   35. How does GIT compare to other SCM tools you have used?
    -  worse/equal (or comparable)/better
   36. What do you like about using GIT?
   37. What would you most like to see improved about GIT?
       (features, bugs, plug-ins, documentation, ...)
   38. If you want to see GIT more widely used, what do you
       think we could do to make this happen?

Changes in GIT (since year ago, or since you started using it)

   39. Did you participate in previous Git User's Survey?
    -  yes/no
   40. What improvements you wanted got implemented?
   41. What improvements you wanted didn't get implemented?
   42. How do you compare current version with version from year ago?
    -  current version is: better/worse/no changes
   43. Which of the new features do you use?
       (zero or more: multiple choice)
    -  git-gui, bundle, eol conversion, gitattributes,
       submodules, worktree, #release notes, #user's manual,
       reflog, stash, shallow clone, detached HEAD, #fast-import,
       mergetool, interactive rebase, commit template, blame improvements,
       #other (not mentioned here)

Documentation

   44. Do you use the GIT wiki?
    -  yes/no
   45. Do you find GIT wiki useful?
    -  yes/no/somewhat
   46. Do you contribute to GIT wiki?
    -  yes/no/only corrections or spam removal
   47. Do you find GIT's on-line help (homepage, documentation) useful?
    -  yes/no/somewhat
   48. Do you find help distributed with GIT useful
       (manpages, manual, tutorial, HOWTO, release notes)?
    -  yes/no/somewhat
   49. Do you contribute to GIT documentation?
    -  yes/no
   50. What could be improved on the GIT homepage?
   51. What topics would you like to have on GIT wiki?
   52. What could be improved in GIT documentation?

Getting help, staying in touch

   53. Have you tried to get GIT help from other people?
    -  yes/no
   54. If yes, did you get these problems resolved quickly
       and to your liking?
    -  yes/no
   55. Would commerical (paid) support from a support vendor
       be of interest to you/your organization?
   56. Do you read the mailing list?
   57. If yes, do you find it useful?
    -  yes/no (optional)
   58. Do you find traffic levels on GIT mailing list OK.
    -  yes/no? (optional)
   59. Do you use the IRC channel (#git on irc.freenode.net)?
    -  yes/no
   60. If yes, do you find IRC channel useful?
    -  yes/no (optional)
   61. Did you have problems getting GIT help on mailing list or
       on IRC channel? What were it? What could be improved?

Open forum

   62. What other comments or suggestions do you have that are not
       covered by the questions above?

-- 
Jakub Narebski
Poland