Subject: Re: [lojban] Re: New Members, Board of Directors, other LogFest results

From: Bob LeChevalier <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 24 Jul 2002 13:58:49 -0400

At 08:42 PM 7/23/02 -0600, you wrote:
>On Tue, Jul 23, 2002 at 08:27:55PM -0400, Bob LeChevalier wrote:
> > >I must've missed that. I'd like to see the delegating of work discussed at
> > >Logfest. (Not that I'll be there.) In particular, it seems worth noting
> > >that projects like, say, the dictionary havn't really moved anywhere in
> > >the last, what, 9 years? Certainly there are extenuating circumstances
> > >as to why the person(s) currently working on it havn't produced anything,
> >
> > like a lack of volunteers?
>
>Who is going to sign up knowing that they're going to do the entire
>dictionary themselves, with no more tools than their text editor, or
>whatever they produce for themselves?

I did, around 17 years ago for JCB.

>(As, there apparently isn't any sort of middle ground when volunteering. 
>Otherwise you surely would've
>taken up one of the many people who has said "What can I do?" on their
>implicit offer.)

I don't know of any middle ground. Short time jobs tend to be done by the 
people who think of them. Collaborative jobs with short time components, 
other than the wiki which has no time constraints or organization to it by 
design, don't consistently get done: look at the current status of the 
phone game, which takes only people making and *keeping* a future 
commitment of part of one evening, and yet half the time we can't get a 
chain of 10 to completion.

Alice was a somewhat larger group effort, but from what I gather, most of 
the work was done by one or two people who almost certainly spent more than 
40 hours on what they did over a period of time.

>Do you think that real dictionaries are done by individuals with word
>processors or text editors? I seriously doubt it.

Actually, at least until the last few years (which I can't testify to), 
they have been done on 3x5 cards, (or automated versions thereof that use, 
indeed, simple text editors or even cruder data bases - the most common 
computer tool for documenting a new language has been freeware called 
Shoebox that was developed by people at Summer Institute of Linguistics, 
and it basically is a data base that is a computerized shoebox of 3x5 
cards). Shoebox's editing capabilities, when last I looked, are below 
those of most text editors.

The premium dictionaries that expect to produce multiple editions have gone 
to developing their own in-house specialized tools suited specifically for 
the needs of the project. From what I've read, these tools are major 
software development efforts taking man-years. The developers also get to 
dictate the hardware that will be used, or to be able to rely on management 
doing so, so they don't have to design for cross-platform use; we're stuck 
with people wedded to Unix/Linux, to Windows, and to Macs in mixed 
proportions, with people apparently unable or unwilling to consider the 
needs of those using other platforms (and I don't pretend that I am any 
better about this than others).

The most common tool used to develop cross-platform stuff these days seems 
to be Java, which also, so I've been told, makes net-based Java applets 
among the most dangerous security threats to a home computer; we have 
Internet Java disabled on all but one of our computers, and I allow them 
only with a security prompt.

I can't do so, because I don't know the languages (and I don't pretend to 
be the programmer that some of you are - I moved from programming into 
requirements analysis back in the late 70s, and have never done more than 
dabbling since then. But I'm not opposed to someone else producing such a 
tool. Unfortunately, the track record is that these tools ALSO seem to 
have to be one-man jobs, that take far more than 40 hours. Cowan started 
the Elephant right after LogFest last year, feels unable to delegate 
pieces, and hasn't finished, and that is only ONE of the sorts of tools 
that we need for on-line collaboration. You had some ideas for dictionary 
tools, but I don't know your status on any of them. I've learned the hard 
way on this project not to design big plans around what people say they 
will do, only around what actually gets done.

As I said, I'm impressed by the pretty-format sample dictionary you 
prepared, but I don't know what tools you used or how to use them myself, 
and I have no idea how to convert what we have into whatever format is used 
by such tools. The reason why I've stuck to plain text flat-files with 
fixed record length is that they are the one thing that can be counted on 
to be portable to almost any environment, and to almost any tool. They can 
also be printed out and worked on off-line (which is the way Nora has 
historically done most of HER Lojban work, on the train to and from work - 
we got a laptop this year with that in mind, but she hasn't even had time 
to set up a user area yet).

>Most likely, they use special software, developed for having a group
>collborate on a dictionary. Why should Lojbanists do any different?

Because we don't have man-years of software development time and money 
available. We have people who want tasks to be assigned to them that they 
can do in "less than 40 hours" (and I think "less than 5 hours" all in one 
day or one weekend is a better guideline for what will actually get 
done). I think I know how to manage a software development project, but 
not with those kinds of resources.

>I'm trying to get people to accept the idea of working on the dictionary
>in a sane, community-based fashion, with special tools designed to ease
>the burden.

That's fine. But who will write the tools AND GET THEM DONE. LLG can't 
rely on promises, and we certainly can't plan to coordinate a big volunteer 
effort based on software, when we don't even have specs for what they are 
supposed to do. I can't write a spec for what we need, because at this 
point I don't have the imagination to figure out what would work for the 
activity-level and long-term-consistency of most of our volunteers.

Long term doesn't seem to be what people want to volunteer for, and I can't 
blame them, since I have a life too.

> > I'll be honest that part of the reason I've had trouble being motivated to
> > work on the dictionary is that even if we get it done, we have no way to
> > publish it.
>
>There are plenty of other people for whom that is not a problem. Me, in
>particular. There are a number of others who'd be thrilled to produce an
>electronic version of the dictionary, setup so that the latest and greatest
>data can be easily exported into a printable form, so that individuals
>can print it off themselves. (This happens quite a bit, particularly when
>it takes you 3 months to deliver the CLL to someone.)

I understand, and I have no problem with people doing so. Have I told you, 
or even *suggested*, that you aren't allowed to print off copies of your 
PDF dictionary?

> > Those of you who are more net-based than I can be motivated by
> > a net-based dictionary, but content-wise the initial dictionary will 
> not be
> > all that far from what is in the current dictionary files (just editing 
> and
> > formatting the exiting file, plus adding some of whatever we have time to
> > add, is what LogFest decided the first dictionary would be a LONNNG time
> > ago.) In that sense, the pretty version you made up IS "the dictionary".
>
>The minutes are incomplete, then, as I believe I've read all the ones
>currently available, and nowhere is that description of the dictionary
>provided.

1997 minutes specified the "next book" will be a mini-dictionary, and 
indicated its intended content. It was put as 8th on my list of priorities 
in 1998. I think it's moved up a couple of notches, but Nick's work moved 
his books to higher priority in the publishing stream. Resuming JL/LK is 
also higher priority. The full dictionary will come after the 
mini-dictionary (which I'll admit you could probably produce for us faster 
than I could at this point).

> Now that I've pried another secret out of you, I can prepare
>that much better. It would be very easy to reproduce that beautified PDF
>with whatever corrections and errata you'd like fixed, and then you could
>put your stamp of approval on it and tell people that there is an official
>Lojban dictionary, there just isn't currently funding to print it. (And
>that would likely make it significantly easier to get donations, if people
>saw what their donating was going to do.)

It isn't that high on the list even if it gets done. Well, actually, if it 
gets done, it will de facto move up the priority list. But I don't have 
time to work on corrections/errata. I just realized yesterday that Nora 
was supposed to do indexing for Nick's books, which she never did and I 
don't think any one else did, though I haven't looked lately. My own 
priority after business matters that never get done as it is, is getting 
our address list up to date so that I can put out a JL/LK that will get to 
the people who have paid for it; I haven't had time for that either.

> > BTW, in formatting the file that you did, YOU have "gotten something done
> > on them" more than anyone else has in the last couple of years; but since
> > we weren't at that stage yet, it was premature. The tasks that are really
> > needed: going through and writing definitions and place structures for new
> > words that have seen usage, and coming up with better definitions for
> > cmavo, we haven't actually had any volunteers that have "demonstrated that
> > they can get something accomplished on them".
>
>Who is really in a position to write all the definitions themselves? For
>the gismu, OK, that is feasible.

The gismu list is done and baselined including the definitions; at most 
some explanatory text for words that there has been discussion on, and I 
doubt that we would actually get to that in the first edition. The cmavo 
list is baselined, but it is generally agreed that we would prefer better 
definitions if we can get them.

>But add on the cmavo, and then a scattering
>of common lujvo and fu'ivla, and no single volunteer can do that. So they
>need to work together.

Correct.

>But when CVS seems to be beyond a number of Lojbanists,

You've finally realized this!!!

>or they refuse to use anything which isn't AOL-istically simple, then some
>sort of cooperative framework needs to be developed so that they're not
>stepping on each other's toes and duplicating effort.

And that cooperating framework will likely have to be AOL-istically 
simple. Hence flat text files.

> > But publishing the current dictionary files in print, is far more than we
> > can afford. If publishing Nick's books increases our revenue stream, that
> > could change in a year or two.
>
>Just because something official exists doesn't mean you've got to print it
>and sell it yourself!

If it is published, then people will send orders to me.

>All the LLG would need to do is distribute an official PDF of the dictionary,
>and say that printed copies of the unmolested PDF are also official. Then
>individuals could go to Kinko's, or use their own printer. Or maybe some
>Lojbanist would print off the PDF on request and sell it.

They can do that now. But it isn't official. And I don't think we should 
put the "official" label on things that are ad hoc, even if they are likely 
to be ad hoc for a long time. We set a standard for ourselves with the 
quality of CLL, and we have to live up to that standard with the other 
baseline books. Otherwise, I might as well just stick with the printed 
word lists - which people have NOT found satisfactory.

> > We could talk about publishing a set of materials on CD-ROM, but my
> > understanding is that CD-ROM dictionaries are already becoming passe
> > because on-line lookup is more convenient for those who need convenience,
> > and the download time for the current file is quite short.
>
>The current ASCII files are likely inconvinent if not impossible for the
>kinds of computerphobic users some people claim we need to target.

Anything more sophisticated is likely to be worse.

> > Honestly that all sounds like more work than what I do now %^) The
> > bookkeeping would be horrible (and keeping track of the paper work is one
> > thing that slows me down), and comb-bound Kinko's would be far more
> > expensive than offset.
>
>Comb binding isn't all the expensive. (Or wasn't, the last time I had
>Kinko's comb bind something for me.)
>
>And "Kinko's" is being used rather generically here. (Sorry, I was unclear.)
>There are always local publishers who frequently are cheaper than Kinko's,
>or more willing to make deals. People volunteering to ship out books could
>investigate to see whether or not they can get a good deal for printing the
>stuff out before volunteering. (Maybe for small stuff, they might even print
>it on their own printers, or use the printers at work/school.)

The estimates for the books are well under 2c a page, including better 
quality binding and cover. Printers don't work that cheap for ad hoc copies.

> > If it were merely a matter of sending out the books, I would prepackage 40
> > books and send them when the orders come in. It's the paperwork, and the
> > specific rules needed to satisfy various booksellers that want a receipt
> > with order number, or multiple books in an order shipped in one box.
>
>Well when it takes 3 months for somebody to get their book, it seems to me
>as though there is something rather wrong with something. Presumably there
>isn't 3 months of paperwork, now matter how hard you try to drag it out,
>so I figure that there must be some sort of slow down in actually getting
>the book shipped out.

Actually it IS paperwork. I no longer have dedicated Lojban office space in 
my house (the kids have filled it up), so the Lojban office is a series of 
not-well-organized file boxes. Orders are typically written down on 
whatever piece of paper is handy because we can't manage to keep a pad by 
the phone. It takes me a few solid hours to get set up to do Lojban work, 
and I don't have a few hours for Lojban work on a regular basis 
anymore. And with that intermittency, I have lost orders when I don't do 
things carefully, double and triple entry bookkeep, etc.

> > >Open a Fedex account.
> >
> > Isn't Fedex a good deal more expensive than even UPS, much less book rate
> > postage? We are getting $5 for shipping, and packing envelopes cost 
> around
> > a buck. We lose money shipping amazon orders, since the UPS for them is
> > $6-8 for one book.
>
>If you were actually interested in this scheme, then pricing with other
>carriers could be investigated. Maybe due to the non-profitness of the LLG,
>they might be willing to give the account a break.

Frankly, I don't have time to investigate.

> > We lose even more on airmail to Australia, which for LLG was around
> > $25 the last time I sent one.
>
>I'd think that people in Australia would be understanding if you made them
>pay a shipping amount a little bit closer to the actual cost.

Fine. But I haven't had time to do that either. Updating our order sheet 
has been in the "too much work" category too, in case you haven't 
noticed. I have been no more effective in the follow-through this year 
than any other volunteer, and less than a couple of you.

> > That sounds reasonable to me. The question is whether there will be
> > volunteers who will dependably follow through.
>
>And if they don't follow through, what happens?

The mild semblance of order in this disjoint organization, that I have 
maintained with difficulty, ceases.

>As I understand it, you currently get snailmail and then don't attempt
>to respond unless it has an email address. How can the volunteer do
>anything worse than what you're already doing?

Respond and not have it duly recorded that he did so, so that we carry an 
order obligation on our books that has been filled. We are a business, 
legally, and if I deposit a check, I feel compelled to be sure that the 
materials get sent out. I'm even more paranoid about credit card orders.

> > We've had a history of people signing up for things and not actually
> > doing them.
>
>Right now, you're signed up for everything on the list, and you're not
>getting any of it done. How can things get any worse?

At least now I know what is and is not getting done. And since I'm legally 
responsible, that is something I find necessary.

>You Can Not Get Everything Done Yourself. Even if you worked Lojban as
>a paid, fulltime job, _and_ your hobby, you *still* wouldn't be able to
>do everything.
>
>Delegation is the most important thing a manager can learn. And as the
>President/CEO of the LLG, you're the manager.

I manager with no dependable resources has nothing to manage.

>So Delegate. What on earth have you got to lose?

I've tried with less important tasks, and been bitten. But ultimately it 
is up to the voting membership, if they think I can delegate more than I 
am. That is one reason they are there.

What do I stand to lose? 16 years of time and emotional investment in this 
project if it falls apart. I think the language will survive my personal 
involvement now. I'm not sure the organization is so solid.

lojbab

-- 
lojbab [email-masked]
Bob LeChevalier, President, The Logical Language Group, Inc.
2904 Beau Lane, Fairfax VA 22031-1303 USA 703-385-0273
Artificial language Loglan/Lojban: http://www.lojban.org