<div class="gmail_quote">On Wed, Oct 20, 2010 at 5:33 PM, Demetris Kikizas <span dir="ltr"><<a href="mailto:kikizas@gmail.com">kikizas@gmail.com</a>></span> wrote:<blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex;">
<div class="im">
> Or, it is merely the Review Team bringing up a potential issue, and<br>
> discussing whether it is worth addressing, and if so, how it should be<br>
> addressed.<br>
><br>
</div>Making browsing of database tables difficult for someone who activates<br>
dozens of new themes per week is not an indication of a potential<br>
issue. Not the way I understand what an issue is in a WordPress<br>
theme.<br>
<br>
I am not saying this because I am not sympathetic. On the contrary:<br>
<br>
I look at themes and plugins myself all the time. I have all plugins<br>
and themes from WordPress Extend on my desktop and on my laptom (local<br>
checkouts). Sometimes I activate 100 or 150 plugins at once to see<br>
how latest trunk behaves, and if there are any obvious breakages. So,<br>
I understand what you say. But that’s an edge case. Few people use WP<br>
like that.<br></blockquote><div><br></div><div>You're conflating two issues here: whether or not options arrays are "best practice", and whether or not they should be part of the Theme Review Guidelines. If you'll notice, the idea of adding the requirement to the Guidelines was discussed, and then dismissed. So why are you still harping on it?</div>
<div><br></div><div>Like I said: we bring up various ideas, issues, concerns, etc. and discuss them. Some translate into changes to the Guidelines, and some don't. If you have so much of a problem with seeing such discussion, then I would suggest not bothering to stay subscribed to this mail list.</div>
<div><br></div><div>(One thing you clearly don't understand about me, or my methods: I bring up many ideas, good, bad, and otherwise. It is through discussing all such ideas, and confirming or dismissing them, that I learn how to be a better Theme reviewer, and how the Theme Review Team gains a better understanding of the assumptions and underlying principles that inform our decisions.)</div>
<div><br></div><meta http-equiv="content-type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8"><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex;">
<div class="im"><br>
>><br>
>> Instead of looking for solutions to practical problems, it comes up<br>
>> with solutions for problems that do not exist.<br>
>><br>
>> Recommendations and requirements for themes should only be there if<br>
>> they solve practical problems.<br>
><br>
> Given that you have yet to review any Themes, how would you know what<br>
> "practical problems" exist?<br>
> You see, one of the "practical problems" with which we as a diverse Review<br>
> Team must deal is the fairness and objectiveness of our reviews. If one of<br>
> us finds that we are making similar comments on several Themes, regarding<br>
> issues that are either not addressed in the Guidelines, or else are not<br>
> addressed clearly enough, we bring such issues up to the Team as a whole, to<br>
> determine how we can ensure that we are all handling such issues fairly and<br>
> objectively.<br>
> But since you've not contributed any Theme reviews, you wouldn't really have<br>
> any idea of the kinds of issues that we see come up frequently in submitted<br>
> Themes.<br>
<br>
</div>So, you are saying that only members of this review team know about<br>
the issues commonly found in WP themes?<br>
<br>
Are you serious?<br></blockquote><div><br></div><div>In part, yes. Unless you've actually reviewed the varied Themes that get submitted, you have little to no understanding of the wide spectrum of quality, or of attempts to game the system, or of the commonly recurring issues.</div>
<div><br></div><div>But in another part: it's just that if you're mainly going to complain, I'm not going to value your complaints very highly if you don't show yourself willing to offer some positive contribution. (Remember: the WordPress community operates on a Contribution Economy. It applies to the Theme Review Team just as it applies to core.) </div>
<blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex;">
<div class="im"><br> ><br>
> So, what are the specific "strict requirements" with which you disagree,<br>
> and why?<br>
><br>
</div>If you people are willing to listen, I am willing to comment in detail<br>
on every requirement and recommendation currently listed on the Codex<br>
page.<br></blockquote><div><br></div><div>Please do. We are absolutely willing to listen to specific issues with specific requirements. </div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex;">
<br>
But I think others, better qualified than me, tried before and failed.<br></blockquote><div><br></div><div>That's a cop-out. </div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex;">
<br>
Like Otto in this thread:<br>
<br>
<<a href="http://www.wptavern.com/forum/themes-templates/1911-theme-repository-reviews.html" target="_blank">http://www.wptavern.com/forum/themes-templates/1911-theme-repository-reviews.html</a>><br>
<br>
I agree with everything Otto says there.<br></blockquote><div><br></div><div>Otto said a lot in that thread (that happens to be several months old, and prior to several improvements to the process and Guidelines). Do you have any specifics? </div>
<blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex;">
<br>
My general objection, in short, is to what I see as a maximalistic<br>
approach to setting requirements. You can’t take everything you would<br>
wish your dream theme to have and turn it into a strict requirement.<br>
<br>
Requirements should be there to ensure that themes work with core,<br>
work with plugins, and do not harm users. Nothing more.</blockquote><div><br></div><div>We (and Matt M.) disagree with this assessment. <a href="http://www.wptavern.com/forum/themes-templates/1911-theme-repository-reviews-2.html#post18635">In Matt's words</a>:</div>
<div><br></div></div><blockquote class="webkit-indent-blockquote" style="margin: 0 0 0 40px; border: none; padding: 0px;"><div class="gmail_quote"><div><meta http-equiv="content-type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: TeXGyreAdventorRegular, 'Century Gothic', 'URW Gothic L', sans-serif; font-size: 13px; color: rgb(85, 85, 85); line-height: 18px; ">The goal of the theme directory is not to list every theme in the world, it’s to list the best ones. We want a reasonable number of themes we can point to that embody the best and brightest of WordPress development, and that users can choose without compromise.</span></div>
</div></blockquote><div class="gmail_quote"><div><br></div><div>So, yes: we are interested in raising the quality standard. The ship of that decision has sailed already.</div><div><br></div><div>Chip</div></div>