Bullet Collector Refactoring

This is one recipe for refactoring wiki pages from ThreadMode to DocumentMode.

Status: Currently just a suggestion, a small experiment, and an invitation to partake in the experiment.

Requirements: One "collector". One set of bullet points within a page. Some other participants. Enough good will to follow this recipe within that one set of bullet points.

Recipe:

• The Collector makes the initial collection of points on the topic at hand, using just two levels of indentation. The first level is a grouping, the second is the accumulated set of statements about that grouping. No blank lines between - this makes the "set" of bullets. Start small and with the best possible GoodStyle.
• Participants who want to play the Collector role are welcome to start another separate collection nearby. Perhaps this constitutes a form of competition, may be an indication that the Collector should give up.
• Participants insert at level three their comments upon a level one or two point. The order doesn't matter because all level three points refer only to the parent item and not the current comments from other participants.
• Participants sign each comment for the sole purpose of helping everyone follow the recipe. AnonymousDonors pick a serial number within the context and sign as "anon1", "anon2" in the usual way.
• Partipants edit or delete only their own comments. This applies especially for comments you dislike or disagree with - wait and see what the Collector does before letting rip.
• Only the Collector edits levels one and two. In doing this, he tries to include and accommodate the level three views and editorially marks them in a minimal way (e.g. by inserting [noted] or [can you rephrase please?] at the start).
• Note that the Collector's edits to the content may cause the related comments to become out of date or inappropriate. This can be eased by appropriate editorial marks, but the level three comments are transient and all readers should expect that they may have previously been attached to a different form of words.
• Participants are encouraged to tidy up (delete or edit) their own comments at any time. Doing this soon after the Collector has used them is encouraged, it is a good way to keep the size down. Updated comments should probably have editorial marks removed, along with the parts of the comment which are now adequately covered.
• For the Collector to make comments in a Participant role is likely to cause confusion and invite cross-comment dialog. It is more constructive to make the best(!) statements you can and wait for comments.
• Collector keeps a list of contributors within the list, as suggested in OpenAuthor.
• To the extent that this recipe consists of rules, they are present to provide a process that is (once debugged) easy to follow and clear to umpire.
• Breaking the rules, asking the Collector to stop and long periods of silence are all signs that this recipe for refactoring isn't working in this case. Just give up. Use whatever content you can rescue from the collection and abandon the rest, then try another approach.

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Example (on the subject of food)

An initial statement might look like this:

Shall we try the BulletCollectorRefactoring? -- CollectorPerson

• Marmite(tm)
  • a strongly flavoured spread used on toast or sandwiches
  • some people love it, others hate it. Preference is usually strongly polarised.
• Jelly
  • a substance added to water to thicken it into a wibbly solid; or the resulting thickened stuff
  • usually contains plenty of sugar and a fruit flavour

After some Participants have added comments,

Shall we try the BulletCollectorRefactoring? -- CollectorPerson

• Marmite(tm)
  • a strongly flavoured spread used on toast or sandwiches
    • Can you mention here that it's a "yeast extract" product -- PersonTwo
    • It's also used in cooking, as flavouring for a hot drink and as a source of flavoured salt -- PersonOne
  • some people love it, others hate it. Preference is usually strongly polarised.
• Jelly
  • Do you mean jam (fruit conserve) or Jello(tm)? BritishCulturalAssumption here. -- PersonOne
  • a substance added to water to thicken it into a wibbly solid; or the resulting thickened stuff
  • usually contains plenty of sugar and a fruit flavour
    • Also contains dead animals. Ugh, disgusting. -- VeggiePerson
    • Not always! There are jellies made of seaweed -- HelpfulPerson

In this case, HelpfulPerson is sort of replying to VeggiePerson. The recipe says this is not a good idea. Whether that's enough to cause CollectorPerson to abandon the refactoring will depend on whether he thinks he can recover neatly. A more compliant contribution would be the suggestion to add the commonly used ingredients as a new level two item.

After a round of Collector edits,

Shall we try the BulletCollectorRefactoring? -- CollectorPerson

• Marmite(tm)
  • a yeast extract product. strongly flavoured, salty, dark colour
  • spread on toast or sandwiches, added to hot water to make a drink, used as flavouring when cooking
    • [noted] Can you mention here that it's a "yeast extract" product -- PersonTwo
    • [noted] It's also used in cooking, as flavouring for a hot drink and as a source of flavoured salt -- PersonOne
  • some people love the flavour, others hate it. Preference is usually strongly polarised.
  • as with any form of salt, eating too much is highly dangerous
• Jelly, aka. Jello(tm) and not to be confused with jam / fruit conserve
  • [noted] Do you mean jam (fruit conserve) or Jello(tm)? BritishCulturalAssumption here. -- PersonOne
  • a substance added to water to thicken it into a wibbly solid; or the resulting thickened stuff
  • may be made of animal protein, seaweed, fruit pectin (anything else?)
  • usually contains plenty of sugar and a fruit flavour
    • [noted] Also contains dead animals. Ugh, disgusting. -- VeggiePerson
    • [noted] Not always! There are jellies made of seaweed -- HelpfulPerson

With the remark about being "highly dangerous", it seems the Collector is showing a little bias! The next round of Participants' comments are sure to call him on this, though.

Miraculously, each participant comes along and updates his comment immediately in this example.

Shall we try the BulletCollectorRefactoring? -- CollectorPerson

• Marmite(tm)
  • a yeast extract product. strongly flavoured, salty, dark colour
  • spread on toast or sandwiches, added to hot water to make a drink, used as flavouring when cooking
    • When I said "used as a source of flavoured salt" I meant that literally, I know of someone who carries a jar of it when travelling in hot dry countries. -- PersonOne
  • some people love the flavour, others hate it. Preference is usually strongly polarised.
  • as with any form of salt, eating too much is highly dangerous
    • Oi, that's not fair! -- MarmiteLover
• Jelly, aka. Jello(tm) and not to be confused with jam / fruit conserve
  • worth noting the BritishCulturalAssumption? -- PersonOne
  • a substance added to water to thicken it into a wibbly solid; or the resulting thickened stuff
  • may be made of animal protein, seaweed, fruit pectin (anything else?)
  • usually contains plenty of sugar and a fruit flavour

Voila, something vaguely resembling DocumentMode.

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Discussion

I was hoping to find a simpler form of expressing this, but hopefully it is adequate to start. It's a suggestion, I'll try it out on a small piece of PissedOffAndExtremelyAngry and see what happens. I doubt it will work as well as it does for my contrived example. -- MatthewAstley

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See also:

• BulletedThreadsSmell