Re: Please take part in the PostgreSQL ecosystem survey - Mailing list pgsql-advocacy

From: Sumedh Pathak

I didn't submit it as a poll because If we submit it as planned, and only provide a link for the interoperability option, that may show we are not treating the other options as serious, and/or will ignore them. The post may possibly get flagged as the community prefers more forthcoming posts. That is why I recommend restructuring it as a poll.

 

 

I see your point... I've just seen some HN poll, and found that some poll received many tough comments on its usefulness.  I'm at a loss because restructuring seems very difficult or impossible.  Even if we could restructure the questions, collecting responses elsewhere other than the original Google Form would surely put the analysis of the whole survey into chaos, especially if we were to repeat the restructuring for each site other than HN.

 

Before considering restructuring, can the HN poll fulfill the following requirements?

 

1. The survey is not limited in duration.

As someone in the PostgreSQL community has been doing the following feature request survey for years, I want to continue the survey for a long time (forever as long as it's free).

 

 

2. Everyone can see the survey result in real-time.

 

3. The respondents can add new choices dynamically.

Because we cannot list all software categories and product names in advance, we have to let the respondents add new ones.

 

4. The survey can have more than one question.

I had to separate the category selection question from the product selection one, which lists only products in the selected category.  Listing all software products in a single question would render hundreds of choices, which makes it difficult for respondents to find their right choices.

 

5. Aggregate the responses in arbitrary aspects automatically, not manually.

Google Form collects the responses in the associated Google spreadsheet.  That allows us, for example, to count the number of requests for each software category and product, list the products in the order of their request counts, arrange comments by product.  It also allows us to figure out which software products are gaining many requests during a certain period of time, since each response entry accompanies the datetime.

 

 

If any of the above cannot be met by HN, I'd like to ask your help to come up with a good, useful guiding question to naturally guide respondents to the original community mail.  What we need is one natural and useful question in itself, isn't it?  I believe that will be more feasible and constructive than restructuring.  Do you have any idea based on your experience in HN?

 

BTW, I don't feel my previous example question is too bad... If it may make people feel like options other than interoperability are not serious, how about the following sharp and straightforward question?  (The sentence may need more refinement and/or explanation, though.)

 

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Q: What do you think about PostgreSQL's interoperability with other software? (especially if you consider switching from other databases)

 

1. I'm satisfied overall, because PostgreSQL can work well with many software products I want to use.

2. I'm not satisfied, because I had difficulties finding software products interoperable with PostgreSQL.

3. I'm not sure.  I rather have a request in other areas than interoperability.

(choice 3 may be omitted.)

 

If you chose 2, please let us know the detail below.

 

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Regards

Takayuki Tsunakawa