Length of time it takes for extensions to be approved for listing in the JED Topic is solved

[sozzled]

The sticky topic (viewtopic.php?f=262&t=414756) states very clearly:

Under normal circumstances, it may take up to 21 days before we review your extension for approval.

One may wonder what parallel universe the JED extension review staff are living in, considering the needs of people to access new software as well as to encourage software developers to list their products on the Joomla Extensions Directory.

As of this moment, the "newest" extension listed on the JED was added on 24 February this year (12 days ago).

By far, the largest source of questions (and complaints) about the JED come from extension developers concerning the delays in the approval process. We work hard to ply our craft and share our work with other members of the Joomla community. It's not easy and, for the most part, it's a thankless effort.

By way of an example, I recently finished a new extension—a simple function that involved less than 100 lines of code (including language translation, XML, PHP, release notes) and a one-page user guide. It may not sound like much work—it took a day or so—and I was one of the lucky few who had their extension listed on the JED a few days after that. I want to make it clear that, in my case, I was the exception to the rule! Some people do not have their extensions approved in 21 days or less; some people wait for months.

"Ordinary" users of J! probably do not realise the hours and days (and sometimes weeks) involved in bringing our products to market. Let me demonstrate in a visual way—a pie chart—to give people a behind-the-scenes breakdown of the extension development life-cycle, from inception to arrival on the JED:



As you can see, the total time to bring the product to market (i.e. have the product listed on the JED) from beginning to end was only about four days but over 85% of that time was spent waiting for the listing to be approved. I'd ask people who use the JED to spare a few moments to consider the time that developers spend trying to work with the JED. But, more importantly, I'd ask the JED review staff to consider the penalty to us, extension developers, in unnecessarily delaying the approval process merely because the target of 21 days is seen as "reasonable" in their opinion.

[anibal_sanchez]

Hi,

We are currently processing all new extensions within a 7-day window.

In particular, I was on holidays the previous weekend. So, I didn't have the opportunity to review the new extensions in the queue. So, there is an additional delay. This weekend, I plan to review the queues to catch up.

Best Regards

[sozzled]

Thanks for your reply, Anibal.

If I interpret your reply properly, it sounds to me like you're saying, "There is only one person at the moment who is reviewing new extensions submissions and that person only looks once a week (if they're not having a holiday) at new extension submissions." Would that be an accurate representation of the current situation? What are the other JED review staff members doing?

More importantly, do you agree with me that the "21 day approval" target is unreasonable from the developer's viewpoint?

[anibal_sanchez]

Hi,

If an extension is checked with JED Checker (https://extensions.joomla.org/extension/jedchecker/) and it follows the JED rules (https://extensions.joomla.org/support/k ... evelopers/), then it is generally approved within 7 days.

The cause of delays and our top replies can be found here: https://github.com/joomla/jed-issues/wi ... -Templates

As you can see, most devs don't check the extensions with JED Checker or try to publish an extension with a different name than the install name.

The JED team (https://extensions.joomla.org/about-jed/about-the-team/) is focused on answering tickets, processing new extensions and the general site operation. Since this is a volunteering effort, we can't ask for more than what people can volunteer.

This is our 2019 plan https://volunteers.joomla.org/teams/ext ... y-1st-2019. The idea is improving the current site and automating the operation. Now, a developer can submit an unchecked extension or named differently than the listing. So, if we can catch the errors before the submission, then the reviewer has to check only the other non-technical points.

If you want to help on this task (you have already taken the time to know the issue in depth), feel free to join the team: https://extensions.joomla.org/blog/item ... velopment/. The recent collaborations that Joomla received to improve JED design and review system followed a similar pattern of volunteering based on interested extension developers.


Best regards,

[sozzled]

Thanks for your reply but it does not answer my questions.

I am one of those "good" extension developers who always runs the JED checker procedure. In my most recent case, I submitted an extension on 28 February (that's 9 days ago) and it still hasn't been approved.

I go through the process methodically. I ensure that my extensions conform to the Joomla extension naming standard. I use the JED submission checklist. I use the JED Checker.

The process takes me a couple of hours but I do it to the best of my ability.

If the JED team requires additional support staff then please talk about it. Please use every opportunity to call for additional staff by writing on the forum and in the team meetings (and the reports that you publish). Please don't leave us not knowing what problems you're having.

Again, I put it to the JED team that the current notice—viewtopic.php?f=262&t=414756—is out of touch with reality. Please address that issue.

[anibal_sanchez]

Let's be precise:

- Yes, we need more JED developers. That's why I'm writing here.

- That's why I telling YOU to join the JED Dev team.

- That's why I telling the readers of this topic, to join the team.

- If YOU don't join the team, then there you have the answer to why the extensions and tickets are sometimes delayed. There are not enough volunteers and/or we don't have enough time in our busy lives to collaborate more. Take into account that most volunteers are regular people, who only have a couple of hours per week.

- We are already using every opportunity to add members to the team.

- I'm telling YOU about our problems, so we can help us. Now, we want to improve the Ticketing System AND JED Checker. There is no better time to help with new extensions and tickets workflow.

- I appreciate your feedback and it gives more information about where we must put our focus. As you can confirm in our plans, we know the pain points and we are trying to address them with the available resources.

Please, don't include phrases like "out of touch with reality". They sound nice but they are not actionable. Everyone interprets them differently and they are the cause of bad blood in our community.


P.S: One more link, How do you express a disagreement? https://magazine.joomla.org/issues/issu ... sagreement

[sozzled]

It takes 5-10 minutes to approve a new extension. It takes days and weeks to argue why new listings are not approved.

[sozzled]

As a follow-up to this discussion, I see that 20 new extensions have been added to the JED. So, it seems, it wasn't that difficult to achieve the outcome after all.

Thanks, Anibal, for attending to these matters. I'm sure that a number of J! extension developers will be pleased that their work has been rewarded. Cheers.

[anibal_sanchez]

Hi,

It took me 3 hours to process them.

The current workflow was designed based on manual processing and volunteering time.

The current focus is on automating these tasks as much as possible. The plan is minimizing these manual tasks and improving the tools that we have.

Again, this is the opportunity to improve the Joomla project and collaborate with the community.

Regards

[anibal_sanchez]

Hi,

For future reference, I add the same info here. the We process all extensions requests and tickets on a weekly basis.

To speed the process:

- Check you extension with JED Checker: https://extensions.joomla.org/extension/jedchecker/
- If the extension has JED Checker errors, it is rejected and you have to re-apply.
- IMPORTANT: The install name must be exactly the same than the Listing.
- If the extension isn't named correctly, it is rejected and you have to re-apply.

You can find more information in our KB: https://extensions.joomla.org/support/k ... evelopers/

If you want to go one step further, this is our list of current support responses: https://github.com/joomla/jed-issues/wi ... -Templates

Best Regards