The listing should be up-to-date, but it's missing a lot of information, such as examples of work, contact information, and specific skills. Personally, I think there's no point of there being a Global Development Team if they aren't easy to contact and easy to learn about (as in, who does what), so it'd be a good idea to take advantage of the page (I can update stuff if someone doesn't have gold or a wiki account).

the current stated goals are easy in comparison to what the group could be contributing, though documentation is awesome

I don't think it's fair to say they it can't be used as an excuse. Nobody really quite knows what to do. We had the Graaloween project, but there weren't many details as to what we were supposed to actually be doing. Another project that was discussed was a Global Event Server, which suffers from the same lack of objectives and organization as Graaloween.

Those, in addition to various graphics and documentation projects, are all that have been discussed. Some of us have taken on personal projects, like myself. But that's just me scripting something and releasing it into the Code Gallery with a GDT stamp on it.

Lack of a leader organizing everything will be the downfall of the GDT, if it already hasn't been. There's a reason why nearly every working community in the world has a system of leadership (businesses, governments, GraalOnline & servers, etc). This whole co-op, we're all equals, let's hold hands around the campfire thing just doesn't work. But I've said all of this before and the sound of my own internal voice is starting to annoy me. :(

I was told that Bell was going to come in and take a gander, but I don't even know if she's settled in to her new home yet.

could we imply that some leader should be voted or appointed (probably appointed) as the head of the GDT (basically giving someone a team of the most competent developers to work with) with the job of directing the GDT to improve graal overall?

No they aren't, that is if you have any standards in quality. The first graalmypics was a bit of a mess, there was nothing after that. "We" tried to do one last year but the amount of work was too much for the 4 of us to handle.

GDT is not really what I expected at all.

Their are servers failing to complete projects (i.e Unholy Nation) because the lack of scripters. How can I server improve itself without no development progress?

Isn't that where GDT should step in, and help out since they have nothing better to do?
I guess I have the whole concept of the GDT wrong, but still.

They haven't requested scripting help (From what I see in the Global Forums), so why are you expecting us to be there?

As for the Graalympics, that really needs PWA or Stefan involvement with Playerworld Managers to ensure that it gets done, GDT can't really enforce anything.

It is, and I will be happy to help out and also forward information to the other members for these kind of projects if someone contacts us with details.

If the leader is just going to be another random member, then I don't see how having one will allow you to do anything you can't already do on your own. You say organization is a must, but what's stopping you from getting things organized yourself? A leader is just going to tell you what you already know: Write a wiki page on _____. Create a _____ system to release to the code gallery. Do ____ (something that anyone, even non-GTD, can already do).

This brings me back to the point I tried to make before the GDT was created. The team is pointless because the only thing separating its members from regular players is the "(Global Development Team)" appending their names.

There's only so much a regular developer can do, and it definitely doesn't require a global staff tag. People who didn't want to help before aren't going to suddenly help now that they are part of a fancy guild. If Stefan or someone with more access and rights were to lead the team, then yeah, things would great and I could see a lot of good come out of the GDT...but that clearly isn't the case.

Let's see if we can get this ball moving when I now am finally added to the team.

Seriously? Good leadership doesn't work that way at all. Structure and direction is needed for success. That's like saying a Manager can hire a bunch of developers, and be inactive because he/she has plenty of staff. Nothing will get accomplished if they're just working on what they want, or what they think is cool. Some sort of plan needs to be followed, even if it's mild.

If they don't want leadership (Which isn't the case by the way), then close this thread, and disband the 'GDT'. Simple.

I can't wait for Bell to reply. :(

I didn't really read through the whole thread, but isn't there 3 other PWA who could help lead this team? Sorry if that sounds a little ignorant.

Like most others in this thread I never found any real purpose with the GDT.

Ideally this is how it would work. This is how Bell wanted it to work, too. But we don't live in an ideal world. People don't tend to get together, organize themselves, share equal power, etc. Inverness might have a different idea of what needs to be done than I do. He might think what I'm doing is completely useless. How do we decide what to do? If we're left to our own devices, are we really bound to any deadlines or standards?

A leader would function just like a good server manager: he or she would assign tasks, set deadlines, etc. Otherwise, we're relying on everybody agreeing on everything and taking responsibility for themselves and their work, including doing what needs to be done, rather than personal side projects. Ideal, but not very realistic.

And the experience and skill, if you count those characteristics as anything important.

Maybe there are members that joined with no intent on helping, but some of us actually understood what we were supposed to be doing.* The global tag (it is not a staff tag) is just to advertise the group.

But we (as in, the GDT members) have been asking about global RC. I don't think many people see the GDT as anything more than a glorified guild, simply because we're just 'regular players'. A global RC is a symbol on Graal, but it's also pretty useful for popping into servers and reminding them that we exist. Not to mention removing the necessity of server owners to add us to their staff lists for us to be able to log on (which some might never remove, causing some security problems when it comes to disgruntled ex-members); instead, they would just add rw rights to whatever it is they need our help with.

*As previously mentioned, a big chunk of what we're supposed to do is help servers to develop. As of yet, I have never personally been asked for help, and as far as know, neither have any other GDT scripters. Server owners probably aren't aware of our existence and what we do. It is our responsibility to advertise ourselves, and the last I checked this was being done.

two more graalympics were held after thyms, and although they were considered "unoffical" and had no global support whatsoever, they were still ran pretty well. the GDT could create the systems to make graalympics an annual event for all servers, but they don't seem to be aiming that high (for various reasons) which makes their current projects seem weak in comparison

imagine if you took the collective members of the GDT and had them create a new classic server, in whatever theme with whatever staff - it would have the most potential in terms of quality for a kind of graal revival project

the point being not that they should be making a server, it's that they should be focused onto some large projects with the benefit of all graal in mind (things like documentation) and focus less on the serverwide helpful-hand role. graal is small enough to have a team like the GDT focus in on single, big areas of graal and improve the quality overall. instead, they're being spread thin with little to no direction on what to help out with, or what to improve, making it less useful than it could be

You'll be waiting a while. She's not going to be around for a long time, remember?