Volker Graubaum 0:00
Cut, cut cut. Hi, my name is Volker and this is Application the TYPO3 community podcast.
Jeffrey A. McGuire 0:06
Welcome to application, the TYPO3 community podcast One, two. Welcome to application, that TYPO3 community podcast. I'm Jeffrey A. McGuire, you can call me jam. And this is where we celebrate the TYPO3 community sharing your stories, talking about your projects, and the difference you make in around and with TYPO3 CMS. In today's episode of application, the TYPO3 community podcast, we really enjoyed my epic conversation with title three Chief Product officer for that album, it's part three of three. Now, if you haven't heard the first two parts, you can find them wherever you're listening to me now. In this one, we go into title three as a community product makers versus takers in open source, the value of open quality standards and recognition. And we talk a lot about the new theme based roadmap for TYPO3 version 11 and beyond. That includes focus thinking and work with the core team agencies, freelancers and the rest of the community to create it. The why of the product, which I summarizes helped more people get more out of title three, and how expressing the why in themes and goals gives context priority and meaning beyond what a mere list of features could, if you're not familiar with the themes and the roadmap yet they are, make title three easier to get started with a news attract new user groups and verticals. Integrate TYPO3 with the services and solutions you already use, and make solution based product communication part of the product. I hope you enjoy listening to this conversation as much as I enjoyed talking with
we've had a fascinating to me conversation so far about a number of different things. And we've been kind of jumping backwards and forwards in our focus at our time between your history and your origin stories in TYPO3, and your job as Chief Product officer of the CMS now and and what that means and what that entails. And I'd like to dive into the Chief Product officer view. Now, you mentioned that you see TYPO3 TYPO3 CMS as a community product. And when I think of a community product, I think of Okay, I understand open source, I understand that volunteer work goes into it giving our best ideas to each other goes into it that some people use it that some people build it and so on. And and there's a lot of, you know, how do we find the balance between business and technology, communications and good ideas and all those things? Can you tell me what you your your vision? What you have a?
Volker Graubaum 2:54
Yeah,
Jeffrey A. McGuire 2:55
what is your vision of a community product?
Volker Graubaum 2:58
Actually, it's, I think the biggest No, it's not a different but the biggest add on from a community product to an open source product is that we, we don't have this one company who's responsible for the way we are going. A lot of open source product has this community driver, or no, this open source driver and the goal and giving the visions and, of course, I'm now here and trying to give visions but they are based on on an main vision, I'm just bringing the vision that we have as CMS for everyone where we are talking maybe in the next months about which came up from Benny together with brand statement that we want to delivering fast and great content to the people. That is all. That's the main vision which came from the community. It was not defined by me or by a company. And I just had to bring it to life and have to sing how we can think about that together with others. But I'm not doing the job alone.
Jeffrey A. McGuire 4:16
Would you say that you are rather than this is my idea. And this is what we're doing. You're not imposing anything on anyone but you. You have looked around and seen where things are and where the great ideas are. And you're bringing this into focus and then providing a chance to to get a lot of it done and help us all.
Volker Graubaum 4:38
Yeah, exactly. That's, that's my idea. And actually, it's when I start that's what I mentioned when I start my role. It's a first talk with so many people I think then the first month I had weeks with 30 hours of calls in a week. Wow. So and with 10 people a week talking about what they are thinking, What's that? and additional to that I was looking in what do we have right now? What is the Extension Manager? What do we have extensions and all that and talking with Benny, a lot about his ideas about the core, but even what he would like to achieve with the product, before we were talking about the core, but now we are talking about the product. So not all things we are doing right now needs to be part of the core. If we don't, if there are reasons why it's not in the core,
Jeffrey A. McGuire 5:43
right, and you're if I understand your vision of what a product is, for example, there's certain things that I can't do with any code I can't do. In the core, I can't provide official support, I can't provide, you know, certain things. So the product is the people who are building it and the services that support it, and the integrations and the extensions and everything, right, not just,
Volker Graubaum 6:09
exactly, it's much, much more it's, as you mentioned, the people the agency that we have very stable community who are offering services, we have trainings, we have certifications, we have the commercial view in the GMB age, all that belongs to the product. And so when we are looking at that, I would also add communication as part of the product, communication about the product, not only the documentation, which is also again, not code, but very important. But even the communication about the product itself is part of the product.
Jeffrey A. McGuire 6:55
When we were talking before, I said something like, oh, all the technical stuff is great. And it's a matter of more and better communication now, and you're saying that, along side having great update wizard and well defined API's and secure back end system and whatever that communicating about the product, communicating about its benefits to different audiences, that's actually part of the product, not something separate?
Volker Graubaum 7:27
Exactly. Very important. Because when I'm making, working and the communication and working about that, I'm telling what solutions I can create with that. And I will focus on why I'm using the product, what is the value of the product, and have it more focused. So that while I'm doing communication, I'm doing product product development. So I can see, what can I do for a special for the marketing people, for example, we can do so much things for the marketing people, we have all that integration with marketing automatisation with DME systems and all that, and but to be very clear about what the product TYPO3 is for marketing people, we need to create the solution communication, so that we are focused on what we are doing, what we have, and maybe what is missing. And so it's a very important thing that we need to tell the story. Otherwise, we won't find the missing
Jeffrey A. McGuire 8:37
ends of that. So when you talk about solution based communication, and you and I have talked about this, before this podcast now, but I got very excited, because I realized that this is this is very much how I think about communicating the value of a technology. And that this this fits really with with what I think is my role in, in general, in and around technology. So, so to synthesize. I think that if you tell a marketer that, you know, and this is really typical open source marketing from five years ago, certainly in from 10 years ago, it wasn't even this could be five, six years ago, it'd be like, we support UTF, eight characters, and you can install any wiziwig editor that you like, as long as you can configure it with images. And, you know, image uploads and the metadata tagging and obviously compatible with schema.org. God knows about. Right? And all the market has to be like I don't know what that is, right. But you as a developer, me as a technical person would be like, Oh, well, that means I can put together an author a writing experience and authoring experience. The way I want it and configure it how I need and then put in a spell check library and do this and this and then I can deliver to a client, I can deliver anything I want. And isn't that awesome. But the clients don't know how to connect those dots necessarily. And it shouldn't be their job to learn how every level of technology works, when what they want, is a great authoring experience that support spell checking in a couple of languages, and lets me have a legal approval and an editorial approval. Right? So a solution based communication is, hey, marketing teams, in international organizations, we've got you covered, we know your job, we know you need this, and this is how we solve it. Right? That's, that's what you're coming in to help with.
Volker Graubaum 10:43
Exactly.
Jeffrey A. McGuire 10:44
Nice, nice.
Volker Graubaum 10:47
But it's even more, because yes, we are telling the marketing people, what they, what are we offering them to them, but we are also telling all the agencies out there and that is the scope we are focusing on. And if you see the full story of the solution, maybe you can add dots on that. So that we have a better solution. And and there we came back to the like, communication is also product, because the communication is needed to onboard all the community in the community product.
Jeffrey A. McGuire 11:30
So so so so let me see if I've understood what you've said, I think you just told me something really cool. And that is if we communicate really clearly that we understand someone's needs, and we solve those needs in a certain way, you know, for a marketer for a sysadmin for different roles, not just marketers, right? If we communicate that about our open source, community product, then our own community members who work with target audiences can also see and absorb that. And not only, you know, the classic old would be Oh, like, I'll give you a sales card to help you sell this stuff. But like beyond that, they can see where maybe you're right folker. And they see like, but actually, we can also do these three things. Or we've had success adding this one technical feature or this one story onto that. And because we're a community and because it's open source, they can contribute that part of the story. Or they can call you and say add to this one feature because it sells every project we have, like everybody can also be involved in the communication and the communication becomes an interaction where you can help everyone then improve the technical side of the product as well.
Volker Graubaum 12:52
Yeah, exactly.
Jeffrey A. McGuire 12:54
clear communication, then has a technical benefit as well. That's fantastic. That's such a great vision. And it makes so much sense in our context.
Volker Graubaum 13:05
Yeah, that's what my goal is. Exactly. Exactly.
Jeffrey A. McGuire 13:14
So, so listen, so listen. Give me so Driss Berta, the project lead of our friends in Drupal land very recently published a blog post that you sent me a link to balancing makers and takers to scale and sustain open source, would you like to give us the the three minute summary of what you've taken away from that article,
Volker Graubaum 13:40
TYPO3 hours, an open source product, actually, you can Yes, just use for your needs. And you can work on and you can sell your services based on that. And it's quite easy is that I take my fault on bringing services to my customers. And then we probably will. I will earn a lot of money because I take a product which don't cost anything and can sell it to my customer. And we'll get a lot of value out of that.
Jeffrey A. McGuire 14:17
value. Add that that that that value add is I understand the technology. I use it to help my customers. I get paid for that. Have a nice day.
Volker Graubaum 14:27
Exactly. That. And if I want to change something, I can change it for myself. Because it's open source. And so we have Yeah, a good business model for me. That's what we said are the takers. We don't say take the open source. Yep. But they don't bring anything back. They don't make TYPO3 open source. And then they're on the other side. There are people Who are investing really a lot of energy in the product and spend 10% 20%, whatever of their working time in their company, maybe less, maybe more to make the product better. So they make something they give it back. Actually, I think the better words would pay maybe be contributors and takers, because actually, even the takers are making solution for the customer. But the contributions, give it back. So that would be maybe describe it in a better way. So yeah, contributors, a vapor are responsible for the product. Actually, if we don't have any contributors, we won't have a good product. Even we won't have a product. So there won't be any product without contributors. So what res says is, it's very important for an open source product, and even more for community product. That we have a balance between taker and contributors. And he is thinking about how can we handle that? What can we do to bring people to contribute? And he has an description on how much value do I get when I'm a taker, or make our as I said, contributor. And the thing is, that take itself would earn more money, if you don't contribute. As long as as as a contributing.
Jeffrey A. McGuire 16:50
Right. But
Volker Graubaum 16:53
he would totally lose his complete business model. If everybody
Jeffrey A. McGuire 16:58
out into takers.
Volker Graubaum 16:59
Exactly. Yeah. So if but if more example is with two people with a MB m, if both are contributor, one of them won't have so much then he was only half as a taker. But both together has more than Yeah, then only taking
Jeffrey A. McGuire 17:25
right. Oh, nice. I can see sort of a game game theory model in there, too. Yeah.
Volker Graubaum 17:32
Yeah, it is. Definitely. You have this. I'm friendly to you game as long as you kick my ass think. Because as long as we are friendly to each other, we can learn together more money.
Jeffrey A. McGuire 17:47
Right. Right.
Volker Graubaum 17:48
And that's a very important thing. And I think it's important to explain, but on the other side, three said, we have to think about what can we do to make making more attractive. So, what can we give back to the community as a community organization as an abler, for example, affiliation or gmch to our contributing members, so, they are not only motivated, because they understand all that, but maybe I can give an add on to that. So that they have a direct business impact, which makes a difference between taking and making or taking and contribution. So what I can say if both are takers, I have no business anymore. Right? So So if both are makers, or if one is taken, one is maker to take a little bit more. Yeah. So what I have to take care is that the maker is not the one who is in a disadvantage, but the maker should be here.
Jeffrey A. McGuire 19:11
Now, and we're also talking then about the difference between an intrinsic motivation and an extrinsic motivation, intrinsic intrinsically. If I am making if I'm contributing, then everybody is getting more. Right. And the problem the problem is just for argument's sake, to equal agencies, and I'm contributing 15% 20% of staff time to contribute. That's that's a day a week of billable hours that I don't have. That means I have to pay everyone less. That means my profit margin is smaller, something like that. But we have but everybody has a great system and the taker gets the great system, but they get five days a week of billable time and so they have a little bit more money floating around. So then the trip To find the extrinsic motivation that makes up for that my 10 20% time and gives me a business advantage.
Volker Graubaum 20:08
Why personal advantage? Also? exchange could be Hey, Jim, I know that you have a company and that you're earning money with working for TYPO3. But since I'm really love to talk with you, I'm so happy that you're talking with me for five hours, even if you only get paid two hours for the podcast, but because that would be enough. So, but you're so a great guy. And I really love it. So please stay here and talk with me. Okay, all right here. Okay, great. So it's a it's an I, it's not that it has to be a business impact, but it has to be an impact, which helps me and of course, my company, it will be probably a business impact. Okay, but for a personal one personal view, it has to be could be different things than ours, our cannon, Dorf, people.
Jeffrey A. McGuire 21:16
Okay, and then and then because we're an open source land, actually, right, we also definitely need to think beyond just an agency or something. Because if I am a freelancer, if I'm a student, if I am, part, I'm using type of three for my club and my hobby, but it has nothing to do with my working life. Right? The motivations could be quite different, right? Having an hour, having an hour of your time a week to have a conversation could be incredibly valuable to someone who needs insight into the things you know about, right? I'm having an extension maintainer become better known, right? So that they get more help with their with with with their code that maybe they don't make money on directly. That's really, really valuable to them, right.
Volker Graubaum 22:08
So that's what I mean.
Jeffrey A. McGuire 22:10
Okay. It's a really interesting balancing act. And this whole idea of between makers and takers in the game theory, of course, it's been around as long as open source has been around. And I've been wondering about the success of open source in the enterprise world. And it's such a clear, understandable set of arguments. When you tell people you can have a tool that's cheap, and that you can customize, but it takes away community influence, maybe it moves the money into a you know, it or keeps the money in those companies. And it's really, you know, I'm not saying that's right or wrong, but the the it, I guess it is a really good time to reconsider what we do from the lowest levels to the highest levels about this.
Volker Graubaum 22:58
It's a hard way to explain it to people who are totally not in their topic, and I'm not sure if they will be ever convinced that giving something back will help. I think they are something in the middle. They are the people who are completely open source fans. And of course there are a lot of people also on zip level. who say that business is that in total, let's say it a little bit more drastic than they may be say it. So open source should be free and free completely. And the people are earning money with that is not a good idea.
Jeffrey A. McGuire 23:39
As much as you can be an idealist, I find it a lot easier to have ideals when I have a roof over my head and I can feed my kids. So
Volker Graubaum 23:47
yeah, that's that's one point. Exactly. But as you mentioned, it can be people who are working on that, too. I'm not using it from business perspective. So then they are earning their kids or feeding their kids kids because they have a job as something different. But even on the other side, it's quite hard that you have to balance between commercial, open source, open source product, community product and all that and since as I mentioned before, the history of TYPO3 is we started with from agency but was fun before the business in terms of events. Actually, we had all the time business even before we had the events, but that it was very deep in the TYPO3 communities that it has to be a very intense motivation on how we are thinking about what we are doing. But for now we are I think we are grown up community already. We are more than 20 From the market, we are even older than Drupal. For example, we just, we just forgot to have a big 20 year party, I think. So we will have 25 years party soon. And yeah, but actually we are grown up. And I think even having the commercial view on that could help to add in terms of intrinsic motivation tools, the people to bring it, because if it just that, as you mentioned, I want to get known for what I have done, and I want to be endorsed, and have someone who sees what I have done and that I, I'm, have really spent so much time in my work. It's very important for the product that they are doing that. And for me, it's very important to show that to the people. Right, and because they are important, and if we don't have this commercial success, that so many agency would use type three. And we won't have have so many people who are using that. So he won't get the positive feedback from all the people.
Jeffrey A. McGuire 26:24
Right. So saying thank you is really important.
Volker Graubaum 26:27
Yeah, it is. And I really would love to do it on a more. Yeah, more professional way, or more organized way. And I really would love to talk with people and extension maintainer who are building great extensions for 510 or even 15 years. And so if I want to go, the next step in terms of official extensions, I'm not sure about the name or how we are naming it but that we have extension, which we can say if you use it, you can be safe. And because there's some when I
Jeffrey A. McGuire 27:16
say, certification and the guarantee of maintenance and support, and that sort of Yeah,
Volker Graubaum 27:20
exactly. And because we all know, there are so many really cool people out there who are working already an extension and take care of that they get maintenance on that. And if they are doing that already, why shouldn't Couldn't we talk with them and say, oh, let's put a stamp on it and say, yeah, it's official maintenance. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Jeffrey A. McGuire 27:48
That would be, that would be a really good market signal as well, that would mean that would mean that I'm, I could I could project even more trust
Volker Graubaum 27:55
into for the market, either. But in the moment, I'm thinking about endorsement, because I trust
Jeffrey A. McGuire 28:01
you. Oh, on the on the thank you side on the on the motivation side?
Volker Graubaum 28:06
Yeah, of course it is, again, yeah, we have a business view on that. So we have a business view on the product or a product view, not not business, that we are earning money on that, but then we're making the product better. But if we have also, and I think that's much more important, especially for a lot of the extension, and an opposite to the integrations, that it's say, it's a way to say thank you, that you get your feedback that this is a supported extension, and we know that and we want to provide these extension to other people.
Jeffrey A. McGuire 28:51
Sure. And I can see that being a huge motivator. And, and in terms of Freelancer careers, and, and, and sustainability and stuff, then it's if if that person has an official, whatever we're calling it, you know, supported extension or something, that their reputation is better. They, they they might get asked to do a little more work, or they might get asked to do a little few more conference presentations, or they might, you know, opportunities grow. So that's, and that's a that's a legitimate good motivation. That's it. That's it. Yeah.
Volker Graubaum 29:24
And we could even think about the product now. Because if I say, this Z's one extension for that kind of solution, where we know that it's maintenance, of course, there are people who can also bid another solution for that, if it's make sense. It's not that I want to say, Oh, we only need these extension and don't need these. We, of course need all the ecosystem because it's very important, but maybe there are people who say, oh, they're three extension. Doing the same thing. And I have couldn't be sure which extension is the right one. And I need that too. But I don't want to work on an extension, which will be not the one who is maintenance in half a year, not doing my own stuff, instead of talking with the people, because I'm not sure when I get an answer and all that, and I had a bad experience before, it could be that said, don't necessarily, it's important that I get a bad experience with the current extension. But I could have a bad experience before. And we could work on that. Because probably the people who have an official extension, they will answer on request, and they will be motivated. So the company who's using that could say, Oh, really a great extension, but I need that features. Can I provide it? Or maybe could I pay give you money for extended extension? If you say other people needs that also?
Unknown Speaker 31:03
Yeah, yeah.
Jeffrey A. McGuire 31:05
And then it's what we call it OSP, we call that a trust signal, this thing is going to be around, it's going to be supported. And if I invest, adding to it, it's gonna it's gonna be the best value for my investment.
Volker Graubaum 31:18
Yep. Yeah. And before, actually, before something went wrong, yeah, something people thinking wrong about it. It's not that I am going to say, what is the official extension or not? That's not my idea. Actually, what I am planning and what I'm working on together with more technical people, and from the product view is defining a rule set, what makes an extension official?
Jeffrey A. McGuire 31:52
Okay, that's
Volker Graubaum 31:54
because it's not that I want to say, Oh, I take this guy's and this guy's who used to be very long in the community. But from my point of view, actually, we are not ready on set. But nearly all extension could be official, at least when we are talking about extensions, not integrations, as long as I have some guaranteed on that. For example, if a great documentation, I have be clear with the coding guidelines of title three. And we'll take care for the maintenance for the LTS release, and the next LTS release, and so on. That are more general routes, which don't fit to a special extension. Because I don't want to take the decision when something should be official, I just want to take care about quality.
Jeffrey A. McGuire 32:50
Right? I'm really glad that you said that. I'm really glad that you made that distinction. Because it sounds to me like you're going to build something that's much more like a checklist that I can act on, rather than like you have to be my friend and you have to like, you know, none of that insider trading sort of thing. So that no,
Volker Graubaum 33:06
no, no, no. Great, no.
Jeffrey A. McGuire 33:09
And so and that that actually makes it that makes the whole thing open and accessible and even more credible in the end. If it's if it's perfectly clear what we're talking about, you know, and transparent.
Unknown Speaker 33:20
So
Jeffrey A. McGuire 33:22
FOCA, global, why does TYPO3, the community product need a theme based roadmap? Oh, what have we and what have we been using so far?
Volker Graubaum 33:36
Oh, the second question is quite easy. We used to have a feature base roadmap for the core. So we are talking about a we used to talk about features, which are fits to a special time. And about, we are only used to talk about the core and nothing else. And actually, that's not enough. And even when we are talking about feature if they didn't give us an answer, they didn't give us the answer on the why are we doing that feature? So lucky Lee, with Benny in the role as a yes, let's say responsible for the core. We are the person who were thinking about the core. And so why. So we have really
Jeffrey A. McGuire 34:43
quite many is quite a product focused. Yes. And and like, like we've mentioned, he runs an agency. So he's actually familiar with the shape of the web today and what client projects need, but in a way, that's just a happy accident that he thinks in those terms. Right, it could have gone differently.
Volker Graubaum 35:02
Yeah, exactly. It's. So we have luckily the right person at the right place. But in terms of communication, when you look at the roadmap, the roadmap is focused on features, we have ideas he has. So he is actually they are seems communicated for the core already, as a general idea of what we want to receive with version 11. But, as mentioned before, table three is a product is not the core only. It's much more. So what I would like to achieve with a roadmap is a possibility for all people in the community, whatever they are doing, to think about what can they do to reach the why the goals in the seams? And I think we could jump in, but we had talked a lot. So maybe we could show talk in deep in a different role and a different conversation maybe? Was Benny together? Yeah. Maybe could ever shot a few short topics? Especially what is important is that, for example, for good product, I need good documentation. Yeah. And there's so much to do for good documentation. And when I say my, there on the roadmap, we have the goal, to have a better start and using TYPO3, then it's called helps. That's the documentation team focused on onboarding on starting documentation, instead of doing the indeed, core functionality document, right,
Jeffrey A. McGuire 36:57
right, right. So so so Exactly. If I don't know why. And if I don't have the why in Simon cynics Golden Circle concept, if I don't know why I am doing something, I cannot measure or understand what it's worth, or if it's effective, or if I've succeeded, because, oh, I implemented a thing. Great. Who is it for it? Well, I needed it and updated a library. Who cares? I mean, maybe maybe you care. But it's, but if you say that I'm the the the why I think is it the CMS for everybody? Is that the sort of the the direction that we're thinking about?
Volker Graubaum 37:42
Yeah, in a professional context, context,
Jeffrey A. McGuire 37:46
making, so
Volker Graubaum 37:48
that's more that's still not what we have on the roadmap, it's still the highest, yes,
Jeffrey A. McGuire 37:54
but but if that's like, the highest level vision of we want more people to be able to get more value from TYPO3, right? That's the big goal. Okay, I want more people. And I want them to get everyone to get more out of it. Okay, those are all right, I can already start to like, now I know that I'm looking in a direction. And then if a point on your end, if you at that point, you said like, or even especially if you didn't have that, if it's just like, okay, you're 23, we need better documentation. And just like you said, the documentation goes, it's like, Okay, well, we're going to make sure that every, you know, up to date version of every API is started today with the full implementation code and the boilerplate in the desert today. And then we'll build that into the, you know, command line tools. And but I don't know, is that is it because we needed what was our goal there were do do do we want to take a great developer experience, and then make it better? What, but knowing that you have a point, make each TYPO3 easier to get started with and use, then you can actually make a decision? Do I need a great onboarding tutorial? And three ways to install it? Or do I need the deepest API documentation? Right, so having that why helps make priority decisions and, and and since so many people in the community over the last few years have decided that that technology, the community product is in such a great place, we really want more people to know about it. We really want more people to adopt it. We want to enable more careers with it right? Then we I feel that the community is centering on to this vision and then that helps us make that helps us make that helps us make those choices and I love the themes that you've chosen and they all fit perfectly what I've just been saying and if I'm allowed to if I'm allowed to say them The themes on on your theme based roadmap for TYPO3 starting now, right and moving forward are, indeed make TYPO3 easier to get started with news. And then attract new user groups and verticals. And by verticals, we mean industries or interests or types of projects or types of organizations. Integrate TYPO3 with the services and solutions you already use. We've been talking about that a lot over the last couple of hours, you know, making integrations of a fully fledged important find the ball set of services, right? And then I'm, frankly, making product communication part of the product. And that being my job, of course, I like that one almost the best.
Volker Graubaum 40:54
Yeah, it's, I think it's very important, as you say, if we want to grow TYPO3, and want to get more value out of TYPO3, even for existing customers, but also for existing agencies using TYPO3, it will be very useful if we attract these people. So that's why I decided to put the solution based communication on TYPO3 dot com, on the roadmap, Angel visa is a project ongoing, and it's not my idea that we change the TYPO3.com page there is then there was a lot of discussion about how the website should be structured. And I think there's a agreement on with a lot of teams. Together the marketing teams Association, Cmd H the.org. team, and not sure who was involved. Eyes, I think 15 people used to be involved. They already decided they want to change how the.com page and the.org page used to communicate with the word outside. And but it's very important for my work either. In the moment, we have this gmba the commercial site, and we have the community site and zips. k if we have the internal view. Yeah, because internal we know we understand that. But if you have an external view, of course, the community is very important. But not the GMB age is so important. It's part of the product. So what we need is a product view. Right, or product and services. And we need a community view. Yeah. And so it should be very easy for me to find what is TYPO3? And what can I do with TYPO3? And how does TYPO3 helps me to get better, whatever my goals are,
Jeffrey A. McGuire 43:13
right? And that's TYPO3, the product. And that's TYPO3.com as the enablement tool for creating more projects and more businesses.
Volker Graubaum 43:23
Exactly.
Jeffrey A. McGuire 43:24
And then TYPO3.org is I want to be part of this. I want to talk with other people. I want to support it. I want to join the association. I want to find out how to use it better. I want to find the documentation. Right. Yeah, that's that space. Yeah.
Volker Graubaum 43:39
I think that is for some people, not for all Luckily, but for some people there is this conflict between the SG mbh. And we as a community ends Association. Yeah. Which is also supported by the two pages and how they are displayed in the moment. And I think we have to be very clear that there is no conflict between these two elements.
Jeffrey A. McGuire 44:10
Yeah. And that letter, that letter that you're talking about, that came out of the different teams collaborating in the workshops and negotiations, frankly, it's the letter of intent, the letter of intent that was created there is called something like, we are all TYPO3, you know, and, and there's a and there's a very clear intent behind it to underscore the fact that the gmbhthe a company is not a external separate something, it's not competition, it's whatever. It's just as much part of the enablement that that you've been talking about.
Volker Graubaum 44:48
Yeah, and that's very important. I am. There's one. I would like to mention one team because it's it's doing a good job and But it shows how the community product TYPO3 is working. Actually. We have an art director in the GBH who's doing a lot of artworks. And, and there's a design team,
Jeffrey A. McGuire 45:16
right? And community design team,
Volker Graubaum 45:19
a community design team, and the design team has created the style guide. And they have defined the rules, how to use types, reason, logo, and the color scheme and all that. And, of course, our art director is part of the design team now, but not the art director for the gmbhthe is deciding all the community design stuff, but the community team is doing that. Well, we work together. Yeah. And I think that's a very good example, because it's a very easy to understand that we have we, of course, need people who are doing things and can take care that we need a design also on a short term, because it's really great that we have so many people on the team who are doing voluntary work. But sometimes,
Jeffrey A. McGuire 46:18
but sometimes you need something Wednesday, and it's already Monday afternoon. So if it's somebody whose job that helps, yeah, exact person is and it helps even more if that person is actually integrated into the community thinking and and the overall team so that so that things are still going to be harmonious.
Volker Graubaum 46:34
Yeah, exactly. So. So we need people who are doing things. And luckily, there are so many people who are doing it on a voluntary base. And we couldn't live without that. But if it's also important that we are in the situations that we can react quickly or fast if it's needed. Yeah. And that's one point. And yeah, I think that that came to another point why we need a sim based roadmap. So the time and since we are talking about a community product, I don't have a we don't have a product team who is developing the core or as I think the TYPO3 for the TYPO3 product full time paid in the TYPO3. GMB Ah,
Jeffrey A. McGuire 47:35
you can't give them deadlines.
Volker Graubaum 47:37
Yeah, and that exactly, I couldn't not even gives them deadline, I couldn't give him task them task.
Unknown Speaker 47:48
Sure, of course,
Volker Graubaum 47:49
when we are talking about deadlines, we all know that even deadlines are quite hard, and often problematic, and so on. So deadlines and even in an internal view, not very good. But in an external view, like the community product. I couldn't say, Oh, we make this this, this, this, this and you make this you make this you make this makes this even if I don't have a timeframe for that. But I could say, oh, it would be really helpful if someone works on Zepp topic is someone motivated to do it? And are the main topics, the main goal we have is that maybe someone have ideas how we can reach that goal, and can help reaching the goal and can work on that. And for them for the goal, it's not so important, if we have a future in the core, it's more important that we have a solution for that. And a solution could be also an extension, if it makes more sense to have an extension instead of putting it on the curb, for example, solution for the marketing people would be having the free possibility to choose what ever we want marketing optimization tool,
Unknown Speaker 49:15
right, and integrate them.
Volker Graubaum 49:18
Yeah, and having one tool or one integration in the core would be even negative. Because I won't be as flexible as I need to be with our product. So this has to be an integration instead of a core part of the core. Sure, or, and there are a lot of other things we could think where it's much better to have it not in the core, then have it outside. And so if I can say oh with this same base roadmap that our goals we want to achieve, and then I can tell them, talk to the people and Have you done anything before, which helps us to reach our goals? What is it? And what can we do to put up, make it more official so that we can communicate about that? And this could be very different kind of solutions we
Jeffrey A. McGuire 50:20
have. I, okay. So that, that feels that feels so interesting. I think I need to, I think I need to sit down and think about that. Because I think that opens, that opens up a lot of possibilities. And, and sort of combining, hey, communicating that our product is great. And then proving that people want that. And then this is how we think it could be improved. And then because we have a Northstar people can maybe choose, do I do I solve problem a or problem B, while problem B, you know, brings this brings the thing to more people like all those things, and how it might change the dynamic of contribution. It's really, really, really interesting. And I don't think I see it all yet. Now, we have talked for an amazing amount of time, because it's been amazingly interesting. And I, and we still have a huge chunk of the conversation that I don't think we've had, but that's fine. So I want to make I want to make two proposals at this point for the first proposal is that you and I call up Benny Mac, the core project lead and say, Hey, Benny, let's record a conversation with the three of us. And let's go through the theme based roadmap that we have, how we got here, and then really point for point, what's going on and down into the individual pieces, right in actual detail. And that would be a nice hour to spend together. And I think it will be way too much for us today. And on the other hand, I think I would be very interested in talking with you, you know, once a month or once a quarter here. And I don't know if that's 15 minutes the product corner or if it's or if it's a quarterly update on the state of things or something. But I'd love to keep, you know, do sort of a progress report on Okay, you're in place now as the Chief Product officer, and you've got these very, very interesting ideas that I think are very valuable. And like, okay, let's see how that goes. And, you know, you can tell us what goes great and what we're getting from it. And what if something doesn't work? Maybe we're going to change something you know, I'd love to I'd love to keep that going.
Volker Graubaum 52:38
Yeah, I really would love to do that. I think we already agreed on asking Benny. So actually, we should write Benny message that's we agreed that we are doing the podcast.
Jeffrey A. McGuire 52:52
We thought yeah, we agree.
Volker Graubaum 52:54
Three Exactly. You know,
Jeffrey A. McGuire 52:58
it doesn't have the same it doesn't sound the same as in English. But you know, we volunteered you. Yeah.
Volker Graubaum 53:06
So yeah, that's definitely a thing we should do. And I would really love about Alaska, the idea was talking in a regular way about how we are things are going, I used to talk with a lot of people about how can I communicate in the best way? What is happening right now? Because it's in the fact I need to and I would love to communicate about what is going on? And what are the progress and what are we doing? And so and yeah, having it in a short product call every six weeks or something like that? or every two months? Yeah, it would be really nice.
Jeffrey A. McGuire 53:51
Okay, let's figure that out. I'd love to do that. I'd love to I'd love to do that together. And
Unknown Speaker 53:56
so
Jeffrey A. McGuire 53:58
finishing out the podcast for today. Um, okay, quick question round. Yeah.
Volker Graubaum 54:06
Okay,
Jeffrey A. McGuire 54:06
if you had to describe TYPO3 in one word, what would it be? Awesome. What's your favorite features of TYPO3?
Volker Graubaum 54:15
flexibility?
Jeffrey A. McGuire 54:18
That's sort of not a, is that a feature? It is.
Volker Graubaum 54:21
It's a key feature.
Jeffrey A. McGuire 54:23
Okay. All right. And what feature Would you like to see added to TYPO3 that it doesn't have right now.
Volker Graubaum 54:30
One only
Jeffrey A. McGuire 54:32
you can have as many as you want, let's say content structures, content structures,
Volker Graubaum 54:38
the possibility and understandings that content is not bind to a page that can be used individual.
Jeffrey A. McGuire 54:47
Alright, so semantic units of content that we can, can combine and process and publish independent of any platform, right? Something like that. Absolutely. And what feature Would you like to see removed from TYPO3?
Volker Graubaum 55:04
It's a naming the idea that's a structure since a crease a page, so the page module,
Jeffrey A. McGuire 55:12
so giving it maybe a different name rather than removing it, right? Yeah. Now that is
Volker Graubaum 55:20
to explain that because it's I think it feeds range, controversy, controversy. But it's, a lot of tools started to add trees, because they need to structure content. And we used to have trees since 20 years. And I think a lot of people already use trees for structuring news or other content elements, like we have with structured content. And but the main thinking about the page tree is that we have a Patreon. And if I understand that it's more or less a structured tree for whatever kind of content, which could be also pages, right, would be make us much more flexible and thinking.
Jeffrey A. McGuire 56:14
Okay, so the ability thinking about the web as a series of pages in 2021. Is, is it might might hold you back? Because it is not a series of pages. It is it is the micro notifications on your pocket, super computer, it is the signs on the bus, it is the weather report, it is it is there's content going out all over the place.
Volker Graubaum 56:40
What do you ever add, it could be pages, that's one of a lot of possibilities, how to structure content,
Jeffrey A. McGuire 56:47
and the hierarchical organization of information within TYPO3 in the thing that's called the page tree. Even for a deck more, I don't know, as long as it's been around, maybe is not only about content, and not only about content display, right? Because that, let's just call it hierarchical tree of information points. Not only does it not have to be pages, but that can be entry URLs that can be separate domains for a multi site installation, that can be different languages on one installation, that can be a corporate department where you give people permissions to work on that branch of the tree, but not the main one. It's so much more than just pages. So cool choice. Great work. I love it. Can you tell us something that you wish people knew about TYPO3, but they usually don't,
Volker Graubaum 57:41
we have the possibility to create content workflows out of the box.
Jeffrey A. McGuire 57:51
Sweet, very good for marketers and content. People love that. I'm so on application, the type of community podcast we have a little thing that I like to call suggest a guest and within or without TYPO3 TYPO3 people or people you think TYPO3 people should hear from, who do you think I should call up and talk with?
Volker Graubaum 58:18
definitely take a name or a role.
Jeffrey A. McGuire 58:21
Oh, you know what, anything you want? Or if it's a challenge for me to go and find a specific kind of person, that'd be pretty interesting.
Volker Graubaum 58:29
So I think we need someone who can really tell us how to create good content, how content should be structured and handled and not from a technical point of view? What makes good content I need I would love to talk you with someone who say what, what is good content? I want to answer on this question.
Jeffrey A. McGuire 58:59
So is it what is good content in 2021? Is it what is good content in the digital age? Is it what is good content like? Or is it just what is good content and somebody who wants
Volker Graubaum 59:08
good content?
Jeffrey A. McGuire 59:10
Okay, and it's from somebody who's out there doing it now? somewhere? Okay, yeah. So if anyone has any ideas about who would be good to talk about about what makes good content, what is good content in any context? And I think actually, focus had less technical, but we're kind of talking in a web context. So what's effective? What's interesting, how does it work methodologies? I don't know. If you have an idea about who we should talk with about what is good content. You can tweet at TYPO3 you can get in touch with us in the TYPO3 community slack and all of the usual places. FOCA go about this has been a marathon of interesting for me, I'm so glad we got the chance to sit down and have so much time and calm to really get into things I have the fun challenge of cutting this into a couple of episodes now. But I'm looking forward to that quite a lot. Thank you so much for taking the time to talk with me. And I am going to get on the phone with Benny Mac now and find us a time for next week to to get straight back into that theme next, sort of but to get straight back into that theme based roadmap.
Volker Graubaum 1:00:24
Thank you, Jen for having me here. All right. Hey,
Jeffrey A. McGuire 1:00:27
you too. We'll talk soon, I guess. Hi. Thanks to the title three Association for sponsoring this podcast. Thank you, b 13, and Stephanie coisa for our logo. Now Siebel Cooper, three como TYPO3, developer and musician x tall, the noun for our theme music. Thanks again to today's guest. If you like what you heard, don't forget to subscribe in the podcast app of your choice and share application that TYPO3 community podcast with your friends and colleagues. If you didn't like it, please share it with your enemies. Would you like to play along and suggest a guest for the podcast? Do you have questions or comments? reach out to us on Twitter at TYPO3 podcast. You can find show notes, links and more information in our posts on TYPO3.org. Remember, open source software would not be what it is without you. Thank you all for your contributions.
Who do you think I should call up and talk with by believing all these pauses in your phone smart broken folders thinking very hard.
Volker Graubaum 1:01:45
I need the Japanese music to decide.
Jeffrey A. McGuire 1:01:49
Okay, wait. I'm going to cut in the Jeopardy music. To
Volker Graubaum 1:02:02
the right Music please. No m but Cut, cut cut. So please cut back before I was stuttering around. And then I will try to Okay.
Jeffrey A. McGuire 1:02:20
Oh no, I'm not cutting any of this. Okay.
Jeffrey A. McGuire
