Desktop backlog management

[Gavin Sharp]

The new Firefox development process depends significantly on "backlog
maintenance" - i.e. ensuring that we have a prioritized list of work items
that encompass everything that we are and will be working on as a team. So
far, we've been using bug 950073 as the tracker encompassing the entirety
of "the backlog", and have been using a Google doc (
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0Av7GIk7p6MZfdDN2ZGkyZFRpSDVacHRfVTQ2bnNNdWc&usp=sharing)
to track the "priority backlog" - i.e. the most highly prioritized bugs
from the backlog, in priority order, from which the team picks work for
each iteration.

We can't just use "all Firefox bugs in Bugzilla" as a backlog, because
unfortunately there are too many not-actionable, unconfirmed, and out of
date bugs in Bugzilla (and just too many bugs in general...). So the basic
problem we need to solve is making sure all confirmed/actionable/important
bugs in Bugzilla make it into the backlog, and thus into our prioritization
process.

Chad, Madhava and I are responsible for maintaining and prioritizing the
priority backlog, and we've been getting better at it, but as you can
imagine it's a difficult task, and there's no way that the three of us can
stay on top of all important bugs on our own. We need help, and input from
the broader development community.

So Chad, Madhava, Lawrence, Jenn, Marco and I are proposing a few different
solutions that will help us maintain the backlog:

a) the introduction of a "backlog triage" bug (bug 981530), which is to be
used for nominating individual bugs to be included in the backlog. Anyone
should feel free to nominate a bug for the backlog by making it block that
backlog triage bug. This list will be reviewed by triage teams (consisting
of representatives from Engineering, UX, Product, QA and other groups)
regularly, who will be responsible for making a decision about whether the
bug should be moved into to the backlog, or removed from the triage list
(i.e. excluded it from the backlog). The criteria for a bug being placed in
the backlog will be detailed on the wiki for reference.

b) backlog triage meetings for desktop engineering leads. This is a meeting
I will set up for engineering managers and tech leads to review the
backlog, and come up with a set of work priorities. The goal will be to
ensure that all bugs being worked on are reflected in the backlog, and to
reach a consensus about their relative importance from an engineering point
of view. I will be responsible for representing that consensus at the GMC
(Gavin, Madhava, Chad) triage meeting, where the final backlog
prioritization is established. Madhava and Chad will be holding similar
meetings for their teams to review the backlog.

Happy to clarify further - please ask if anything isn't clear.

Gavin
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