Proposal: Create connections between Performance Team and Hosts

This post offers a proposal to create a private slack channel (#performance-hosting) where members of both the Performance Team and relevant representatives from hosting companies can come together to share information impacting the performance of sites, test relevant PRs, and have a quick feedback loop for any performance regressions in new releases. This builds on the current private #security-hosting channel that’s already in place and has proven to be an area of collaboration.

Background

In talking to folks last week at WCUS alongside @harishanker, it became clear that in some cases hosting companies would benefit from a more curated and focused space for contribution that aligns with areas where they can make the biggest impact. In talking with folks, the following areas came to mind: performance, infrastructure, support, and security. This was a repeated topic in all conversations and, in these conversations, the #security-hosting channel came up as an already functional pathway.

Format

Create a new private slack channel for #performance-hosting that includes members from the Performance team for monitoring and engagement alongside relevant members from hosting companies. This is private in order to allow for more sharing and it’s centered around performance in order to provide a curated path for contribution, bringing in folks from the Performance team to engage directly.

What will this group work on?

Below are some of the ideas that were shared in the conversations. See these are starting ideas and not entirely encompassing:

• Share anonymized data around plugins that are impacting sites the most in order to do outreach to them with performance suggestions, see what we can learn from them to improve Core, and update the plugin checker for anything that might be missing to help future contributors.
• Share common user configuration to provide better tests for real world performance situations, rather than solely relying on lab metrics.
• Test performance PRs early.
• Create a tight feedback loop after releases for any performance degradations.

Why performance?

It’s clear there are a specific areas that hosts are best equipped to make the biggest impact and contribution, including performance. At the same time, the Performance team is a strong team with a clear roadmap, sponsored contributors, and a dedicated space already. In my time in the FSE Outreach Program, I found out how critical it is to create a space that’s managed, maintained, and specific. This checked all the boxes and I anticipate there will be more areas that will, like Support.

Why a private channel?

In talking to folks, a private channel came up as a safer space to share information. I am not personally opposed to a public channel but I want to recognize the reality that for folks in the hosting space, it felt advantageous to have private.

What do you all think? Please share by October 9th, 2024.

Please share your thoughts below. While there was an appetite for this idea when talking to folks in person, I want to know what blockers there might be and whether there are reasons not to pursue this, especially from the Performance team who will be impacted by this.

#hosting, #performance