Post mortem The Gathering Online 2021

[joms]

The Gathering Online 2021

This is a post morten representing my personal views from The Gathering Online 2021.

General summary

Backend was up and running in good time, and delivered a good auth service for both UNICORN and Tech:Online.

Frontend got another rewrite, and finally feels like a code base that could live on. It was taken back to basics and focused on delivering a good user experience for creative competitions. Game was not involved, and all other functionality like community competitions, achievements and looking for group was removed in its entirety.

In general it was less issues connected to direct bugs. Though, some hick-ups were found in the access control, and a major incident when the backend stopped working for a longer period at a critical time. The frontend had some issues in presenting information the correct way, and a bug that probably is connected to token refreshing.

Reported bugs

• Users had do log out and in to get the right permissions
• Disappearing fields in lists and admin panel
• Participant display is unstable
• GeekEvents authenticated users with admin panel (not verified)
• Files with wrong file path while downloading
• All Wannabe authenticated users can see the admin panel
• The competition creation didn't explain fields good enough, and did not help ensure that fields were filled in a way motivating users to participate
• Mobile support could've been far better

Incidents

From around 23:19 to 06:17 Friday the backend did not work. This was a critical time as it was deadlines in this period, and shows going from the morning.

Both @eriktm and I was unable to respond immediately.

However, this pointed out an important issue being totally reliant on two persons with no communicated agreements towards availability or response times either way. The only reason this has worked before the online versions of TG, is because of the developers being at the venue from ~10 in the morning until ~1 in the night because being at The Gathering is the most awesome thing we know. However, in the online version we both have lives to manage with its own needs.
It should be discussed if UNICORN should live under an umbrella better designed for 24/7 response during intensive periodes.

Conclusion

Not taking the downtime incident into account, I personally mean this is the most stable and best user experience UNICORN has provided in many years, and we are on the path to have a code base that could be built on top of, and live for multiple years without complete rewrites.

Onwards and forwards

All discovered bugs and issues must be fixed before The Gathering 2022. We will bring on a designer to help build a better user experience for both administrators and users. Administrators should get more capabilities leaving less to manual handling for the unicorn crew.

[kristebo]

A short reply in no particular order.

I agree this has been the most stable version of Unicorn to date, but the issues at hand are serious.

The downtime could have been solved.

Most of the issues could be classified as UX problems. There are issues both for the admins and participants.

[kristebo]

To clarify some of the input issues for the participants could've been solved with more accurate compo rules and description

[kristebo]

• GeekEvents authenticated users with admin panel (not verified)

verified as a WB login.