This RFC covers the proposal of adopting Slack for our chat platform (in lieu of hipchat).

The current user arguments in favour are:

• User preference (as expressed frequently to me) due to familiarity with other projects using Slack

• More finely tuned notifications, client read message synchronisation (mobile/desktop) and similar superior usability features

• Perceived poor performance of Hipchat (in terms of service availability, connection management, buggy clients)

The community support arguments are:

• Interface with standard protocols (IRC, XMPP) and fee structure make it more approachable to eg. students needing urgent help rather than the more "gatekeeper" model required from hipchat

• The adoption trend seems to favour Slack, so likely to be more popular as we onboard more external collaborators in the coming yers

The SQuaRE arguments in favour are:

• More actively supported integrations platform

• An opportunity to normalise chat usernames to match Github usernames, which would simplify implementation of a much requested feature to @ users for their build failure notifications

• No need to cull inactive usernames

The arguments against are:

• Disruption of change

• No 1:1 video facility

RFC Process:

• There is a separate question of whether to join Slack with the free (but limited history search) plan, or the per-user plan with unlimited history plan (which would still need some gatekeeping). The argument is that the successful introduction of Discoursed-base c.l.o should lead us to treating chat as a more transient platform and flush substantive conversations to Discourse.

• In the event this RFC passes, implementation needs to lag until SQuaRE can move the current integrations (eg. Jenkins) over.

• Despite a SQuaRE preference for Slack for the reasons stated, we feel like a minor stakeholder in this questions compared to user preference. Also, this RFC affects more users than typical. For this reasons, I encourage you to fill this poll unless you really want to add something to the arguments.

https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/R5TKNBB

Poll Results as of 2016-02-12 (see [^Data_Q1_160212.pdf] attachment):

"I actively prefer Slack","36.4 %"
"I actively prefer Hipchat","4.5 %"
"I don't mind, let the people who care choose","50.0 %"
"I don't have a preference but don't want to have to change.","9.1 %"

Answers: 22