Bravo, Aisha,
I myself was wondering why "advocacy" no longer shows up on the lists of OpenBSD mailing lists. It was a nice place to discuss ideas that are not just confined to technical software matters. I see that is still works however. Next thing is to ask the devs if they would consider putting it back. Austin On Thu, 14 May 2020, Aisha Tammy wrote: > Hi all, > I was wondering why this list is a bit dead (?!) and hoping to gain > some ideas for maybe reviving it. > > I totally understand that most people at openbsd are devs and would > like to focus more on coding than advocacy so I was wondering if people > like me who are not that techy (mostly small ports) can help with > this part. > > I am open to constructive criticism, so please forgive me if I seem > out of touch. I have been subscribed for close to a month and didn't > notice a lot of things happening around here :( so I was hoping > to spice things up a tiny bit. > > Most of the ways in which I have tried previously is my creating > whole bunch of small openbsd github projects and sharing them on reddit > and twitter. But like this is barely scratching the surface of social > media. I feel like there is a lot more that could be done :) > > Some of the basic things which I feel like are low hanging fruits > > (1) Showcasing tutorials on setting up small projects. > > One of the things that people get a good feeling from (me included) > is when we manage to get some service running, no matter how small > or insignificant it is. Like getting my znc setup, I was riding on > that high for like 2 weeks (I know this sounds a bit dumb cuz I am > a noob, but it was pretty nice to feel like I accomplished something). > > So it might be nice to show how to set up small services. > I mean things like setting up a blog (using worpress or similar), > or a wiki, or a hugo/jekyll website. > > There are a lot of really nice blog posts by a lot of cool people > which show work arounds (for quirks) for these things in OpenBSD. > > It might be nice to have some kind of highlights page at openbsd > which shows these nice links. (I know undeadly.org exists but is > not pointed to by openbsd.org, would be nice if that could be done > if nothng else is possible) > > I feel like while OpenBSD has really awesome benefits, the communication > of these with the community could do with some work. > > (2) Having a bit more of a social presence > > Doesn't need to be facebook/twitter. I know undeadly.org has some really nice > articles with highlight for nice things happening in the tech/ports lists > but unfortunately undeadly is not that well known > > While I am by no means a social media expert I still feel the lack of > presence of OpenBSD in general media articles and published stories. > > I am open to some idea about how to try and increase this part. > Some ways I can think of: > A) Getting in contact with news letter publishers and letting them > know of nice developments that have happened. I don't think that > linux news letters would be averse to having openbsd information > sent on them. > I am sure a lot of them would love if we send them information > and do some of the work of finding articles for them, which ties > into my previous part of having a highlights page > B) Having an official blog > I feel like this is a pretty important thing, especially in nowadays, > where most things are spread online. Having an official blog will make > things very easy for a lot of people to get interested. I am sure that > there are quite a lot of people willing to chip in for this part if it > was announced that there is going to be such an endeavor. > C) (A controversial point) Trying to make things look a bit more > stylistic (please don't kill me T.T ) > While I agree that clarity is the most important part a small amount > of color in the official documentation is not the worst thing in > the world. I am open to this part being thrown out. > > (3) Showcasing a page for people to get involved in various parts of > the project > > Currently the pipeline to get involved seems like > try out obsd -> find something you find is not working or you don't like -> > find person working on it -> contact them -> bug report/patch to change > (have I missed something?) > This seems to be a tried and true pipeline which has worked so far. > It might also be good to have a page of open quests/projects in openbsd > where new people can contribute without having to delve too deep into > system code. This was inspired by my recent forays into string algorithms > on OpenBSD (nothing wrong with them, just that I was looking around and > trying to see what could be changed/improved). > > Having devs post TODOs and help needed/appreciated into a web page allows for > interested parties to get a better look at ongoing projects. > > Currently I haven't figured out anyway to see what current new projects > are being developed in OpenBSD. I feel like showcasing ongoing projects > is just as important as showing completed ones in the highlights. > > (While watching presentations are conferences is definitely one way to see > ongoing projects it is nowhere near and optimal approach) > > ---- > > These three were my main points in sending this email. > Sorry that it got a bit long in the process. > > Any things that I might be wrong about, I assure you I mean nothing harmful > so do let me know what I have missed and erred on. > I am only started using OpenBSD for a short while for less than 7-8 months > but I feel like in those 7-8 months a lot of the things that I have learned > could > have benefited from the above points to make the transition simpler :) > > These are my personal thoughts so take them with handful of salt. > > Hope you all are staying safe, > Aisha >
