Hi all,
Perhaps we can discuss this at Thursday's DIG meeting, but with the OPW
deadline looming, it would be great if we could get some of this
discussion done via e-mail.
As you may have seen, the starter projects I put on the wiki page for
potential OPW projects were both related to documentation. I wanted to
share my thinking on each of these projects with the rest of DIG to see
if others agree that these are worthwhile projects to pursue and also to
see if there are people who might be willing to step up as mentors for
the project. Since mentoring can take quite a bit of time, I would like
to see at least two mentors for a project before officially listing it
as a potential project.
Also, if you have a documentation-related project in mind, feel free to
add it to the discussion.
The first project idea I posted is to bring somebody in to take a
birds-eye view of our official docs and make improvements in any or all
of the following areas: the doc site's stylesheets, the organization of
content, the layout of the content (for example, maybe displaying more
than one section on each HTML page), improved navigation, etc.
A while back, Dan Scott shared a link in IRC to the PosgreSQL
documentation site, and I was thinking that something as simple as
providing links along the top to help users to navigate to the same page
for other releases would be a big improvement, particularly for users
who enter the site through a Google search and don't necessarily know
what release they are looking at. Those were the types of changes I
thought might come about from this project.
One thing I like about the project is that, although an intern would
need some familiarity with Evergreen if looking at ways to reorganize
content on the doc site, they could make a lot of improvements to the
way documentation is presented without needing to know the ins and outs
of how Evergreen works.
I added my name as a possible co-mentor for the above project.
The other project I identified was for an intern to work on
documentation on circulation for the new web client. However, I'm on the
fence with this project. I added it because it is a large documentation
project that needs to be done. However, I think the first project would
be much more interesting for a potential intern and require a bit more
creativity.
What does everyone else think of these projects? Are there other
documentation projects we should add to the list?
Thanks!
Kathy
Kathy Lussier
Project Coordinator
Massachusetts Library Network Cooperative
(508) 343-0128
[email protected]
Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/kmlussier
#evergreen IRC: kmlussier
On 8/25/2014 12:49 AM, Kathy Lussier wrote:
Hi all,
Please excuse the cross-postings.
At its meeting last week, the Executive Oversight Board discussed the
possibility of participating in the GNOME Outreach Project for Women -
http://gnome.org/opw/. The goal of OPW is to increase the
participation of women in FOSS projects by connecting interns with
communities that need help for specific projects.
It is similar to the Google Summer of Code program in which Evergreen
has previously participated, but the internships provided through this
program can extend beyond coding. Interns could also work on user
experience design, graphic design, documentation, web development,
marketing, translation, or any other task that would help sustain the
project. The EOB agreed to put forth the funds to cover the intern's
stipend if, as a community, we could come up with some strong project
ideas that will help the community and mentors willing to commit their
time to the project
I have started a page at http://wiki.evergreen-ils.org/doku.php?id=opw
where we can start collecting potential project ideas. I had a couple
of doc ideas that I have already added to the list. If you can think
of anything that you think would be a worthwhile project, feel free to
add it to the page.
Please remember, though, that the projects need to be something that
serve as an entry point for somebody who is entirely new to Evergreen.
In talking about how to define a project, OPW suggests starting with
smaller tasks (i.e. bugs) with a shared them and progressing over time
to more complex tasks (i.e. features). They also ask that we select
projects where the intern is likely to see their contributions
incorporated in the project before the internship is over.
Also, we need to make sure we have committed mentors on any project
that is ultimately posted. The next OPW round starts September 8 when
the names of participating organizations are released. The application
deadline is October 22. During that application period, mentors may
need to commit as much as 10 hours per week on the program since
you'll be working with multiple potential applicants. I expect that it
wouldn't be 10 hours per week for the entire application period, but
that it will become more demanding as the application deadline
approaches.
The internship dates then run from December 9 to March 9, during which
time you may need to spend up to five hours per week working with the
intern. Due to the time commitment, I think we should shoot for two
mentors on each project so that the commitment does not fall on just
one person.
There is more information for potential mentors at
https://wiki.gnome.org/OutreachProgramForWomen/Admin/InfoForMentors.
We need to let OPW know by September 8 if we plan on participating, so
we have about two weeks to see if we can pull together some strong
projects. However, I think this is doable if we have some willing
volunteers and good project ideas.
Feel free to let me know if you have any questions!
Kathy
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