Hi there, Quim and his team have indeed thought through the totality of tech community events and I am sure he can respond here with his thoughts. Regarding the MediaWiki roadmap, the thinking is that by publishing it we a/make planning for 3rd party users much more feasible, b/inform the community about what the Foundation will be doing so that we can avoid overlap, and c/hopefully incentivize broader participation by the community in the formulation and delivery of the roadmap.
I hope this makes sense. Victoria > On Apr 27, 2017, at 11:35 AM, Isarra Yos <zhoris...@gmail.com> wrote: > > Thanks. > > Different events serve very different purposes, though - hackathons, for > instance, seem to be largely useful for onboarding newcomers and giving staff > and other occupational contributors an opportunity to work on projects > separate from their usual work, basically whatever they feel like doing, as > opposed to what they have to. But these often don't do much for established > volunteers, as a result, who generally just work on whatever they feel like > all the time already. Have you looked into how the roles of these different > events fit together across all the different groups, and how scopes affect > them (regional, topical, etc)? This would also be useful for chapters/groups > planning their own events. > > How exactly is publishing a roadmap going to help facilitate community > contributions? > > -I > > On 27/04/17 03:11, Victoria Coleman wrote: >> Hi Isarra, >> >> thank you for the question. We want to support our diverse technical >> communities in a variety of ways. One of our key tools are the hackathons, >> where we hope to welcome both seasoned and new volunteer developers. We want >> to support them not just by providing a series of events but also with tools >> and WMF staff time. These are the key goals of our new Wikimedia Cloud >> Services team. They build and make labs and tools available and participate >> in the hackathons to onboard newcomers and in general assist volunteers. >> Another key change we are making this year is creating the MediaWiki >> Platform team who as well as doing much needed work on the codebase will >> also facilitate contributions and planning with the volunteer community by >> publishing a roadmap. And as Quim notes below we are changing the nature of >> the Dev Summit to have it focus on the strategic technology issues and >> decisions the Movement is faced with. As such it is an event that might >> appeal more to the seasoned members of our community. Attendance for the >> summit will be decided on the basis of position papers for WMF staff and >> volunteers alike. I am personally excited about the lineup of events this >> coming year. But as always we learn and adapt. If we collectively decide to >> try for a different configuration the following year, we can totally do >> that. Please keep the feedback coming! >> >> Best regards, >> >> Victoria >> >> >>> On Apr 26, 2017, at 12:23 PM, Isarra Yos <zhoris...@gmail.com> wrote: >>> >>> Regarding the Developers Summit in particular, how do you plan to reconcile >>> making the event smaller with your goal of better retention of newcomers >>> and volunteers in general when that's often the only venue they have at >>> which to discuss the high-level technical issues with other stakeholders? >>> Volunteer and third-party developers are not privy to most of the usual >>> venues afforded to WMF staff such as inter-team meetings and events, and >>> yet they make up an important part of the overall stakeholder community >>> that these issues impact. They - we - need to be able to participate in >>> these discussions, and the Developers Summit is one of very few >>> opportunities even open to us where we can make our voices heard. >>> >>> -I >>> >>> On 20/04/17 07:28, Quim Gil wrote: >>>> On Sun, Apr 9, 2017 at 1:14 AM, Quim Gil<q...@wikimedia.org> wrote: >>>> >>>>> Hi, the Wikimedia Foundation has published a draft of its Annual Plan >>>>> FY2017-18 >>>>> <https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_Foundation_Annual_Plan/2017-2018/Draft> >>>>> and it welcomes your review. >>>>> >>>>> I want to highlight here the improvements that we are proposing to the >>>>> developer events (co)organized by the WMF. From local to global: >>>>> >>>>> The Technical Collaboration team proposes to combine multiple activities >>>>> (often disconnected) in a single program focusing on onboarding new >>>>> developers >>>>> <https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_Foundation_Annual_Plan/2017-2018/Draft/Programs/Community_Engagement#Program_12:_Onboarding_new_developers>. >>>>> We >>>>> want to work with the Wikimedia technical community to bring a new wave of >>>>> developers to our projects, and events play an important role. >>>>> >>>>> Local developer events >>>>> We want to support developers and organizations willing to reach out to >>>>> specific groups and geographies. We are hoping to see many local developer >>>>> meetups and small hackathons or workshops around the World, starting small >>>>> and simple. We should be able to offer introductory materials, contacts >>>>> with Wikimedia developers in the region, maybe travel budget to send >>>>> experienced volunteers to help mentoring the in the bigger events, maybe >>>>> travel budget to invite the best newcomers to our regional and global >>>>> events. >>>>> >>>>> Adding tech to regional Wikimedia events >>>>> Last year we experimented organizing technical workshops in WikiArabia, >>>>> and others have done similar efforts in other regional events (for >>>>> instance, a small hackathon next to WikiConference India). We want to work >>>>> with the organizers of these regional events in order to attract >>>>> experienced Wikimedia developers and newcomers, organize developer >>>>> activities, and also improve the collaboration between the technical and >>>>> non-technical contributors in these regions. >>>>> >>>>> Better retention of newcomers at the Wikimedia and Wikimania hackathons >>>>> Although we don't expect major changes in the organization of the >>>>> Wikimedia Hackathon and the hackathon at Wikimania, we want to focus >>>>> better >>>>> on new developers onboarding and retention. In every Hackathon we meet >>>>> many >>>>> new developers, but the retention rates are very low. We want to review >>>>> what we can do before, during, and after these apparently successful >>>>> events >>>>> in order to retain newcomers better. One hypothesis is that we should >>>>> focus >>>>> call for participation, scholarships, and Wikimedia Foundation >>>>> participation in providing a great experience to new volunteers who have >>>>> gone through local and regional events, and also "junior" developers >>>>> coming >>>>> from wiki projects through the development of bots, gadgets, tools, >>>>> templates. >>>>> >>>>> A smaller and more focused Wikimedia Developer Summit >>>>> After some discussions between Community Engagement, Technology, and >>>>> Product, we have decided to propose a different approach for the Wikimedia >>>>> Developer Summit. Organized by the Technology department as part of their >>>>> technical >>>>> community building >>>>> <https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_Foundation_Annual_Plan/2017-2018/Draft/Programs/Technology#Program_4:_Technical_community_building> >>>>> efforts, we want the Summit to finally become the venue where the toughest >>>>> technical problems are discussed between the stakeholders directly >>>>> related. >>>>> We want to reduce the size/budget of the event, separate it from the WMF >>>>> AllHands, >>>>> >>>> Due to travel budget considerations, the Summit still might be connected to >>>> the WMF AllHands. >>>> >>>> >>>>> and define its main themes well in advance. >>>>> >>>>> A Program Committee<https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T160996> would >>>>> decide these main themes to be discussed at the Summit. We also want to >>>>> explore the possibility of tackling some of these themes at the Wikimedia >>>>> Hackathon and Wikimania, where we could get most stakeholders involved >>>>> with >>>>> just a little extra effort (since many of them would be attending anyway). >>>>> >>>>> We believe that this approach will serve better the Wikimedia technical >>>>> community that we have, and also the the community that we want to have, >>>>> with a new wave of developers joining our various projects. >>>>> >>>>> -- >>>>> Quim Gil >>>>> Engineering Community Manager @ Wikimedia Foundation >>>>> http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/User:Qgil >>>>> >>> _______________________________________________ >>> Wikitech-l mailing list >>> Wikitech-l@lists.wikimedia.org >>> https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l >> >> _______________________________________________ >> Wikitech-l mailing list >> Wikitech-l@lists.wikimedia.org >> https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l > > > > > _______________________________________________ > Wikitech-l mailing list > Wikitech-l@lists.wikimedia.org > https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l _______________________________________________ Wikitech-l mailing list Wikitech-l@lists.wikimedia.org https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l
