Re: Gobby notes from diversity/inclusion BOF/workshop, Cambridge
On Wed, Nov 16, 2016 at 3:14 AM, Gunnar Wolf wrote: > Yes. The Debian culture is cast around older tools. We work mostly via > (plain-text!) email and IRC. And yes, I will argue (and even prove, as > we did for an online conference ~10 years ago, where IRC was proven > better than any other alternatives because of many small details) that > they are much better suited to our work than that newfangled, > mobile-friendly, over-AJAXy technologies that lure youngsters > nowadays. I really doubt we will change our use of tools, but that is > an important hurdle to attract newcomers: Our way of communication > smells like it's 1995. And we like it to be uphill both ways. There is no reason our tools can't be friendly to folks used to web interfaces too. For example, Fedora seems to be doing some good work there: http://blog.linuxgrrl.com/2016/11/15/fedora-hubs-and-meetbot-a-recursive-tale/ "Note this follows our general principle of enabling new contributors while not uprooting our existing ones." -- bye, pabs https://wiki.debian.org/PaulWise
Re: Gobby notes from diversity/inclusion BOF/workshop, Cambridge
Adrian Bunk writes ("Re: Gobby notes from diversity/inclusion BOF/workshop,
Cambridge"):
> On Sat, Nov 12, 2016 at 02:23:35PM +, Ian Jackson wrote:
> >...
> > Robust discussion is important but the time to stop is *before*,
> > not after, it's become personal. Is it possible to have a
> > 'personality moderator' role in Debian which could be used to help
> > calm down argument?
> >...
I feel motivated to point out once again that I didn't write that
text, contrary to the impression given by your quotation. It's not
something I would have written and I don't care to defend it against
what reads to me like it is intended as a criticism.
Next time I post a gobby notes file in this way I will spend 5-10
minutes trying to draft a rubric that explains what the file is, how
it came to be, and what kind of things it can sensibly be used for.
I'm sorry for not doing that this time.
Thanks,
Ian.
--
Ian JacksonThese opinions are my own.
If I emailed you from an address @fyvzl.net or @evade.org.uk, that is
a private address which bypasses my fierce spamfilter.
Re: Gobby notes from diversity/inclusion BOF/workshop, Cambridge
Hello Gunnar, On Tue, Nov 15, 2016 at 01:14:24PM -0600, Gunnar Wolf wrote: > But... Most of us joined when we were perfectly classifiable as > "young". So, something has clearly changed in a project that attracted > twenty-somethingers twenty years ago...? > > So, Sean says something quite similar to what I was thinking: > > [...] > > Yes. The Debian culture is cast around older tools. We work mostly via > (plain-text!) email and IRC. And yes, I will argue (and even prove, as > we did for an online conference ~10 years ago, where IRC was proven > better than any other alternatives because of many small details) that > they are much better suited to our work than that newfangled, > mobile-friendly, over-AJAXy technologies that lure youngsters > nowadays. I really doubt we will change our use of tools, but that is > an important hurdle to attract newcomers: Our way of communication > smells like it's 1995. And we like it to be uphill both ways. Although I agree with you that our older-fashioned tools are probably putting some younger people off, I just wanted it to be clear that I was making a slightly different point in my previous message. The contrast I was invoking with many (not all) projects on GitHub was simply (i) the lag time between submitting work and getting feedback, and (ii) the number of revisions required before work is accepted. > When many of us joined (in my case, early 2000s), Free Software was a > strongly counter-cultural way to do something creative and challenge > the system. When I started getting involved with it (mid 1990s), it > was something our teachers never even imagined. That's a great way to > lure young people in... But nowadays, we are the teachers and, to a > given extent, we are the system — Free software has been there since > always. Free software runs the biggest enterprises in the world. What > is there that attracts young minds to us? Our superior package > management, or our beautiful policies? This is a very interesting thought. Thanks for sharing it. -- Sean Whitton signature.asc Description: PGP signature
Re: Gobby notes from diversity/inclusion BOF/workshop, Cambridge
On Sat, Nov 12, 2016 at 02:23:35PM +, Ian Jackson wrote: >... > Robust discussion is important but the time to stop is *before*, not after, > it's become personal. Is it possible to have a 'personality moderator' role in > Debian which could be used to help calm down argument? >... "personal" by the standards of which culture? As one example, polite/rude are partially the other way round in Germany and the UK, just like yes/no often have a swapped meaning in the UK. Worth reading: http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-politics-37799805 A quote from that article: "In Germany ... not saying what you mean is not forgiven. It's seen as dishonest, confused and ineffective." I am German. If you say "yes" when you mean "no", depending on the circumstances this is something I might consider a personal insult - and after that I might permanently consider you a dishonest person that cannot be trusted. I am pretty sure there are also lots of things I say or do that are completely normal and not rude in my culture, but might come across as rude to people in the UK or elsewhere. cu Adrian -- "Is there not promise of rain?" Ling Tan asked suddenly out of the darkness. There had been need of rain for many days. "Only a promise," Lao Er said. Pearl S. Buck - Dragon Seed
Re: Gobby notes from diversity/inclusion BOF/workshop, Cambridge
Thanks, Ian and Sean, first for publishing this Gobby notes, and then
for the interesting idea exchange that resulted. I wanted to answer to
Ian's mail on this same topic, but then Sean started writing things
that I resonate with... So, the original text posted by Ian (to which
Ian claims no authorship, of course) said:
> We are not doing well at attracting younger developers into the
> community. It can be very difficult to get younger people to attend
> because of the tendancy for younger people to be very
> self-conscious.
But... Most of us joined when we were perfectly classifiable as
"young". So, something has clearly changed in a project that attracted
twenty-somethingers twenty years ago...?
So, Sean says something quite similar to what I was thinking:
> Firstly, I intended to say more in my previous message about why we're
> having difficulty attracting younger developers. The reason I wrote
> that d-mentors is very different to d-devel was to make the point that
> self-consciousness probably isn't the reason we're having difficulty
> with younger developers. The kind of venues where new contributors
> engage are places where it /is/ comfortable to be wrong about something,
> so that's probably not why we're struggling.
>
> Secondly, let me suggest why I think we're having difficulty attracting
> younger developers. The issue is that patience is probably the number
> one virtue required for enjoying working in Debian, and young people are
> often impatient. I suspect that things like GitHub have made this
> worse. People get used to getting excited feedback on their pull
> requests made against fly-by-night JavaScript projects. Then they
> package something for Debian, and it takes two months before someone
> reviews it.
Yes. The Debian culture is cast around older tools. We work mostly via
(plain-text!) email and IRC. And yes, I will argue (and even prove, as
we did for an online conference ~10 years ago, where IRC was proven
better than any other alternatives because of many small details) that
they are much better suited to our work than that newfangled,
mobile-friendly, over-AJAXy technologies that lure youngsters
nowadays. I really doubt we will change our use of tools, but that is
an important hurdle to attract newcomers: Our way of communication
smells like it's 1995. And we like it to be uphill both ways.
The examples you give on d-mentors are quite interesting; I wouldn't
be able to tell, as I haven't been on that {list,channel} since I
don't have enough free time to do it (many years alreaedy).
There have been several attempts to bring a fresher interface to how
we coordinate and how users approach us; I can only think about
initiatives such as ask.debian.net, which is used and valuable, but
has IMO failed to gather critical mass; I have never seen my search
engine direct me to ask.d.n for any question, and it's only in the
back of my mind as a place I should someday try to look at...
When many of us joined (in my case, early 2000s), Free Software was a
strongly counter-cultural way to do something creative and challenge
the system. When I started getting involved with it (mid 1990s), it
was something our teachers never even imagined. That's a great way to
lure young people in... But nowadays, we are the teachers and, to a
given extent, we are the system — Free software has been there since
always. Free software runs the biggest enterprises in the world. What
is there that attracts young minds to us? Our superior package
management, or our beautiful policies?
So... Well, I also don't intend to present a solution, just a brain
dump (hopefully not following by the full core and a segfault) :)
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Description: Digital signature
Re: Gobby notes from diversity/inclusion BOF/workshop, Cambridge
Hello, On Mon, Nov 14, 2016 at 04:19:58PM +, Ian Jackson wrote: > > Did you mean that it is hard to get younger people to attend IRL events, > > like the minidebconf at which this discussion was held? Or are you > > saying that the self-consciousness that is common among younger people > > is repelling them from Debian more generally? > > The gobby session was a collaborative effort. Please don't think that > I wrote it all! I wrote very little of it. (And some of it is even > internally contradictory.) I don't remember which contributor made > the point you quote above IRL, or or who wrote the corresponding text. Ah, of course, sorry to imply that. > > If you meant the latter, I think that it is only places like the > > debian-devel ML and IRC channel where it's an issue. Places like > > the debian-mentors ML and IRC channel have an atmosphere in which it > > is much more comfortable to be wrong about something. I spent many > > months subscribed to only debian-mentors and some team mailing lists > > before feeling the need to subscribe to debian-devel too. > > Thanks for this useful insight. Can you tell us more about what > specific things people say or don't say that (on d-devel or d-mentors, > say) that make that easier ? > > Some examples (please file the names off if you are criticising) > would be nice. > > I suspect the answers may be obvious but I would like to hear your > opinion. Firstly, I intended to say more in my previous message about why we're having difficulty attracting younger developers. The reason I wrote that d-mentors is very different to d-devel was to make the point that self-consciousness probably isn't the reason we're having difficulty with younger developers. The kind of venues where new contributors engage are places where it /is/ comfortable to be wrong about something, so that's probably not why we're struggling. Secondly, let me suggest why I think we're having difficulty attracting younger developers. The issue is that patience is probably the number one virtue required for enjoying working in Debian, and young people are often impatient. I suspect that things like GitHub have made this worse. People get used to getting excited feedback on their pull requests made against fly-by-night JavaScript projects. Then they package something for Debian, and it takes two months before someone reviews it. We shouldn't feel the need to apologise for the fact that the RFS queue is slow, and that patience is a key virtue for being involved in Debian. It's a virtue, after all -- something people ought to develop. I think that part of the reason we're able to /retain/ more senior volunteers is that they know that they are not under any time pressure to react to requests for feedback (there was a long discussion about this on d-devel recently). Volunteer time is always our scarcest resource. However, the busywork involved in Debian packaging magnifies the need for patience such that we're driving away people who would otherwise be great contributors. This is why I recently wrote dgit-maint-merge(7). People can understand why it can take a long time to be sure that something satisfies DFSG, but they can't understand why they have to use quilt(1) or gbp-pq(1) to edit patch queues, or why they have to keep signing and uploading new source packages to mentors instead of typing `git push`. There are plenty of other examples of busywork we require of people beyond things related to 3.0 (quilt). Thirdly, let me address the question you actually asked :) I suspect that the fundamental difference is that on d-mentors there is a normative standard for the work people are trying to do -- our shared standard of a good Debian package, partially documented in Policy -- but on d-devel it is that very standard that is being continually hashed out. When a new contributor posts something to d-mentors, they know that they have probably not met the standard yet, and they want other people to help them figure out how they've failed to meet it. From the point of view of posting on d-mentors, the shared standard for a good Debian package is something fixed. By comparison, that standard is not seen as something fixed when one is posting on d-devel. It is simply more comfortable to be wrong about a fixed, impersonal standard, than it is to be wrong relative to the views of other people trying to hash out what the standard should be. Especially when they're at least a decade older than you. I don't have any particular examples of the point I'm making, except perhaps Gianfranco Costamagna's work on d-mentors. In his reviews, he always tries to get people to figure out why he's not satisfied with some aspect of their packaging by themselves, rather than just telling them what to change. (Other regular reviewers do this too; Gianfranco is just the most prominent.) This makes it clear that the standard is something that is just as accessible to the intellect of the reviewee as
Re: Gobby notes from diversity/inclusion BOF/workshop, Cambridge
Sean Whitton writes ("Re: Gobby notes from diversity/inclusion BOF/workshop,
Cambridge"):
> On Sat, Nov 12, 2016 at 02:23:35PM +, a gobby session contained:
> > We are not doing well at attracting younger developers into the community.
> > It can be very difficult to get younger people to attend because of the
> > tendancy for younger people to be very self-conscious.
>
> Did you mean that it is hard to get younger people to attend IRL events,
> like the minidebconf at which this discussion was held? Or are you
> saying that the self-consciousness that is common among younger people
> is repelling them from Debian more generally?
The gobby session was a collaborative effort. Please don't think that
I wrote it all! I wrote very little of it. (And some of it is even
internally contradictory.) I don't remember which contributor made
the point you quote above IRL, or or who wrote the corresponding text.
> If you meant the latter, I think that it is only places like the
> debian-devel ML and IRC channel where it's an issue. Places like the
> debian-mentors ML and IRC channel have an atmosphere in which it is much
> more comfortable to be wrong about something. I spent many months
> subscribed to only debian-mentors and some team mailing lists before
> feeling the need to subscribe to debian-devel too.
Thanks for this useful insight. Can you tell us more about what
specific things people say or don't say that (on d-devel or d-mentors,
say) that make that easier ?
Some examples (please file the names off if you are criticising)
would be nice.
I suspect the answers may be obvious but I would like to hear your
opinion.
Thanks,
Ian.
--
Ian JacksonThese opinions are my own.
If I emailed you from an address @fyvzl.net or @evade.org.uk, that is
a private address which bypasses my fierce spamfilter.
Re: Gobby notes from diversity/inclusion BOF/workshop, Cambridge
Hello, On Sat, Nov 12, 2016 at 02:23:35PM +, Ian Jackson wrote: > We are not doing well at attracting younger developers into the community. > It can be very difficult to get younger people to attend because of the > tendancy for younger people to be very self-conscious. Did you mean that it is hard to get younger people to attend IRL events, like the minidebconf at which this discussion was held? Or are you saying that the self-consciousness that is common among younger people is repelling them from Debian more generally? If you meant the latter, I think that it is only places like the debian-devel ML and IRC channel where it's an issue. Places like the debian-mentors ML and IRC channel have an atmosphere in which it is much more comfortable to be wrong about something. I spent many months subscribed to only debian-mentors and some team mailing lists before feeling the need to subscribe to debian-devel too. -- Sean Whitton signature.asc Description: PGP signature
Gobby notes from diversity/inclusion BOF/workshop, Cambridge
At the Cambridge minidebconf, we just had a BOF/workshop session on diversity and inclusion. These are the notes from the Gobby document. Thanks, Ian. gobby.debian.org /minidebconf-uk_2016/diversity-inclusion Lucy "Aardvark" Wayland kicking off BoF, but I am only facilitator. The idea is to get eveybody else involved. BTW - ambient microphones in lecture theatre are going to be turned on for this session, but this one only. One view is that Debian is quite diverse already, even if some groups are not populous? How do we turn acceptance into proactive inclusivity? Ian points out that surviving in Debian requires a high level of ability to push and promote your own opinion - 'fighting'. The threshold for saying "this is an issue for me" is high There is a degree to which socratic discussions have virtue; it's important to be able to argue a position well. At the same time, it's important to develop a culture where it's safe to be wrong or to disagree—at least on technical matters. Robust discussion is important but the time to stop is *before*, not after, it's become personal. Is it possible to have a 'personality moderator' role in Debian which could be used to help calm down argument? We are not doing well at attracting younger developers into the community. It can be very difficult to get younger people to attend because of the tendancy for younger people to be very self-conscious. It is hard to moderate open fora because the mere act of making a forum open and inclusive means that it is procedurally more difficult to prevent unpleasant interaction. It is difficult to solve social problems with technical measures. It is often easy and appropriate to mitigate social problems with technical measures. Debian Code of Conduct; anti-harassm...@debian.org; da-mana...@debian.org (but: depends on the mode of communication, e.g. for lists contact listmasters) Being proactive with diversity: Outreach programs; DebConf diversity bursaries... ? Sign up: outreach mailing list/alias More stuff on the front page of www.debian.org about diversity / welcoming new contributors. Make it very clear that we need help! Make www.debian.org less technical, more social. (new website foo required so it's not a complete PITA to change anything!) It's valuable and important for established members to serve as role-models for newer members to follow, particularly when conflicts are occurring—to show what the standard is. Diversity statement should be on front page below Social Contract -- Ian JacksonThese opinions are my own. If I emailed you from an address @fyvzl.net or @evade.org.uk, that is a private address which bypasses my fierce spamfilter.
