Victoria, Thanks for replying quickly, however what about the event I suggested, any thoughts on that?
On Fri, Apr 28, 2017 at 3:57 PM, Victoria Coleman <vcole...@wikimedia.org> wrote: > 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 > _______________________________________________ Wikitech-l mailing list Wikitech-l@lists.wikimedia.org https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l
