My 2 cents....
I dont understand why we have to have an extension for every single project. It would make
sense if we assume that ed programs only work in one language and this tool had some
effect on the content of the project. We have worked in multiple languages, mostly Spanish
followed by English but in our past event last week, we tried translating articles about
Mexico into Danish, Swedish and French, taking "advantage" of our foreign
students. We also work a bit with Commons, not only uploading files, but providing
subtitles (boy, could we use a better way to do that... something like the tool on YouTube
as students are wasting a lot of time on figuring out times rather than focusing on
language) and improving/translating file descriptions (a good exercise for lower level
language classes). Right now, I cannot really track a lot of this without personal
reporting from students/teachers... many of whom do not understand the need to document so
precisely what we do.
A single education extension on Meta that could track user names across all projects, now
that we have global usernames, is much better going forward. I talked to a couple of
engineers during Wikimania 2015 who basically told me, in so many words, that the
extension as it is right now is not fixable, and needs to be replaced. Such a tool is
feasible as there are already tools that do similar things
(
e.g.https://tools.wmflabs.org/guc/index.php).
If we cannot get this done via the normal channels, we should look into alternatives, such
as partnering with one or more unis and maybe even find other sources of funding.
Leigh
From: akoval(a)wikimedia.org
Date: Wed, 30 Sep 2015 05:43:38 -0700
To: education(a)lists.wikimedia.org
CC: qgil(a)wikimedia.org; jalexander(a)wikimedia.org
Subject: Re: [Wikimedia Education] Education extension blocked?
The librarian in me couldn't resist providing a citation for Pine's and
Kevin's and Revi's points.
https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Developers/Maintainers#MediaWiki_extensions_…
This page may not be quite current. Until yesterday, the education program extension was
still marked as supported. The listed maintainer (and original developer of our dear
extension), Jeroen De Dauw, has not worked on it since 2012, afaict. [1] Nevertheless,
this page illustrates a pattern of neglect and abandonment. (Did I just actually type
that?? Ah well, truth to power...)
[1]
https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Wikipedia_Education_Program/status
--
Anna Koval, M.Ed.
Manager, Wikipedia Education Program
Wikimedia Foundation
+1.415.839.6885 x 6729Skype: annakoval.wiki
akoval(a)wikimedia.org
education.wikimedia.org
On Wed, Sep 30, 2015 at 1:04 AM, Pine W <wiki.pine(a)gmail.com> wrote:
That is a good point, Revi. And this is the kind of mess that makes me discouraged
sometimes. But I think that James' involvement will be helpful here, as will a
possible migration plan to a maintained tool.
(I've noticed a pattern recently of a few people separately deciding that they're
not going to maintain certain tools or projects any longer. This maintainability problem
really needs to be addressed, and is something that I'm hoping a CTO or VPE would
address head-on.)
On Wed, Sep 30, 2015 at 12:58 AM, Yongmin Hong <lists(a)revi.pe.kr> wrote:
2015. 9. 30. 오전 3:52에 "Floor Koudijs" <fkoudijs(a)wikimedia.xn--org>-4f21ay07k 작성:
The option that we are currently considering (and I
cannot yet guarantee a timeline or anything like that because we're in the middle of
the planning phase) is adapting the Wiki Ed Foundation's Dashboard to make it fit for
international use. See the Phabricator task here, and the related Phabricator project. We
would like to make this a feature project for the next round of Outreachy, which means
that we'll have a dedicated intern to work on this project full time for three months,
with the support of two mentors. If this works out as I hope it will, we may have
something ready before the next academic year - but again, no hard guarantees here. I am
currently working on getting the project shaped up, looking into mentors and confirming
with possible interns.
Two important points that were addressed in this
thread:
* Have community involvement early on. I really love
this idea, and I'm very grateful you're bringing this up and keep reminding us not
to forget about that. What I'd personally love to see is a group that can be involved
in advice, user testing and anything else on the user end that we may need. I'm
copying Quim Gil on this email to see if this fits within the scope of Outreachy, as he
may have some ideas around how to organize this best. We would have to be careful not too
derail the project with too ambitious ideas and suggestions, and focusing on attainable
and concrete tasks for the intern to work on. That said, having several minds involved in
this with different backgrounds could be hugely valuable, in my opinion.
* Think about maintenance. This is what I'm
currently looking into, since it's clear that the issue is not so much developing new
tools, but also looking ahead and making sure there will be ongoing support for these
tools. That's a longer discussion that wwill take place in parallel to the development
of the tool itself. This may not sound reassuring, but please trust that it's foremost
in all of our minds at WMF - we already have enough tools out there that don't get the
proper support, and we really don't want to build more.
I seriously doubt that the software will be
maintained after the internship period if this is Outreachy project.
The likely workflow:
1.The Outreachy term ends
2.User disappear/become inactive
3.We are going to get this same message again at some stage after new security
vulnerability is found.
Well, yeah, Flow, LQT, (ironic both tools are going to be not be developed)[1] etc etc.
[1]: context: Flow was developed with the purpose of 'replacing LQT/make discussion
easier' but I feel if they succeded to replace LQT fully.
(disclaimer: Flow is "not active development mode" according to the WMF team.)
--
revi
https://revi.me
-- Sent from Android --
_______________________________________________
Education mailing list
Education(a)lists.wikimedia.org
https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/education
_______________________________________________
Education mailing list
Education(a)lists.wikimedia.org
https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/education
_______________________________________________
Education mailing list
Education(a)lists.wikimedia.org
https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/education