Hi Dragan,

Many thanks for your inputs.

On Wed, Oct 7, 2020 at 9:02 AM Dragan Espenschied <dragan.espenschied@rhizome.org> wrote:

Dear Mohammed,

Thank you for starting this initiative.

My input:
From what pool are you planning to draw these consultants? Given the state of documentation of Wikibase and all the components that are required to make it useful, only people with deep knowledge of the architecture can offer classic consulting jobs, as in, deliver a product in a given time frame for a pre-determined cost. And I think I already know everyone who would be able to do that personally :) What I would see as helpful from side of WMDE would be a mentoring program for developers and consultants, followed by a documentation effort that could be lead by the folks that received the mentoring.

For now, this directory is a first step toward establishing the list of providers that are currently active in the Wikibase ecosystem and making them visible to all. It is meant to cover not only those providing custom development work, but also those who can provide technical support in installing and setting up an instance. Additionally, there are Wikibase projects that have expressed interest in finding support in ontology development and data modeling.

We appreciate your suggestions around a mentoring program for a way forward. Helping the Wikibase ecosystem to have a sustainable service infrastructure is an ongoing process, and we will be eliciting more feedback on this topic in the coming months from the Wikibase community.

How are institutions interested in consultant work supposed to find this list? Is this going to be merged into existing resources, like wikiba.se or learningwikibase.com?

A link to the service provider directory will be added to wikiba.se [1] and we welcome other resources to do so too. We would like to give consultants some time in the next week or two to add themselves to the list before it is made more visible on the website.

Cheers,
Dragan

--
Dragan Espenschied
Preservation Director
Rhizome at the New Museum

On Mi, Okt 7, 2020 at 06:54, Mohammed Sadat Abdulai <mohammed.sadat_ext@wikimedia.de> wrote:
(Apologies for cross-posting)

Hi everyone,

I am happy to announce that a Wikibase-specific consultants directory is now available on Meta: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikibase_Consultants_and_Support_Providers

This service provider directory is intended to help people to find professional help with Wikibase if they need it -- be it technical support (installation and setup), custom development services, or data modeling expertise. You are welcome to add yourself if you think you or your company should be listed on the page.

This service directory is a work in progress as consultants add themselves. Please note that the inclusion of a service provider on these lists does not constitute an official endorsement by the Wikibase team.

If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to ask.

Cheers,

--
Mohammed Sadat
Community Communications Manager for Wikidata/Wikibase

Wikimedia Deutschland e.V.
Tempelhofer Ufer 23-24
10963 Berlin
www.wikimedia.de

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[1] phab:T265051

Mohammed Sadat

Community Communications Manager for Wikidata/Wikibase

Wikimedia Deutschland e.V.
Tempelhofer Ufer 23-24
10963 Berlin
www.wikimedia.de