On 07/01/2013 08:10 PM, Quim Gil wrote:
On 06/29/2013 02:31 AM, Faidon Liambotis wrote:
Hi Sumanah,
On Fri, Jun 28, 2013 at 07:39:19PM -0400, Sumana Harihareswara wrote:
https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Wikimedia_Engineering/2013-14_Goals#Wikimedia...
Back in April, Quim made a proposal on this list for a plan to attract new contributors that included a "deeper restructuring of our community spaces", including a reshuffling/repurposing of wikitech/mediawiki.org.
I think the outcome of that discussion was to run an experiment and reevaluate, but I might have lost track -- the Wikitech contributors RFC[1] shows no real updates since April though.
Thank you Faidon for bringing up that discussion. There were several outcomes out of it:
- Let's improve the main runways for new contributors but let's not
reshuffle wikitech/mediawiki.org right now.
- Let's focus on the onboarding & editor engagement tools to onboard and
engage technical contributors.
- Let's find specific audiences and areas to get new contributors right now.
https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Project:New_contributors#The_solution
This is reflected in several points of the plan shared by Sumana:
- Focus on the area of automated browser testing to bring a new breed of
Wikimedia contributors.
Keeping the focus on mentorship programs like OPW and GSoC.
Fluent connection with two pools of potential contributors: the
Wikimedia communities we serve (involving Tech Ambassadors) and the upstream FLOSS communities we depend on.
- Introduction of community metrics to analyze our contribution
workflows, where are the good practices and the bottlenecks.
In addition to this, in my (draft!) personal goals I'm proposing
To improve web pages and documentation for new contributors.
To promote DIY tasks for volunteers.
To promote and streamline the conversion path from Wikimedia user to
tech contributor.
A deeper restructuring sounds like goal material. Is this under consideration for the coming year?
A lesson (at least for me) from that discussion is that, even when the community agrees in deep restructuring, this must happen through small steps.
Absolutely personal opinion:
The release management of MediaWiki is planned to change, while tools like Echo API and Flow are also in the pipeline. These factors might lead to pragmatic ad-hoc restructuring steps in a way that no big plan discussed in advance could.
Basically, I think Quim represented well what Engineering Community Team learned from the discussion about the new tech contributor funnel, and how we're using those lessons and ideas in our 2013-2014 goals. Thanks, Quim!
Faidon wrote:
Personally, I'd love to see some movement in the wikitech/mediawiki split, I think it becomes increasingly important the further we invest into projects such as Wikimedia Labs/Tool Labs and bridging the gap between operations and software development.
That's an good point, and I would like to hear from more people to understand how many people think "yes, this is a crucial thing that Engineering Community ought to work on in [time period]".
Silke, Coren, Ryan and I are tentatively planning on a Tool Labs doc sprint July 23-25. I think that, as we update and consolidate relevant documentation during that sprint, we'll better understand what specific "missing manual" or "oops, wrong wiki" problems are blocking people, and we'll better see where transclusion, merging, and other technical solutions can help.
Thank you for the feedback, Faidon!