Open Source Educator (Part Six: How to Get Started) March 5, 2011

<polyachka> So what do you recommend for people who want to contribute to open source but don’t know how to start

<mchua> Funny you should say that, because Nicholas Whittier just came up with a blog post about that.

<mchua> (He’s new to open source himself and he’s writing about how he’s learning to participate in it.)

<mchua> http://imperialwicket.com/getting-started-in-open-source-part-2-where-can-i-take-these-courses

<polyachka> great

<mchua> So, I’m tempted to say “well, it depends…” but I know that newcomers sometimes really want those clear instructions. I’d say 3 things for them.

<mchua> First, start reading. Lurk everywhere you can – mailing lists, if you can figure out how to get on IRC channels, lurk there… read blog Planets – not just shiny press releases, you want to find where the actual contributors are talking and thinking out loud and hear what they’re saying.

<mchua> Second, start writing. Start thinking out loud. One of the things we lack the most in open source communities is newcomers telling us “hey, it’s hard to contribute because you haven’t allowed people to do X” – and if we don’t know that, we can’t fix it.

<mchua> I wish more people would do what Nicholas is doing, and write about what it feels like to be a newcomer to a project.

<mchua> That’s actually the most valuable contribution a newcomer can make – because experienced contributors can’t see those things any more, we’ve lost that ability – you’re the *only* people who can tell us how to make it easier for people like you to come help us.

<mchua> So don’t wait until you’re “good enough,” because you’re already good enough.

<mchua> Third, find some sort of scaffolding to help you – whether that’s an individual mentor who’s willing to help you through your first contribution, whether that’s an internship with a company that’s doing open source or something like Summer of Code…

<mchua> …attending a local hackathon (it’s often a great way for new people to get started – things go much faster in person) and contacting some people there beforehand and saying “hey, I’m new and want to start helping with your project, I’ll be at this event I saw you were going to, could you sit down with me and help me get started?”

<mchua> or going to the online versions of that – some projects have online classrooms for new folks – the Drupal Dojo, the Fedora Classroom.

<mchua> It’s about connecting with the people in that project as early and as fast as possible.

<mchua> And then you’ll figure out what basic skills you learn from there.

<mchua> I’d also say that for the “basic skills” part – one of the things I’ll be doing over the 2011-2012 (North American) school year is teaching online versions of that POSSE workshop for professors, except open to everyone and online (on IRC).

<mchua> http://teachingopensource.org/index.php/POSSE_modules has the topics – we haven’t set scheduling yet, but there’ll be one every two weeks during the school year.

What Are We Missing On The Map? January 29, 2011

Besides home/front page, that was described earlier on this blog, and is still in works, it feels like the map needs more interactive Help section and the Meeting place for sharing ideas, jobs, internships, event postings, etc. Here are my thoughts so far:

Help Section:

1. FAQ in pdf format and available via search (magic archive).

We can identify 20-50 most frequently asked questions from volunteers and XO/Sugar users that we get through RT and write them down with best possible answers maybe even with images. We also should  try to expand Nick’s initial write up, Mark Battley/Nancie Google Doc and other possible questions in story telling format. Then we’ll combine them in a pdf doc and also into the map so people can type the question in Search and get the answer via magic archive. It will also help transfer part of the support gang/RT work to the map and triage questions.

2. Answers by Live Caring Humans.

This part is for support gang to answer questions not frequently asked or very specific, related to certain topics requiring great share of expertise.   I think it will be much better in quality than yahoo answers as our support gang volunteers are more qualified in EduTEch area and it will be an opportunity for them to build public recognition as experts, if they want. Questions and answers could also be anonymous or under nick names to preserve participant’s identity. We can feature the best question of the week…

Meeting Place/Intersection:

1. Forum.

Discuss topics, new articles, olpcnews themes, any news, events, videos, etc. All that is happening now on support gang list, but has 100% value not only for 200 people on the list but whole OLPC community worldwide no matter what home country. That is the way for them to keep up to date on news/release, see and post comments.

2. Lampost.

a) “half-baked ideas” per Nick – Encounters/Treasures… People who have ideas but need either advice, partners, resources or something else… (example, someone wants to start a deployment in Laos and looking for sponsorship, etc.)

b) List of Volunteers, similar to Craigslist.org format…with possibly several fields to fill in and short intro what they are looking for (length, type of work, location, paid/non-paid, contact info)

c) Offers of grants, jobs, internships, etc.

 3.Global Calendar.

Upcoming events world-wide, markers can post their event here freely…

Very open questions:

How can we do multi-language support? If someone knows a better answer to the question in Help, should we prompt people to post it via olpcmap.net/share? When a question is posted for live caring humans, should it be emailed automatically to the right people, who sign up to receive those and answer by topic/area (potential ambassadors/mentors/SMEs)? In order to participate in discussions,  how do people identify themselves - with their email, marker  id or anonymously? Should some questions be answered off-line or all be on-line? Please send us your ideas as we are still working on the design of these pages. Thank you!