Community building progress

[Noah Slater <ns...@apache.org>]

Hi folks,

What's the status of the community building efforts we previously
discussed? Which initiatives have been put into practice, and how did
they turn out? Are we planning to expand our efforts in this area?

Thanks,

-- 
Noah Slater
https://twitter.com/nslater

Re: Community building progress

[Henry Saputra <he...@gmail.com>]

Also Kasper had reached out to Apache Gora community to possible
integration work.

This is all good work to build out the community

On Saturday, September 20, 2014, Kasper Sørensen <
i.am.kasper.sorensen@gmail.com> wrote:

> Hi Noah,
>
> I didn't really keep a record of which initiatives where launched
> specifically to build community or just as general steps forward. But I
> think we've had a few good things happen since last we talked on the
> subject at least.
>
> Specifically to build community we made the twitter account. Not a very
> busy account still, but it's a small step.
> I did make the CONTRIBUTE.md file and mark a bunch of JIRA tickets as
> "starter" tickets. I can't really say if this have had any impact.
>
> BUT I do see a couple of very nice developments during the last month or
> two:
>
> 1) We added our first non-initial committer to the project, Tomasz
> Guzialek. Tomasz was doing his masters thesis at Human Inference, so his
> involvement can be traced back to that though.
>
> 2) Someone external to the community (Niels H. Christensen) actually
> contributed with a very nice blog post [1] and that sparked a lot of ideas
> in my head at least. The story behind this is that I met Niels through a
> friend and had a conversation with him about MetaModel. He found the
> project interesting and relevant to his research project, so decided to
> expand his research a little in this direction.
>
> 3) Just today we merged the quite big contribution by Alberto Rodriguez,
> the ElasticSearch module.
>
> 4) Also I am very excited to see the talk and work being made on new
> operator types by Francisco Javier Cano Bailen.
>
> All 4 contributions are great IMO, but I would point out that Alberto and
> Francisco are both cases of people joining the community without any "real
> life" interaction prior to the involvement. I guess this kind of community
> activity is a very positive sign and tells that we're able to attract
> people to the project online too.
>
> I hope this gives some insight. What's your impression of the progress? Do
> you have more ideas or wishes?
>
> Best regards,
> Kasper
>
> [1]
>
> https://semanticwebrecipes.wordpress.com/2014/08/25/offering-semantic-web-data-in-apache-metamodel/
>
> 2014-09-20 17:00 GMT+02:00 Noah Slater <nslater@apache.org <javascript:;>
> >:
>
> > Hi folks,
> >
> > What's the status of the community building efforts we previously
> > discussed? Which initiatives have been put into practice, and how did
> > they turn out? Are we planning to expand our efforts in this area?
> >
> > Thanks,
> >
> > --
> > Noah Slater
> > https://twitter.com/nslater
> >
>

Re: Community building progress

[Noah Slater <ns...@apache.org>]

Thanks Henry.

Nope we don't need bylaws or a CoC, but I believe they could help
attract contributors. We learnt on CouchDB that if you don't have
bylaws, nobody really knows how the project works, or what the rolls
are, and I think that holds back contribution.

We could copy the CouchDB bylaws, change a few references to
MetaModel, and then vote them in. Assuming that the way we do things
on CouchDB is compatible with how this community wants to operate.

Similarly, I think establishing even a minimal CoC which will be
enforced by the PMC opens up this project to contributions from people
who might not contribute otherwise.

Certainly not graduation blockers. But I consider these to be very
important for all ASF projects.

On 21 September 2014 00:19, Henry Saputra <he...@gmail.com> wrote:
> Thx for input Noah.
>
> We have twitter account already and had been tweeting news about MM.
> Kasper also have blogged about new features in MM.
> I think this is why we got some new contributors lately.
>
> As for website, yes we need to update with ways to contribute evangelize it
> more.
>
> For by laws and conducts, seemed like the last input from IPMCs we don't
> need for now.
> It could slow down contributions if we don't get it right and many projects
> didn't get it right.
>
> - HS
>
> On Saturday, September 20, 2014, Noah Slater <ns...@apache.org> wrote:
>
>> Thanks for the update.
>>
>> Have you thought about setting up a project blog and tweeting out
>> progress, news, things going on in wider ecosystem? Each blog post is
>> an opportunity to tweet and to share the link on Reddit, Hacker News,
>> and so on.
>>
>> Same thing with releases. What's the current release cadence like?
>> Making regular (even if small) releases serves as a sort of heart beat
>> for the project, and can be very useful for drumming up interest.
>>
>> Basically, we should be looking for opportunities to get the word out
>> about the project.
>>
>> Some comments on the website:
>>
>> We don't mention "contribution" anywhere. While the website is
>> obviously intended for downstream users, we should also be thinking of
>> it as an job advertisement. We are looking to recruit people to the
>> project. What can we do to make this happen?
>>
>> cf. http://couchdb.apache.org/#contribute
>>
>> I'd also suggest we think about establishing some bylaws and a code of
>> conduct.
>>
>> cf. http://couchdb.apache.org/bylaws.html
>> cf. http://couchdb.apache.org/conduct.html
>>
>> Both documents help to make the project more welcoming.
>>
>> --
>> Noah Slater
>> https://twitter.com/nslater
>>



-- 
Noah Slater
https://twitter.com/nslater

Re: Community building progress

[Henry Saputra <he...@gmail.com>]

Thx for input Noah.

We have twitter account already and had been tweeting news about MM.
Kasper also have blogged about new features in MM.
I think this is why we got some new contributors lately.

As for website, yes we need to update with ways to contribute evangelize it
more.

For by laws and conducts, seemed like the last input from IPMCs we don't
need for now.
It could slow down contributions if we don't get it right and many projects
didn't get it right.

- HS

On Saturday, September 20, 2014, Noah Slater <ns...@apache.org> wrote:

> Thanks for the update.
>
> Have you thought about setting up a project blog and tweeting out
> progress, news, things going on in wider ecosystem? Each blog post is
> an opportunity to tweet and to share the link on Reddit, Hacker News,
> and so on.
>
> Same thing with releases. What's the current release cadence like?
> Making regular (even if small) releases serves as a sort of heart beat
> for the project, and can be very useful for drumming up interest.
>
> Basically, we should be looking for opportunities to get the word out
> about the project.
>
> Some comments on the website:
>
> We don't mention "contribution" anywhere. While the website is
> obviously intended for downstream users, we should also be thinking of
> it as an job advertisement. We are looking to recruit people to the
> project. What can we do to make this happen?
>
> cf. http://couchdb.apache.org/#contribute
>
> I'd also suggest we think about establishing some bylaws and a code of
> conduct.
>
> cf. http://couchdb.apache.org/bylaws.html
> cf. http://couchdb.apache.org/conduct.html
>
> Both documents help to make the project more welcoming.
>
> --
> Noah Slater
> https://twitter.com/nslater
>

Re: Community building progress

[Noah Slater <ns...@apache.org>]

Thanks for the update.

Have you thought about setting up a project blog and tweeting out
progress, news, things going on in wider ecosystem? Each blog post is
an opportunity to tweet and to share the link on Reddit, Hacker News,
and so on.

Same thing with releases. What's the current release cadence like?
Making regular (even if small) releases serves as a sort of heart beat
for the project, and can be very useful for drumming up interest.

Basically, we should be looking for opportunities to get the word out
about the project.

Some comments on the website:

We don't mention "contribution" anywhere. While the website is
obviously intended for downstream users, we should also be thinking of
it as an job advertisement. We are looking to recruit people to the
project. What can we do to make this happen?

cf. http://couchdb.apache.org/#contribute

I'd also suggest we think about establishing some bylaws and a code of conduct.

cf. http://couchdb.apache.org/bylaws.html
cf. http://couchdb.apache.org/conduct.html

Both documents help to make the project more welcoming.

-- 
Noah Slater
https://twitter.com/nslater

Re: Community building progress

[Kasper Sørensen <i....@gmail.com>]

Hi Noah,

I didn't really keep a record of which initiatives where launched
specifically to build community or just as general steps forward. But I
think we've had a few good things happen since last we talked on the
subject at least.

Specifically to build community we made the twitter account. Not a very
busy account still, but it's a small step.
I did make the CONTRIBUTE.md file and mark a bunch of JIRA tickets as
"starter" tickets. I can't really say if this have had any impact.

BUT I do see a couple of very nice developments during the last month or
two:

1) We added our first non-initial committer to the project, Tomasz
Guzialek. Tomasz was doing his masters thesis at Human Inference, so his
involvement can be traced back to that though.

2) Someone external to the community (Niels H. Christensen) actually
contributed with a very nice blog post [1] and that sparked a lot of ideas
in my head at least. The story behind this is that I met Niels through a
friend and had a conversation with him about MetaModel. He found the
project interesting and relevant to his research project, so decided to
expand his research a little in this direction.

3) Just today we merged the quite big contribution by Alberto Rodriguez,
the ElasticSearch module.

4) Also I am very excited to see the talk and work being made on new
operator types by Francisco Javier Cano Bailen.

All 4 contributions are great IMO, but I would point out that Alberto and
Francisco are both cases of people joining the community without any "real
life" interaction prior to the involvement. I guess this kind of community
activity is a very positive sign and tells that we're able to attract
people to the project online too.

I hope this gives some insight. What's your impression of the progress? Do
you have more ideas or wishes?

Best regards,
Kasper

[1]
https://semanticwebrecipes.wordpress.com/2014/08/25/offering-semantic-web-data-in-apache-metamodel/

2014-09-20 17:00 GMT+02:00 Noah Slater <ns...@apache.org>:

> Hi folks,
>
> What's the status of the community building efforts we previously
> discussed? Which initiatives have been put into practice, and how did
> they turn out? Are we planning to expand our efforts in this area?
>
> Thanks,
>
> --
> Noah Slater
> https://twitter.com/nslater
>