Talk:Wikimedia Community Developers Group

Archives

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Discussion/voting

Any interested editors are invited to discuss and vote on the below proposals for this user group — TheresNoTime (talk • they/them) 04:57, 22 December 2022 (UTC)

Not trying to be a jerk, why is everything already at a voting stage without room for discussion first? Previously we had discussed what the scope and role of a hypothetical community developers group should be and it's really not clear to me how this proposal addresses the issues that were raised then. Legoktm (talk) 19:06, 23 December 2022 (UTC)

Please feel free to propose actionable improvements to the activities etc. below — TheresNoTime (talk • they/them) 20:06, 23 December 2022 (UTC)

I think it would be best if there was a clear set of goals for the user group that we could discuss first. The mission statement of "aims to foster closer collaboration between all developers" is a good mission, but doesn't really lend itself for figuring out what activities the group should be engaging in. I am still of the mind that we should be creating multiple groups and possibly a community developers "hub", but we have to start somewhere and that could easily be this group!

Based on below, "ensuring volunteer's patches do not languish in backlog-hell" could be a goal. Having that as a goal would let us discuss what approach is best to achieve that, rather than starting with the proposed solution of "code review-a-thons". I personally think that repeated check-ins and 1:1 guidance is much more fruitful to getting patches across the finish line and empowering contributors in the long run (c.f. Road to +2). I would love to see people try if code review-a-thons work, but right now there's nothing to measure whether they are successful or not. Fundamentally any code review solution needs to have people with +2 rights on board, and I don't really have a sense of what would incentivize those people to participate here.

I am pretty against having the "Single point of contact" and "Developer advocate" activities in principle, so I have no actionable improvements to propose. People will continue to post questions wherever they feel like it, to whoever happens to be around. I think having a single group try to advocate to the WMF will weaken power rather than grow it; we've seen how that was a goal for MWStake and I think it backfired.

It's hard for me to evaluate the desire to be a thematic organization without more details and context. A thematic organization means there's a legal non-profit entity. Why is that a benefit here? What would having a separate non-profit entity help this group achieve that it couldn't otherwise?

Finally, I'm very surprised by the "Proposed eligibility criteria" and your support for it. I do not intend to join any group that does not have following the Technical Code of Conduct as a requirement. Legoktm (talk) 06:30, 24 December 2022 (UTC)

@Legoktm: Thank you for these points, and for raising them here — I know we've discussed some parts of this previously on Discord, but in the spirit of transparency and doing things "the wiki way" it's great to be able to start the conversation here so that (hopefully) we can find a solution collaboratively. The concerns and comments you've raised deserve more time than I can commit on Christmas Eve, but I did want to initially respond to your final comment on the proposed eligibility criteria — you're absolutely correct, and I should have explicitly mentioned this rather than assumed it was implicit. I'll make a change now. I really value your thoughts on this and look forward to trying to figure out how to proceed — TheresNoTime (talk • they/them) 19:40, 24 December 2022 (UTC)

I am interested in finding ways to lower the barrier to learn programming. For that I looked at and use alternative ways of programming. So for example programming with visual programming languages or Spreadsheet functions. There is the Programming Languages Diversity Project page here in Metawiki I have edited in the last days and what is still under construction. The goal is to collect examples for such alternative ways of programming and try to enable people to use these ways of programming within the Wikimedia projects. I have participated in workshops of Small Wiki Toolkits. And it is from my point of view a good example of support. There is a telegram group and there I aksed a question and got answers. It was interesting and I think when I need help in a topic I usually ask at a related project and not an user group. So I am not sure if you reach enough people when you are only a user group. For coordination I prefer thematic pages. I am interested in participating in the user group. Getting support when contributing to the Wikimedia project code base as a newcomer is important and I hope that it is possible to find enough people who are interested in supporting newcomers.--Hogü-456 (talk) 20:20, 6 January 2023 (UTC)

Proposed activities

Code reviews

Leading code review-a-thons to ensure volunteer's patches do not languish in backlog-hell.

1.  Support — TheresNoTime (talk • they/them) 03:35, 22 December 2022 (UTC)
2.  Support Chlod (say hi!) 06:44, 22 December 2022 (UTC)
3.  Strong support Remagoxer (talk) 07:54, 22 December 2022 (UTC)
4.  Support EpicPupper (talk) 20:14, 22 December 2022 (UTC)

Supporting high-impact tools

Helping pair developers with high impact tools looking to build a more resilient development team.

1.  Support, and we should probably reach out to the technical engagement team — TheresNoTime (talk • they/them) 03:35, 22 December 2022 (UTC)
2.  Support (strongly) Chlod (say hi!) 06:44, 22 December 2022 (UTC)
3.  Support Remagoxer (talk) 07:54, 22 December 2022 (UTC)
4.  Support EpicPupper (talk) 20:14, 22 December 2022 (UTC)

Single point of contact

Become a "single point of contact" for community developers unsure of whom to contact/how to proceed with a desired technical outcome.

1.  Support — TheresNoTime (talk • they/them) 03:35, 22 December 2022 (UTC)
2.  Support Chlod (say hi!) 06:44, 22 December 2022 (UTC)
3.  Support Remagoxer (talk) 07:54, 22 December 2022 (UTC)
4.  Support EpicPupper (talk) 20:14, 22 December 2022 (UTC)

Discussion

• I'm curious what is meant by this item. How would it be done, exactly? I'm nervous about the idea of creating another location for questions; but would 100% support either: more people being active/watchlisting the existing locations, or anyone helping to consolidate/clean/improve the existing locations. (I.e. mw:Communication is already overwhelming, and omits the hundreds of local VPTs/etc.) Hope that helps! Quiddity (talk) 20:45, 22 December 2022 (UTC)

  @Quiddity: It's a valid concern — this certainly wouldn't be "another place to ask questions", and I'm personally thinking more of a consolidation effort. Although our documentation can always be improved, often the answers are Out There™ and I'm hoping the collective knowledge of the members would lend itself to pointing people in the right direction. — TheresNoTime (talk • they/them) 03:29, 23 December 2022 (UTC)

• Removed per Special:Permalink/24327911#Boldly reducing the initial/future aims — TheresNoTime (talk • they/them) 17:53, 4 January 2023 (UTC)

Developer advocate

Advocate on behalf of the group to the appropriate areas of the Wikimedia Foundation on issues which affect developers.

1.  Support — TheresNoTime (talk • they/them) 03:35, 22 December 2022 (UTC)
2.  Support Remagoxer (talk) 07:54, 22 December 2022 (UTC)
3.  Support EpicPupper (talk) 20:14, 22 December 2022 (UTC)

Discussion

• Removed per Special:Permalink/24327911#Boldly reducing the initial/future aims — TheresNoTime (talk • they/them) 17:53, 4 January 2023 (UTC)

Proposed eligibility criteria

Any active member of the Wikimedia Community

We seek to encourage newer developers and help build their skills — as such, our eligibility criteria have been made to be as open as possible. Any active member of the Wikimedia Community is eligible to join this user group, providing they abide by the code of conduct for Wikimedia technical spaces.

1.  Support — TheresNoTime (talk • they/them) 04:49, 22 December 2022 (UTC)

    Note: Modified to explicitly mention the code of conduct for Wikimedia technical spaces — TheresNoTime (talk • they/them) 19:43, 24 December 2022 (UTC)

2.  Strong support Remagoxer (talk) 07:54, 22 December 2022 (UTC)
3.  Support EpicPupper (talk) 20:14, 22 December 2022 (UTC)

Boldly reducing the initial/future aims

Based off the detailed and appreciated comments above by Legoktm, I am boldly reducing the initial activities to:

• Leading code review-a-thons to ensure volunteer's patches do not languish in backlog-hell.
• Helping pair developers with high impact tools looking to build a more resilient development team.

and removing the future aims section, to ensure we can focus on practical and useful improvements first and foremost.

@Legoktm: I intend to respond to your comments in detail, and this change only begins to address the points made — I hope reducing and redefining the focus of the user group can lead to some constructive discussion on how to address the foreseeable problems. — TheresNoTime (talk • they/them) 17:44, 4 January 2023 (UTC)