Islandora Slack?

[Melissa A]

Hello all,

The Islandora Roadmap Committee recently took up a discussion about whether the Islandora community might benefit from having a Slack[1] channel, run by the Islandora Foundation and taking advantage of their free licensing for non-profits. There are a lot of technical details to work out (hosting, maintenance, logging, etc), but before we delve into those, we thought it would be best to start off by surveying the community to see if there's interest in having a Slack channel at all.

Currently we use irc, Skype, Google Hangouts, and FreeConferenceCallHD for voice and text chatting. Slack could be an additional option, or we could try to move meetings from the existing options over to Slack, depending entirely on what the community prefers.

Please let us know if you're interested in having Slack as a channel for the Islandora community by answering this three-question survey[2].

Thanks!

- Melissa Anez

[1] https://slack.com/

[2] https://docs.google.com/forms/d/1XrAeItLcS0ucKoy_I_Oc8J-mO-5tTKh2tSgULwAGlvM

[Cary Gordon]

What model are you considering for Slack adoption?

If you intend to replace your other options with Slack, presumably you are looking at the paid service. I have little experience with that, but I do use Slack as an open channel for our team, and I use the slack channels for other projects. All of these use the free version, which has limits, many of which can be worked around with integrations and bots. The 10k message storage limit is an example of a limit that can be dealt with by a bot.

I like Slack, but for me the issue is that it is a big jump between the free version and the paid version, and it is one we can't justify.

Thanks,

Cary

[Danny Lamb]

FWIW I think IRC and FreeConferenceCallHD work just fine. If anything we should just stop using Skype and Google Hangouts before rushing to Slack.

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[Alex Garnett]

Given that Islandora is one of the only communities that I still connect to via freenode IRC (and Slack supports generic IRC endpoints if the channel admin enables them), this would probably simplify things for others in my position... political views on Slack having cannibalized IRC notwithstanding.

On Wednesday, April 5, 2017 at 1:23:49 AM UTC+2, Danny Lamb wrote:

FWIW I think IRC and FreeConferenceCallHD work just fine. If anything we should just stop using Skype and Google Hangouts before rushing to Slack.

On Apr 4, 2017 12:37 PM, "Melissa A" <meliss...@gmail.com> wrote:

Hello all,

The Islandora Roadmap Committee recently took up a discussion about whether the Islandora community might benefit from having a Slack[1] channel, run by the Islandora Foundation and taking advantage of their free licensing for non-profits. There are a lot of technical details to work out (hosting, maintenance, logging, etc), but before we delve into those, we thought it would be best to start off by surveying the community to see if there's interest in having a Slack channel at all.

Currently we use irc, Skype, Google Hangouts, and FreeConferenceCallHD for voice and text chatting. Slack could be an additional option, or we could try to move meetings from the existing options over to Slack, depending entirely on what the community prefers.

Please let us know if you're interested in having Slack as a channel for the Islandora community by answering this three-question survey[2].

Thanks!

- Melissa Anez

[1] https://slack.com/

[2] https://docs.google.com/forms/d/1XrAeItLcS0ucKoy_I_Oc8J-mO-5tTKh2tSgULwAGlvM

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[soro...@gmail.com]

+1 to this.

---
A. Soroka
The University of Virginia Library

> On Apr 4, 2017, at 7:23 PM, Danny Lamb <dl...@islandora.ca> wrote:
>
> FWIW I think IRC and FreeConferenceCallHD work just fine. If anything we should just stop using Skype and Google Hangouts before rushing to Slack.
>
> On Apr 4, 2017 12:37 PM, "Melissa A" <meliss...@gmail.com> wrote:
> Hello all,
>
> The Islandora Roadmap Committee recently took up a discussion about whether the Islandora community might benefit from having a Slack[1] channel, run by the Islandora Foundation and taking advantage of their free licensing for non-profits. There are a lot of technical details to work out (hosting, maintenance, logging, etc), but before we delve into those, we thought it would be best to start off by surveying the community to see if there's interest in having a Slack channel at all.
>
> Currently we use irc, Skype, Google Hangouts, and FreeConferenceCallHD for voice and text chatting. Slack could be an additional option, or we could try to move meetings from the existing options over to Slack, depending entirely on what the community prefers.
>
> Please let us know if you're interested in having Slack as a channel for the Islandora community by answering this three-question survey[2].
>
> Thanks!
>
>
> - Melissa Anez
>
> [1] https://slack.com/
> [2] https://docs.google.com/forms/d/1XrAeItLcS0ucKoy_I_Oc8J-mO-5tTKh2tSgULwAGlvM
>
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> For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
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[Jennifer Eustis]

I wonder if using Slack might add too many options on the table. Skype and Google Hangout have their obvious flaws. I've gotten used to the free conference call - can people share their screen with this service? But I think we use Nick's free conference number for certain things. Would it make sense to create an Islandora free conference number so it's not linked to a person? I guess the question that's at the back of my mind is what would we gain with Slack?  Having slack as an additional option might cause more of a fractured discourse in the community. Would people participate only in the communication channel that they prefer? 

Jennifer

[Nick Ruest]

> But I think we use Nick's free conference number for certain things.
Would it make sense to create an Islandora free conference number so
it's not linked to a person?

The registration information has been transferred over to the foundation.

-nruest

On 2017-04-05 09:13 AM, Jennifer Eustis wrote:
> I wonder if using Slack might add too many options on the table. Skype
> and Google Hangout have their obvious flaws. I've gotten used to the
> free conference call - can people share their screen with this service?
> But I think we use Nick's free conference number for certain things.
> Would it make sense to create an Islandora free conference number so
> it's not linked to a person? I guess the question that's at the back of
> my mind is what would we gain with Slack? Having slack as an additional
> option might cause more of a fractured discourse in the community. Would
> people participate only in the communication channel that they prefer?
>
> Jennifer
>
> On Wednesday, April 5, 2017 at 8:51:37 AM UTC-4, A. Soroka wrote:
>
> +1 to this.
>
> ---
> A. Soroka
> The University of Virginia Library
>
>
>
> > On Apr 4, 2017, at 7:23 PM, Danny Lamb <dl...@islandora.ca

> <javascript:>> wrote:
> >
> > FWIW I think IRC and FreeConferenceCallHD work just fine. If
> anything we should just stop using Skype and Google Hangouts before
> rushing to Slack.
> >
> > On Apr 4, 2017 12:37 PM, "Melissa A" <meliss...@gmail.com

> send an email to islandora+...@googlegroups.com <javascript:>.

> > Visit this group at https://groups.google.com/group/islandora

> <https://groups.google.com/group/islandora>.

> > To view this discussion on the web visit
> https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/islandora/CAMGDzwCjmdOu8GQ1v4-TnjFkwnZMK8sQR7wo%3Dd6_b%3DneMbOCUA%40mail.gmail.com

> <https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/islandora/CAMGDzwCjmdOu8GQ1v4-TnjFkwnZMK8sQR7wo%3Dd6_b%3DneMbOCUA%40mail.gmail.com>.

>
> > For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout

> <https://groups.google.com/d/optout>.

> >
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>
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> <https://groups.google.com/d/optout>.

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[Tom Cramer]

Weighing in from Hydra-land, we're making extensive, effective use of Slack, via the free service. We work around the 10,000 message limit by archiving public channels to slackarchive.io. The various interest and working groups have distinct channels, and ad hoc conversations (such as for one-time meetings or, ahem, #branding!) can easily spin up in new channels. Having a cross-community IM channel & directory has also proven useful. At this point, it has supplanted a lot of the traffic that would have otherwise gone to one of the lists. We never really had a pan-project presence on IRC (and people still use Skype?!?)--so it has taken off organically. We haven't found it to be a replacement for calls or videoconferencing, but rather a useful (and persistent) backchannel for sharing, links, agendas, etc. Of course YMMV, but overall I think it's proven a definite asset for us. 

- Tom

[dric...@utk.edu]

IRC and FreeConferenceCallHD is 2 places for one conversation. There has got to be a simple place we can do both. 

On Tuesday, April 4, 2017 at 7:23:49 PM UTC-4, Danny Lamb wrote:

FWIW I think IRC and FreeConferenceCallHD work just fine. If anything we should just stop using Skype and Google Hangouts before rushing to Slack.

On Apr 4, 2017 12:37 PM, "Melissa A" <meliss...@gmail.com> wrote:

Hello all,

The Islandora Roadmap Committee recently took up a discussion about whether the Islandora community might benefit from having a Slack[1] channel, run by the Islandora Foundation and taking advantage of their free licensing for non-profits. There are a lot of technical details to work out (hosting, maintenance, logging, etc), but before we delve into those, we thought it would be best to start off by surveying the community to see if there's interest in having a Slack channel at all.

Currently we use irc, Skype, Google Hangouts, and FreeConferenceCallHD for voice and text chatting. Slack could be an additional option, or we could try to move meetings from the existing options over to Slack, depending entirely on what the community prefers.

Please let us know if you're interested in having Slack as a channel for the Islandora community by answering this three-question survey[2].

Thanks!

- Melissa Anez

[1] https://slack.com/

[2] https://docs.google.com/forms/d/1XrAeItLcS0ucKoy_I_Oc8J-mO-5tTKh2tSgULwAGlvM

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[Jonathan Green]

My aversion to slack for an open source project is that slack isn’t open source, it requires users to register with a third party, and not everyone can just join the channel. This is mainly because Slack is a team communication tool, not an open community communication tool.

 

There are ways around the closed registration: https://github.com/rauchg/slackin

But then we need to host this thing as well.

 

The open source projects that Islandora is most closely involved with, Drupal and Fedora both have IRC channels, which means that most people involved in Islandora have to be on IRC anyway.

 

IRC is a little archaic, however there are web clients available. On OSX Limechat is a nice.

 

Here is some more anti-slack propaganda that I really like for everyone to consider ☺

http://sircmpwn.github.io/2015/11/01/Please-stop-using-slack.html

https://medium.freecodecamp.com/so-yeah-we-tried-slack-and-we-deeply-regretted-it-391bcc714c81

 

Cheers.

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[Rosemary Le Faive]

My aversion to Slack is because I don't like it. I don't like interacting with it.

With IRC, you can pay attention, or not, and if you don't there's not much chance that you've missed anything. It's a passive backchannel with a way to ping people if you want their immediate attention. It's like the chatter over by the water cooler, if the Islandora Community were an office. 

When we use Skype (or hangouts, or conference calls) we are having a "meeting" and everyone's assumed to be present/paying attention. It's like a conference room.

We use the google group/listserv (this) when we want longer, full-community discussions or to make official announcements. It's like the office... memos? You can probably find the important information you're looking for that was posted here without too much trouble. It threads the discussions nicely and you can link to particular posts or replies.

But Slack, in my experience, tries to command your attention all the time, even if it's not something that you need to be paying attention to. It's like having an extreme open-concept office: everyone has to listen to everyone's conversation and nobody can get any focused work done. Even if you set it to "do not disturb" and come back after a while, it's a commitment to "get caught up". 

Like many modern addictive apps, I think it was designed to promote engagement with the platform, and it is very good at that. But I don't think it improves our current ability to engage with people. 

[jy]

We use slack here in our office and I agree with Rosemary's assessment.

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[Dean, Robin]

If the objection is to Slack specifically (rather than to any non-IRC team chat software), what about something like Atlassian HipChat or Mattermost? Those can both be locally hosted and have free options. Mattermost is open source.

https://about.mattermost.com/

https://www.hipchat.com/

 

That said, I think you’d get the most use by picking Slack. Code4Lib, Hydra, and DLF-related groups come to mind as library communities that overlap with Islandora and already have a Slack presence. Drupal also has various Slack channels. https://www.drupal.org/slack

 

I like the idea of being able to have a “general” Islandora channel and connected, optional channels for the interest groups or release teams. It’s good to hear this model is working in the Hydra community.

 

Thanks to Melissa and the roadmap committee for starting the discussion!

 

Robin

 

[soro...@gmail.com]

I think Jonathan's statement is really useful here:

"...Slack is a team communication tool, not an open community communication tool."

All of these products are for team use. There's nothing wrong with that; on the contrary, that makes them useful. But is the Islandora community trying to provide itself software development team tools, or community development tools? They are inevitably different.

---
A. Soroka
The University of Virginia Library

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[Melissa Anez]

Thank you everyone for the great discussion around this topic. After looking at the statements here and at the results of the survey, the Roadmap Committee has determined that there isn't currently enough interest to pursue setting up an Islandora Slack. 

Thank you,

- Melissa Anez