August Platform Ops Community Hacking meeting

[Joel Maher]

Today we met to discuss a few items, the raw notes are here:
https://public.etherpad-mozilla.org/p/platform-ops-community

The next meeting will be in 4 weeks on September 13th at 13:00 PDT.

We have a todo list:
** [jmaher] write a summary of QoC and things to do next time from the list above
** [jmaher] get nntp mirroring working so thunderbird users can see messages
** [jgriffin] sync with Jan about Janitor to get a contributor to give good feedback and build a roadmap
*** [jmaher] - find a contributor to help with a roadmap
** [ahal] create platform ops "planet"

The primary discussion was a focused on how we can do better at mentoring and growing our mentors on the team (both in strength and volume). While this is a common subject to discuss every other meeting, some new ideas came to the table:
* pairing up mentors in project specific irc channels for offloading help on logistics and questions in channel.
* having 2 mentors per contributor, 1 for current bugs, 1 for general onboarding and backup support.
* mentor review bugs (good first/next bugs) and documentation. This scales better than a forum of people reviewing all bugs and documentation for all projects. This also gives an opportunity for mentors to be more helpful and supportive of each other, more projects, and in the end more contributors.

Please feel free to add topics to the etherpad for the next meeting, or send an email to jmaher [@] mozilla.com with questions or topics.

[kalpes...@gmail.com]

[martianwars]
I would like to add something here. The next iteration of QoC (Quarter of Contribution), could be on a larger scale where we have a few projects from TaskCluster and Releng along with A-Team projects.

In my opinion, a common form should be setup on mailing lists where people could post Mozilla related projects they'd like to mentor and have contributors on.

>From the last QoC, the major shortcoming was the lack of material incentive for new contributors. This time we gave all successful contributors t-shirts and a Mozilla letterhead certificate of completion. Maybe laptops next time? Though I don't know how feasible that is.

[Joel Maher]

On Wednesday, August 24, 2016 at 3:56:53 PM UTC-4, kalpes...@gmail.com wrote:
> [martianwars]
> I would like to add something here. The next iteration of QoC (Quarter of Contribution), could be on a larger scale where we have a few projects from TaskCluster and Releng along with A-Team projects.
>
> In my opinion, a common form should be setup on mailing lists where people could post Mozilla related projects they'd like to mentor and have contributors on.

I like the idea of encouraging others to participate. A simple google form would be realistic to put together- then a couple people follow up and help build up great projects.

>
> >From the last QoC, the major shortcoming was the lack of material incentive for new contributors. This time we gave all successful contributors t-shirts and a Mozilla letterhead certificate of completion. Maybe laptops next time? Though I don't know how feasible that is.

Personally I don't see the QoC as having a high enough quality bar like GSoC and Outreachy. I do think t-shirts, stickers, and a certificate of completion are great incentives, and much more than that would break away from the original intention of the program. We have QoC as a way for a contributor to have a dedicated mentor and a focused project that is useful to Mozilla. There is little in the way of requirements, possibly you struggle and fix 3 bugs, hopefully you have learned a lot and enjoyed your time. Others might build great tools and add a lot of features.