advice on issue tracker for community software solutions

[mjumbewu]

Hi folks,

I'm looking to set up a system where local neighborhood associations
and community organizations can make requests for software design/
development assistence. I considered using a jobs board, but am now
leaning towards using an issue tracker to do this, so that
organizations can file an "issue", and then work with the community of
developers to get it resolved (fmi, see
http://kwawatu.blogspot.com/2010/06/philly-software-for-citizens_25.html#tracker).
I'm most familiar with bugzilla, but feel that it might be a bit
intimidating for non-tech folks (and some tech folks even). So, I was
wondering whether anyone has successfully used another issue tracker
for this. Alternatively, if you think there'd be a more appropriate
tool, I'm certainly open to suggestions.

Thanks,
- Mjumbe Poe

[Nick Grossman]

Hey Mjumbe,

One really easy way to get something like this started would be to use http://uservoice.com or http://ideascale.com -- neither of these is exactly what you're looking for (e.g., no notion of "closing" a ticket), but they are both good for getting your ideas / wish list out in public, and are super quick to set up.

Thanks for writing up that post, by the way -- here in NYC, we've actually been working on a similar problem.  What we're starting, in partnership with the Manhattan Borough President's office, is a monthly meetup to bring together neighborhood groups, community boards, and civic technologists -- the idea is to a) clarify some of the specific hurdles where better information/tech can help and b) start in on solutions, which can be really simple to start.  Take a look at http://meetup.com/SpeakUpNY for some more detail -- the next meeting is set for Monday, July 26th.  It's a bit of a hike from Philly, but you should definitely consider attending if you can -- we're talking about NY, but the issues obviously transfer.

More generally, this is something we've been working on with the folks from Code for America (http://codeforamerica.org) -- we are discussing ways to help build an infrastructure where this sort of needs/ideas/tools sharing for civic software could be made easier.  More on that soon.

Best,

Nick

--

Nick Grossman

Director of Civic Works

OpenPlans | http://openplans.org | (917) 388-9040 | @nickgrossman

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[Me]

@Nick: I will definitely try to make it up to the meetup.  Any idea how long the meeting will go?  I'll likely be bussing there and back, but I don't want to duck out too early.  And would it be alright if I invited a few people (don't know whether anyone else will be able to make it though).  And regarding Code for America: one of the reasons I'm doing this is because Philly is one of the 5 CfA cities this year.  I feel it would be good for us to have a strong civic software community so that gifts like those from CfA will thrive here.  Also, I want to set the bar high :).

@Matt: OpenAtrium looks pretty good.  I'll have to play with it, try out some sample scenarios.  I was considering going with a Drupal solution; good to see there's already a solid place to start from, at least.

Thanks for the replies folks!

 - Mjumbe

[Nick Grossman]

Great. The meeting is scheduled for 6:30pm - 8:30pm: You can see more
and RSVP here http://www.meetup.com/SpeakUpNY/calendar/14035906/.
Also, the event is open, so anyone else on this list should feel free
to attend. Mjumbe, I added you to to the list -- Shaan from the
MBPO's office will be sending out an email with more details later
today. Great to hear about CfA -- happy to do what we can to help you
with that. Maybe we can do a Speak Up Philly eventually...

Nick

--
Nick Grossman
Director of Civic Works
OpenPlans | http://openplans.org | (917) 388-9040 | @nickgrossman

[Chris Steins]

Team,

I'm helping the City of Los Angeles' Planning Department hold their
first-even webinar to discuss the City�s recently released 2010 Bicycle
Plan and the first Five-Year Implementation Strategy:

https://www2.gotomeeting.com/register/272965491

I'm going to write a little blog post on Planetizen about it.

Does anyone in the group have examples of other cities that have used
webinars to encourage public participation in a planning process?

Thanks,

Chris

--
Chris Steins
ste...@urbaninsight.com
Urban Insight - www.urbaninsight.com
3700 Wilshire Blvd., Suite 570
Los Angeles, CA 90010 USA
Telephone: 323-857-6901 x109
Toll-Free: 877-872-6150 Fax: 877-944-6792
Skype: urbaninsight-chris

[Josh Schmalbach]

Does anyone have examples of cities that have sucessfully used a wiki to engage the community in urban planning projects? Any help is appreciated.

I am looking for some concepts to integrate into my master's thesis. Thanks!

Joshua Schmalbach
Jsch...@fas.harvard.edu
>>
>>
>>
>

[Matt Cooperrider]

Hi Joshua,

I can help. My company has done this:

1. futuremelbourne.com.au - 10 year city plan in a wiki - first internal collaboration, then public participation
2. weplan.parks.vic.gov.au - wiki-based collaborative parks management planning
3. upcoming - Southern California regional bike and pedestrian plan (will encompass many cities, notably LA)

There is an extensive post-implementation review posted on the future melbourne site. We also wrote an article here:

http://cpd.org.au/article/collaborating-crowd-better-policy-development

Hope that helps. Feel free to hit me up with questions.

-Matt

--
Matt Cooperrider
Strategic Account Manager, Collabforge pty ltd
collaboration ~ mass collaboration ~ social software
Mobile: + 61 (0) 468 954 779 ~ Office: + 61 (0) 3 96637 310
239 Rathdowne St, Carlton, Melbourne 3053
collabforge.com ~ twitter.com/mattcoop

[Steven Clift]

I'd be interested in any kind of local community engagement that
worked with a wiki.

We use Mediawiki almost like an open CMS -
http://pages.e-democracy.org - and it is very difficult to get others
to use it organically unless we've seeded about 80% of the content.

Compared to our neighbor Issues Forums - http://e-democracy.org/nf -
where people discuss development all the time informally, wiki work is
like pulling teeth.

Steven Clift - http://stevenclift.com
  Executive Director - http://E-Democracy.Org
  Follow me - http://twitter.com/democracy
  New Tel: +1.612.234.7072

[Matt Cooperrider]

We use Mediawiki almost like an open CMS -
http://pages.e-democracy.org - and it is very difficult to get others
to use it organically unless we've seeded about 80% of the content.

Compared to our neighbor Issues Forums - http://e-democracy.org/nf -
where people discuss development all the time informally, wiki work is
like pulling teeth.

It's true that wiki work is like pulling teeth. I think people who enjoy document collaboration are a rare species, so you need a pretty large pool of stakeholders before you can build a critical mass of users (unless your community is already wiki-literate for whatever reason).

We've really only used it in cases where a document was already being produced, and the wiki supplies an additional channel for participation. And, on an upcoming wiki planning site, we're going to pair comment threads with the wiki pages, to see if that lowers the barrier to participation for some. The addition of basic social networking features (profiles, private messaging) can help as well.

Relatedly, London-based developer tav has hacked some basic social networking and collaboration features into Mediawiki:

http://socialstartuplabs.com/wiki/User:Tav

(links to source code, context for this, can be found here: http://tav.espians.com/will-you-peerfund-my-work.html)

tav's work in general is worth a look, but I think the Mediawiki hack could be a potentially useful upgrade to many existing Mediawiki installs. (btw: he's looking for small donations...)

 

[Philip Ashlock]

Hey Mjumbe,

What solution did you end up pursuing for this? Is the site up someplace for us to see? TenderApp is another solution, but it's software as a service rather than open source.

I think http://simpl.co is also very similar to the concept you described.

Best,
Phil

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Philip Ashlock

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