Season of Docs/2019

Google Season of Docs is a program to foster collaboration between open source projects and technical writers. The main part of the 2019 Season of Docs will run for three months, from September to November 2019, but the application period for technical writers ends on 30 June 2019.

2019 Timeline

 * April 2 – April 23: organizational application period
 * April 23 – April 29: Google reviews and approves organizations
 * [Current] April 30 – July 30: Technical writer exploration and application
 * July 30: Technical writing projects announced
 * August 1 – September 1: Community bonding
 * September 2 – December 6: Docs development through project finalization
 * December 10: Results announced

Potential technical writing projects for 2019 season
https://developers.google.com/season-of-docs/docs/project-ideas

Technical Documentation


 * Find examples and create templates for genres of technical writing on Wikimedia projects (Ex. How-tos, Walk-throughs, User-Guides, etc). Use your templates to revise and improve existing documentation and to stand as an example for others in the future. (Document on this page: https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Techincal_documention_templates_and_suggestions)
 * Identify a Wikimedia technical project in need of technical documentation or improvement to technical documentation. Create a proposal that outlines how you would improve this area of technical documentation content.
 * Review and update client library lists: https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T204855 -- this task may be very limited and may need to be bundled into a larger project.
 * API:Client code/Gold standard

Evaluate and recommend


 * Help others understand how to suggest improvements to technical documentation and how to contribute to improving technical documentation.
 * Evaluate, iterate, and test this draft process proposal: https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Technical_documentation_prioritization
 * Document your experience on-boarding as a technical writer on Wikimedia projects. What did you need to know? What tools did you need? How and where are things documented? How do you work with others and test your documentation and processes?
 * Research and propose a content strategy for a technical documentation content collection for a Wikimedia project.
 * Suggest a technical documentation project that covers evaluating current knowledge assets and content collections. Provide suggestions for improvements.

Audience research and user experience

Create resources for staff and volunteers
 * Research audiences that uses Mediawiki / Wikitech technical documentation. Who is using the technical documentation? How and why do they use it? Create a set of personas for the kinds of technical collaborators who are using our research and users we will want to reach out to. Provide a set of recommendations for creating technical documentation and resources for a variety of users. The report can discuss intersections (ways to reach out to a wider audience). It can also discuss recommendations to reach out to smaller segments.
 * Create reusable templates for technical contributors to use as a basis for technical documentation in specific genres (For ex. Walk-throughs, tutorials, recipe, FAQ, etc)
 * Include examples and tips for writing in particular genres: User:SRodlund (WMF)/tips for document genres (This page will be moved to a main space once it is more complete)
 * Create a set of short video walkthroughs and tutorials to help onboard new technical collaborators. (Ex. How to get started with Phabricator for Wikimedia technical projects. How to XYZ)
 * Curate and promote technical documentation tasks for hackathons and other developer events. Explore outstanding technical documentation tasks in Phabricator. Create technical documentation tasks that can be completed in a short time frame at hackathons and developer events. Create onboarding/quickstart documentation that new collaborators can use guide them through the process of improving and creating technical documentation.

Creating a viable and valuable proposal
We wanted to share some recommendations and tips for you to think about when preparing your proposal.

Pre-reading
Make sure to read the guides available to you on the Season of Docs website. Pay careful attention to the section on "Creating your application" https://developers.google.com/season-of-docs/docs/tech-writer-application-hints

Is Google Season of Docs right for you?
Before creating and submitting a proposal, please consider thoughtfully whether this program is right for you. GSoD is for technical writers who would like to learn more about how to participate and contribute to open source projects and for open source projects in need of technical writers with at least some prior experience.

If you already have a lot of experience working in open source, this may not be the right program for you. You may still apply, but consider areas of open source that you still want to learn about and explore.

If you do not have any prior experience as a technical writer (as a student, volunteer or as a professional), this may not be the right program for you. We are looking for individuals with demonstrated experience contributing to and working on technical writing projects.

We welcome all proposals, and we want to be realistic with potential technical writers about the viability of those proposals. This year, we are only able to work with one technical writer. There will be some competition.

Solid technical writing is very important to the success of our open source projects, and we have a long-term commitment to make it priority. There will be many future opportunities to contribute to technical documentation projects in the future, whether through GSoD or other initiatives.

Tips

 * Browse the suggested technical writing projects and think about what might work for you. Many of these are not very detailed, yet, because we want to make sure that the project you propose fits your skill set, challenges you, and also creates a valuable contribution to our open source project.
 * Communicate with us, if you have questions or ideas. We will do our best to help guide you in the right direction. As we select candidates for our projects, we will be thinking a lot about the kinds of communications we had during the proposal projects.
 * Check, double check, and triple check your grammar and style. This is important for your proposal, you project, and in your interactions with us and community members.
 * Unless some information you wish to share with us is truly private, we prefer to work out in the open. Please make sure your questions are asked publicly in the Zulip chat, so that project admins and participants can have the opportunity to answer and benefit from your questions and thoughts.

Previous experience with technical writers or documentation
Our organization's participating administrators both have prior experience working with technical writers and documentations. Both of this year's administrators are located on the Developer Advocacy team and work to help improve on-boarding and system documentation for technical collaborators at different skill levels. The main administrator is a technical writer who has over a decade of experience working in tech. She is a former writing instructor and has worked with student writers, clients, and organizations to enhance skills and produce quality technical documentation and communication. The second administrator is an experienced developer advocate who works directly with technical contributors. In this role, she works to improve technical documentation across our projects in order to improve the experience of technical contributors. She has served as a mentor, working directly with volunteer technical writers on Wikimedia's projects.

Previous experience with similar programs, such as Google Summer of Code or others
In the past, our organization has participated in Google Summer of Code, Google Code-in and Outreachy. The last and current rounds of Outreachy have been focused specifically on improving technical documentation for the MediaWiki Action API. We have plenty of experience working with contributors, students, and interns on technical documentation related projects.

Accepting the Season of Docs stipend
Yes. We will be looking into this.

Public profile

 * 1) Name - Wikimedia Foundation
 * 2) Website URL - http://wikimediafoundation.org/
 * 3) Tagline - Global movement whose mission is to bring free educational content to the world
 * 4) Logo - https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Brand
 * 5) Primary Open Source License - GPL 2.0
 * 6) Organization Category - Web
 * 7) Technology Tags - PHP, Javascript, HTML, CSS, Python
 * 8) Topic Tags - Wikipedia, Wikimedia, MediaWiki, Semantic Web, Documentation

Descriptions

 * 1) Short Description - Wikimedia is a global movement whose mission is to bring free educational content to the world through its various projects, local chapters, and support structures.
 * 2) Long Description - Wikimedia envisions a world in which every single human being can freely share in the sum of all knowledge. It spans various projects, local chapters and support structures of the non-profit Wikimedia Foundation. There are 13 projects that Wikimedia officially supports including Wikipedia, a fifth most popular site on the internet and a well known free knowledge project in the world. Wikipedia is used by more than 400 million people every month in over 300 languages. Some of Wikipedia's sister projects are Wikimedia Commons, Wikidata, MediaWiki, Wikivoyage, etc. All major projects of Wikimedia are collaboratively developed by users around the world using the MediaWiki software. There is much more to do that you can help Wikimedia achieve: stabilize infrastructure, increase participation, improve quality, increase reach and foster innovation. Read more about Wikimedia on our homepage.

Proposals

 * 1) Application Instructions -
 * 2) Proposal Tags - outreach-programs-projects

Contact Methods
Please feel free to reach out to us with questions. We like to work in the open and together with our community. Following are the best methods to reach us with questions and for official announcements.


 * 1) Zulip - https://wikimedia.zulipchat.com/#narrow/stream/195601-gsod19 (PLEASE NOTE: Zulip is the best way to contact Wikimedia's Google Season of code admins.)
 * 2) Google Group - technical-documentation@wikimedia.org

Links

 * 1) Twitter URL (optional) - https://twitter.com/Wikimedia
 * 2) Blog URL (optional) - https://wikimediafoundation.org/news/

Why does your org want to participate in Google Season of Docs?
Wikipedia is well known as an encyclopedia, but Wikimedia is less known as a free software project. Through outreach programs like GSoD, we attract new contributors, and individuals interested in many different aspects of producing software. It is a great opportunity for us to concentrate on technical documentation, which is often overlooked during and after the software development process. For participating writers, this is an opportunity to work on real-world projects, build a visible portfolio, and help them grow professionally. Our participation in GSoD will help us to better undestand how potential contributors are experience our technical documentation and how to improvie it in ways that help scale support and enhance user experiences. Our mentors gain good experience, karma, and have some fun! All this brings meaningful impact to our community.

How many potential technical writers will you mentor this year?
1

How will you keep technical writers engaged
One of our requirements for a project to get featured in GSoD is to have two mentors, with at least one of them with prior experience. All our mentors use various communication mediums for weekly check-ins and project-related discussions with writers. Zulip is our main communication channel. We monitor it throughout the week.

How will you help technical writers stay on schedule?
Mentors and technical writers will work together to scope GSOD projects that are challenging but can be reasonably completed during the time frame. Together, they will create specifications, agree on milestones, and outcomes and communicate regularly throughout GSOD to ensure projects are running on schedule. We encourage students and mentors to avoid working in isolation and push for all project management in Phabricator (a task management tool we use at Wikimedia). We also require bi-weekly reports that help organization administrators learn about student's progress.

How will you keep technical writers involved with your community after GSoD?
We will encourage ongoing relationships between mentors, technical writers, and the community, which will go beyond the timeline of the program. We hope that technical writers will be encouraged by the positive interactions and practical experience they build and will continue to participate in ours and other FOSS projects. We will try to invite former GSoD students to participate as mentors or administrators in the future rounds of GSoD, encourage them to take part in our international community events such as the developer summit, hackathon, etc. and promote some of the success stories and blog posts around in our community.

Has your org been accepted as a mentoring org before?
Yes. We have participated in Google Summer of Code, Google Code-in, Outreachy and other outreach programs.

What year was your project started?
2001

Where does your source code live?
Most of our source code lives on Wikimedia Gerrit which is being mirrored to Github and also, some code repositories live on [https://github.com/wikimedia. Github] too.