Wikimedia Technology/Annual Plans/FY2019/TEC10: Build Technical Community/Goals

Program Goals and Status for FY18/19

TEC10: Build Technical Community

• Goal Owner: Bryan Davis
• Program Goals for FY18/19: Wikimedia's software products and platforms have a diverse collection of technical communities including code contributors, documentation contributors, bug reporters, API consumers, volunteers who build innovative solutions to on-wiki workflow issues, researchers who examine the data generated by the Wikimedia projects, value-added vendors who provide services and support based on Wikimedia free and open-source software products, and true 'third parties' who install and use FLOSS software produced by the Wikimedia movement on their own computers for various reasons. These audiences contribute directly and indirectly to the broadest goal of the movement: to collect and disseminate knowledge. However, they have not always been well recognized for these contributions and supported in their work. The technical community support project will attempt to begin to address this shortcoming by providing better documentation, facilitating community building, and establishing better pathways for communication between these communities and the Foundation.

We will expand and strengthen our technical communities, focusing on understanding their needs and measuring the progress and outcome of our efforts. In particular, we will focus on three traditionally underserved communities: tool and bot developers; API and data consumers; and third-party users of our software.

• Annual Plan: TEC10: Build Technical Community
  • Primary Goal is Knowledge as a Service: Evolve our systems and structures
  • Tech Goal: Support our Technical Community

Q1 Goals

Outcome 1 / Output 1.3

Technical Writing

Attract and foster a robust community of skilled and aspiring technical writing contributors

Primary team: DevAdv

Goal(s)

• Research potential partnerships/joint programs with other FOSS-oriented communities and organizations

Status

 Note: July 2018

In progress

 Note: August 10, 2018

Discussed the 'feedmereadmes' meetup event that was attended by a open source community members in the SF office  Done; follow-on events will hopefully be held every quarter (in the Bay area) in the WMF offices (will need funding); POSSE and Mozilla Open Source Student Network are also two groups that might be able to help out (outreach is ongoing to build new and long term partnerships) In progress

 Note: September 12, 2018

In progress Srishti and Sarah are working on a blog post about the Mozilla OSSN + POSSE partnerships

Outcome 3 / Output 3.1

Support use of Wikimedia services

Promote Wikimedia products at relevant conferences, hackathons, and within the Wikimedia communities

Primary team: WMCS, DevAdv

Goal(s)

• Promote Cloud Services products at Wikimania Hackathon
• Promote FOSS participation at Wikimedia Hackathon
• Assist in New Developer mentoring program at Wikimedia Hackathon
• Promote Technical Writing tasks at Wikimedia Hackathon

Status

 Note: July 2018

 Done

Outcome 8 / Output 8.1

Developer Advocacy

Update MediaWiki.org homepage and other key content pages

Primary team: DevAdv

Goal(s)

• Update visual design and content of MediaWiki.org Main Page

Status

 Note: July 2018

In progress this is being worked on occasionally

 Note: August 10, 2018

In progress managerial encouragement is ongoing

 Note: September 12, 2018

In progress No visible progress, but Bryan s helping to instill the courage to put out a proposal to the wider community for feedback. However, we will NOT finish this (it'll be Partially done) in Q1, but we have reasonable hope that we will make good progress in the next 2 weeks.

Outcome 8 / Output 8.4

Developer Advocacy

Collect or create content

Primary team: DevAdv

Goal(s)

• Investigate and improve MediaWiki Action API documentation

Status

 Note: July 2018

In progress

 Note: August 10, 2018

In progress collaboration within the WMCS team is ongoing and analytics of page views and site usage is continuing (looking for key pages and how we can make them better and creating sample pages of what a 'good page' looks like for future usage).

 Note: September 12, 2018

In progress Template for a "good" API documentation page created at https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/API:Main_page and other pages in the top 20 most viewed API pages have been updated. Work is In progress on an Outreachy project proposal to attract an intern interested in helping update additional pages to match the new

Q2 Goals

Outcome 1 / Output 1.2

Technical Writing

Improve documentation for Toolforge & Cloud VPS based on gaps identified by the 'Tech writing (Re)working group' and via the Toolforge Annual Survey.

Primary team: DevAdv

Goal(s)

• Plan and visibly improve Toolforge technical documentation

Status

 Note: November 14, 2018

This has begun this month, so it is now In progress

 Note: December 12, 2018

This goal is still In progress for planning this work out, but the visibly improve portion hasn't quite started yet as the effort has turned out to be much bigger than anticipated; this will continue in Q3.

Outcome 3 / Output 3.1

Developer Advocacy

Promote Wikimedia products at relevant conferences, hackathons, and within the Wikimedia communities

Primary team: DevAdv

Goal(s)

• Survey Wikimedia Foundation staff to gauge interest and support for reviving Tech Talks  Done
• Develop plan for Tech Talks reboot (pending survey results) In progress

Status

 Note: November 14, 2018

This has begun this month, so it is now In progress and the survey has been sent  Done

 Note: December 12, 2018

Developing the plan for the tech talks reboot is In progress - we're currently reaching to lots of folks who have done talks like this in the past/present and looking at ways to make them all better. This will continue in Q3 with the results from the surveying and plan for the future.

Outcome 8 / Output 8.1

Developer Advocacy

Update MediaWiki.org homepage and other key content pages

Primary team: DevAdv

Goal(s)

• Update visual design and content of MediaWiki.org Main Page

Status

 Note: September 24, 2018

This goal was carried over from FY18/19Q1

 Note: November 14, 2018

This is In progress and can be viewed here

 Note: December 12, 2018

The timeline has been revised a bit and this will be Partially done by end of January 2019.

Outcome 8 / Output 8.3

Developer Advocacy

Organize Wikimedia project participation and support mentors and other participants in Outreachy, Google Summer of Code, Google Code-in, and similar programs.

Primary team: DevAdv

Goal(s)

• Support Outreachy Round 17  Done
• Support Google Code-In 2018  Done

Status

 Note: November 14, 2018

Both of these goals are In progress and we expect the announcement for Outreachy to go out shortly and Google Code-in has lots of tasks added.

 Note: December 12, 2018

Google Code-in ends today, and is considered  Done. Outreachy support will be for 5 interns and work is In progress as of a week ago. This work will continue in Q3, so it's considered  Done for Q2.

Outcome 8 / Output 8.4

Developer Advocacy

Collect or create learning-oriented (tutorial), goal-oriented (how-to), and understanding-oriented (overview) content describing the Wikimedia movement's technical spaces, technical services, and FOSS projects.

Primary team: DevAdv

Goal(s)

• Outreachy internship - MediaWiki Action API: Documentation improvements to the top 50 most viewed API pages on-wiki In progress
• Review and improve top viewed overview pages of the Action API Partially done

Status

 Note: November 14, 2018

Outreachy is In progress for selecting candidates but the actual internship won't happen until later.

Reviewing the Action API has also kicked off and is In progress

 Note: December 12, 2018

Interns have been selected and we've been mentoring/training them, this work will continue into Q3.

Reviewing and improving the overview pages are nearly complete ( Partially done), and a survey is in progress, but this goal can considered  Done at this point in the quarter.

Outcome 7 / Output 7

Collaboration with the community of researchers in industry and academia is further scaled and supported, so that more findings and datasets are published and disseminated under an open license, to help us answer strategically important questions.

Organize and host the annual Wiki Research Workshop to help align the interests of the academic community to issues of strategic importance for the movement. Continue to successfully run a research workshop at a major conference, as we have for the past 4 years.

Primary team: Research

Goal(s)

• Submit a proposal for the workshop.

Status

 Note: December 14, 2018

The proposal has been submitted and has been accepted and this can be considered  Done. The workshop proposal has been accepted and the event will be hosted at the Web Conference 2019 in SF in May. The call for contributions is out.

Q3 Goals

Outcome 1 / Output 1.2

Technical Writing

Improve documentation for Toolforge & Cloud VPS based on gaps identified by the 'Tech writing (Re)working group' and via the Toolforge Annual Survey.

Primary team: DevAdv

Goal(s)

• Plan and visibly improve Toolforge technical documentation In progress

Status

 Note: February 13, 2019

• Documentation triage is In progress with various 'fix this doc' tickets, but lots of more work to do.

 Note: March 13, 2019

• This is still In progress and good movement is being made, we expect this to continue through the next couple of months, quarters (kind of a 'forever' project)

Outcome 3 / Output 3.1

Developer Advocacy

Promote Wikimedia products at relevant conferences, hackathons, and within the Wikimedia communities

Primary team: DevAdv

Goal(s)

• Develop and implement plan for Tech Talks reboot  Done
• Support volunteer technical community participation in Wikimedia Hackathon 2019  Done

Status

To do February 2019

• Development is  Done and the first Tech Talk will be Feb 27 with several folks in the queue to do future tech talks. We are trying to be planned out in advance, with at least 1 per month.
• Hackathon planning work has kicked off and is In progress

 Note: March 13, 2019

• Tech Talks have been rebooted!  Done
• Participation planning for the upcoming Hackathon is  Done, just need to attend the event in Q4

Outcome 7 / Output 7

Collaboration with the community of researchers in industry and academia is further scaled and supported, so that more findings and datasets are published and disseminated under an open license, to help us answer strategically important questions.

Organize and host the annual Wiki Research Workshop to help align the interests of the academic community to issues of strategic importance for the movement. Continue to successfully run a research workshop at a major conference, as we have for the past 4 years.

Primary team: Research

Goal(s)

• Invite speakers, oversee the paper submissions and review process in preparation for the event in Q4.

Status

To do February 2019

• First round of speakers were finalized...

 Note: March 14, 2019

• This goal is now  Done

Outcome 8 / Output 8.1

Developer Advocacy

Update MediaWiki.org homepage and other key content pages

Primary team: DevAdv

Goal(s)

• Update visual design and content of MediaWiki.org Main Page In progress

Status

 Note: February 13, 2019

• This goal is still In progress and we still hope to be done by end of quarter or early in Q4, it's going a bit slow because we are in the community feedback cycle.

 Note: March 13, 2019

• This is now Partially done with Phase 2 (feedback on proposed changes), phase 3 will start quickly (wireframe design) and hope to implement in Q4.

 Note: March 31, 2019

• Phase 3 started (wireframe design proposed and up for discussion); to implement in early Q4.

Outcome 8 / Output 8.3

Developer Advocacy

Organize Wikimedia project participation and support mentors and other participants in Outreachy, Google Summer of Code, Google Code-in, and similar programs.

Primary team: DevAdv

Goal(s)

• Support Outreachy Round 18 In progress
• Support Google Summer of Code 2019 In progress

Status

 Note: February 13, 2019

• GSOC is underway with our publishing of tasks and getting approved as an organization. Outreachy round 17 is In progress round 18 is scheduled for later this quarter/FY.

 Note: March 13, 2019

• both still In progress

Outcome 8 / Output 8.4

Developer Advocacy

Collect or create learning-oriented (tutorial), goal-oriented (how-to), and understanding-oriented (overview) content describing the Wikimedia movement's technical spaces, technical services, and FOSS projects.

Primary team: DevAdv

Goal(s)

• Outreachy internship - Improving ~20 documentation pages and creating a demo app to help users of MediaWiki learn how to use our APIs  Done
• Create 1-3 Action API usage tutorials  Done
  • API:Nearby places viewer, API:Article ideas generator, API:Picture of the day viewer
• Create essay describing typical software development prioritization concerns to help community understand the decision-making process  Done
  • Bug management/Development prioritization
• Develop maturity model for technical documentation content Partially done
  • User:SRodlund (WMF)/Maturity model for MediaWiki technical documentation

Status

 Note: February 13,2019

• Internship is going very well (with a sample page from one of our interns here)
• API usage tutorials are underway In progress
• We've been gathering tasks and notes on how we can frame this discussion
• Maturity model is also In progress, more details are in the ticket.

 Note: March 13, 2019

• Internship is  Done here)
• API usage tutorials are underway In progress
• Create essay describing typical software development prioritization is  Done
• Develop maturity model is Partially done. Next steps are integrating strategy into document which will happen as mid-term and FY19/20 planning are completed.

Q4 Goals

Outcome 1 / Output 1.2

Technical Writing

Improve documentation for Toolforge & Cloud VPS based on gaps identified by the 'Tech writing (Re)working group' and via the Toolforge Annual Survey.

Primary team: DevAdv

Goal(s)

• Continued from Q3 Plan and visibly improve Toolforge technical documentation In progress

Status

 Note: June 6, 2019

• This is Partially done for now and will be fully done next quarter.

Outcome 3 / Output 3.1

Developer Advocacy

Promote Wikimedia products at relevant conferences, hackathons, and within the Wikimedia communities

Primary team: DevAdv

Goal(s)

• Support volunteer technical community participation in Wikimedia Hackathon 2019
• Continue Tech Talks series

Status

 Note: June 6, 2019

• The work was  Done at the Hackathon in Prague and the most recent Tech Talk was in May and the next one is in June.

Outcome 7 / Output 7

Collaboration with the community of researchers in industry and academia is further scaled and supported, so that more findings and datasets are published and disseminated under an open license, to help us answer strategically important questions.

Organize and host the annual Wiki Research Workshop to help align the interests of the academic community to issues of strategic importance for the movement. Continue to successfully run a research workshop at a major conference, as we have for the past 4 years.

Primary team: Research

Goal(s)

• Organize the 6th Wiki Research Workshop on May 14, 2019 task T211890 In progress

Status

To do May 2019

• This is  Done

Outcome 8 / Output 8.1

Developer Advocacy

Update MediaWiki.org homepage and other key content pages

Primary team: DevAdv

Goal(s)

• Update visual design and content of MediaWiki.org Main Page  Done

Status

 Note: April 14, 2019

New content and layout of the mediawiki.org front page deployed on 2019-04-13 is now  Done. List of potential follow-up work has been published.

 Note: June 6, 2019

• This is fully  Done

Outcome 8 / Output 8.3

Developer Advocacy

Organize Wikimedia project participation and support mentors and other participants in Outreachy, Google Summer of Code, Google Code-in, and similar programs.

Primary team: DevAdv

Goal(s)

• Support Outreachy Round 18
• Support Google Summer of Code 2019
• Support Google Season of Docs participation

Status

 Note: June 6, 2019

• Both Outreachy ( 4 projects) and GSOC (12 projects) are fully In progress
• Season of Docs is also now In progress

 Note: June 27, 2019

• These efforts are still In progress and will wrap up in Q1 for GSoC and Outreachy. Season of Docs will be fully in swing early in Q1 FY19/20 with participant selection.

Outcome 8 / Output 8.4

Developer Advocacy

Collect or create learning-oriented (tutorial), goal-oriented (how-to), and understanding-oriented (overview) content describing the Wikimedia movement's technical spaces, technical services, and FOSS projects.

Primary team: DevAdv

Goal(s)

• Mentor Outreachy project on documentation improvements to the ~20 top 70 most viewed MediaWiki Action API pages on-wiki
• Mentor GSoC project on develop code samples in Javascript and PHP to demonstrate the use of MediaWiki Action API modules

Status

 Note: June 6, 2019

• Both goals are In progress right now for the next few months.

 Note: June 27, 2019

• These efforts are still In progress and will wrap up in Q1 for GSoC and Outreachy.