[SeasonOfDocs] Fwd: What is our vision?

Sat Jun 1 19:20:12 PDT 2019

Hi All

My suggestions below are in green

Regards

Chris

Chris Pettit

Professor of Urban Science

Director, City Analytics

From: SeasonOfDocs <seasonofdocs-bounces at lists.osgeo.org> On Behalf Of Brian McRae
Sent: Saturday, June 1, 2019 12:54 PM
To: seasonofdocs at lists.osgeo.org
Subject: [SeasonOfDocs] Fwd: What is our vision?

I agree that it is a good list (thanks Cameron for starting this). I've added one more point, and suggested a bit of word-smithing (explanatory notes below):

* quick and simple procedures for contributors to add content;

* high level of visibility and recognition for contributors;

* Clear and intuitive documentation;

* Covering the evolving breadth of OSGeo software;

* Structured to meet the diverse needs of the OSGeo community;

* Designed to invite and facilitate user contributions; and

* Linking to relevant external learning resources

* ... and what else ???
Notes
Replaced "QGIS and GeoNetwork" with "OSGeo" as it is succinct and enduring (evolving)

Added "community" (but kept "user" on the next line) as it is broader and reflects core OSGeo values (that we want to promote?)

"Structured" (could be designed?) meaning not just the writing style, but also including consideration of how different resource types integrate (manuals, tutorials, etc.)

"Invite and facilitate" -- a bit more expansive than "lowers the barrier"? (e.g., would it be possible/desirable to allow comments at the bottom of doc pages, thereby inviting and facilitating minimal effort contributions, in real time, that could be edited/incorporated as docs are revised?)

"Linking..." to pick up my earlier comments about the potential to consider how official documentation can complement/integrate with other resources. May be too ambitious, but worth considering at this stage?

Cheers, Brian

0411-659-430

[Image removed by sender.]<http://linkedin.com/in/bpmcrae>

On Sat, 1 Jun 2019 at 08:43, Jared Morgan <jaredleonmorgan at gmail.com<mailto:jaredleonmorgan at gmail.com>> wrote:
Yep I agree. Getting this right is super important.

On Fri., 31 May 2019, 19:22 Jo Cook, <jo.k.cook at gmail.com<mailto:jo.k.cook at gmail.com>> wrote:
As a further vision for the overarching Google Season of Docs project, I would like to add:

"Lowering the barriers for users to contribute to documentation"

Thanks

Jo

On Thu, May 30, 2019 at 9:39 PM Cameron Shorter <cameron.shorter at gmail.com<mailto:cameron.shorter at gmail.com>> wrote:

Our email thread has covered multiple topics, so I've changed the title and am focusing here just on the question of "Vision":
On 30/5/19 10:00 pm, Jared Morgan wrote:
>   Jared Morgan wrote: Do we have a learning vision defined for the project? Where would I
>     find this?

Matteo wrote: what do you mean exactly here? The type of contribution an user wants to
add?

Jared Morgan wrote: Apologies for not being specific enough here. What I'm curious about is whether we have any overarching learning goals that we would like users to get out of existing training modules.

And, if the goals are different for new modules, what would those learning goals be.

I will be open with you all here: I've not got much experience with training material creation. It's something I'd like to learn more about and I think I'm in the right project to get this knowledge.

Great question Jared. Research [1] [2] into open source has identified success metrics to include: "vision" and "opportunity to identify alignment with the community".

Defining a vision is harder than asking. As we don't seem to have a ready answer yet, I suspect we either haven't articulated our vision, or we have room to improve it.

I was hoping to cut-and-paste a clear vision from our OSGeoLive home page, but it appears we have work to do as our vision is spread across multiple places.

OSGeoLive is a self-contained bootable USB or Virtual Machine based on the Lubuntu Linux distribution, that is pre-installed and pre-configured with over 50 of the best GeoSpatial Open Source applications along with sample datasets. It contains clear and consistent Overviews and Quickstarts for each application. This allows people to quickly learn the breadth of OSGeo software, and is regularly used in workshops and training sessions or is being handed out at conferences.

What is our vision for QGIS and GeoNetwork documentation and this Season of Docs initiative? Maybe:

* Clear and intuitive documentation

* Which addresses our key user groups (defined as ???)

* Which covers the breadth of rapidly innovating QGIS and GeoNetwork software

* ... and what else ???

[1] http://cameronshorter.blogspot.com/2018/11/comprehensive-research-into-open-source.html

[2] https://cameronshorter.blogspot.com/2018/12/catching-elusive-episodic-volunteer.html

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Cameron Shorter

Technology Demystifier

Open Technologies and Geospatial Consultant

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