[Qgis-psc] Certification and contributions

Sat Mar 3 02:46:33 PST 2018

Hi

Thanks for your ideas Vincent and Regis. Please let’s also include Hans and Kurt in these discussions - they have been really helpful in the process so far and currently act as the moderators for new certifying organisations so we should include them in this discussion.

From my side the proposal seems interesting. I had some other ideas too - like mandating open course content and requiring that all course ware are contributed to the lessons platform. My idea is that we aim towards a future where we build up a standardised curriculum (see https://github.com/kartoza/projecta/issues/740 for plans we have in this regard). I would like us to get to the point where we say ‘to qualify as a basic QGIS desktop user, you must have been training in these topics’. With the curriculum tool we are designing, we would be able to address concerns of Kurt and others that trainers may have vertical market or context specific training they want to deliver. Each training certificate could reference a specific curriculum that was delivered so that you can review what exact training the person was given.

When we are thinking about this, lets also keep in mind that the certification programme is in itself intended to be a way in which organisations can contribute back to QGIS (though putting out more skilled QGIS users into the market place, and contributing certification fees to the project)…

Regards

Tim

> On 02 Mar 2018, at 10:39, Régis Haubourg <regis.haubourg at gmail.com> wrote:
> 
> Hi all,
> I agree very much with that too. Any quality and long term contributer has a lot more value than a only money. Because this will open the circle of the contributers, spread the word to all the students, and the time going, demultiplicate the active community part.
> 
> >your proposal makes sense to me. we have already discussed about similar
> approaches, and we always stopped to the poit of deciding how much is
> enough
> 
> About that, it is clear that trying to find a fixed threshold based on quantitative measure in not feasible at all.
> I agree with Vincent that evaluating a small report in a committee can be the way. We could settle up a template like bellow. I imagine the following content, with direct url to contribution list or statistics:
> 
> ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> 
> # Disclaimer to sum up the goals of the certification program
> 
> ..some detailed info here...
> - open the community to more contributors
> - fund part of the project
> 
> 
> # Describe your activities and team
> 
> 
> # Describe how your are contributing to the QGIS project.
> 
> categories (please add links contributions proves)
> - code: (ex: contribution activity page for github https://github.com/haubourg <https://github.com/haubourg>)
> - testing / issue handling: (ex with our tracker: https://issues.qgis.org/projects/qgis/issues?utf8=%E2%9C%93&set_filter=1&f[]=status_id&op[status_id]=o&f[]=author_id&op[author_id]=%3D&v[author_id][]=989 <https://issues.qgis.org/projects/qgis/issues?utf8=%E2%9C%93&set_filter=1&f[]=status_id&op[status_id]=o&f[]=author_id&op[author_id]=%3D&v[author_id][]=989>)
> - documentation : etc..
> - translation:
> - training material:
> - project management / community life :
> - Donation / support:
> - Funded development :
> - User support (mailing lists, stackexchange, local forum ...) :
> 
> # Describe others FOSS contributions (same pattern)
> 
> # Any feedback that could help in improving the process
> 
> ---------------------
> 
> I think that should be a yearly process too. That would help in :
> 
> - measuring the success of that process
> - avoid having life certificate to companies that either disappeared or stopped contributing
> - Improve the process each year
> 
> That could be done as a pear review process, which means that reviewers need stay very  welcoming, objective, keep an independant point of view with their own interests. etc.
> I think QGIS community really has the right spirit for handling that without being unfair, and still keeping the process with low administrative burdain, either for the certification committee or for the certificated folks.
> 
> I'll be glad to help in that area (since my c++ skills are really low :) )
> 
> Regards
> Régis
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 2018-03-02 8:55 GMT+01:00 Paolo Cavallini <cavallini at faunalia.it <mailto:cavallini at faunalia.it>>:
> Bonjour Vincent,
> 
> Il 02/03/2018 08:46, Vincent Picavet (ml) ha scritto:
> > TL;DR : my point is that any organization willing to be recognized as a
> > certificating organization should prove that it actively contributes to
> > QGIS ( not financially ).
> 
> your proposal makes sense to me. we have already discussed about similar
> approaches, and we always stopped to the poit of deciding how much is
> enough. having a clear and fair process, which will leave everybody
> happy, is very difficult. we had success in classifiyng support
> providers in core contributors, contributors, and others. perhaps a
> similar approach could be reused.
> 
> > PS : posted to QGIS-PSC, should I copy to qgis-users ?
> 
> IMHO better come out with a shared proposal before raising too many
> discussions among our users.
> 
> all the best.
> 
> --
> Paolo Cavallini - www.faunalia.eu <http://www.faunalia.eu/>
> QGIS & PostGIS courses: http://www.faunalia.eu/training.html <http://www.faunalia.eu/training.html>
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—

Tim Sutton

Co-founder: Kartoza
Project chair: QGIS.org

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