[SeasonOfDocs] How should we focus OSGeo training within SeasonOfDocs?

[Cameron Shorter]

OSGeo Season of Docs folks, (BCCed to a few potential collaborators),

As you know, the OSGeo Foundation will be allocated 1 paid technical 
writer, for equivalent of ~ 3 months (probably spread over 6), as part 
of Google's commitment to Season of Docs [0].

But more valuable are the 18+ serious volunteers (on this list) wanting 
to be involved, and 5+ QGIS training material baselines that we can 
potentially build upon. [1] I'm hoping to discuss these baselines within 
this email thread and build a collaborative vision which focuses our 
Season of Docs direction.

(Chris, Ori, Scott from Uni of NSW), Charlie from Uni of Massachusetts, 
Piers from Gaia Resources, Jo from Austun Technology, Matteo from QGIS 
docs, Nick from Uni College of London, Phil from GeoAcademy: You all 
have mentioned training material that you might be able to access. I'm 
hoping you might restate your ideas here. (Cut and paste from before is 
fine).

My observations so far (based on input so far):

* We have multiple offers of material to start from, but less interest 
in building from someone else's material.

* We all find it hard to sustain the maintenance of material, 
acknowledging the rapid innovation of QGIS (and other OSGeo projects). 
We'd all love external help updating our material.

* We are all concerned about the free-rider problem. We are mindful that 
collaborators in material development are potential competitors for 
students (and hence funding). Our organisation's reputation is an 
important part of this story.

* We need to balance generic content that is easy to maintain versus use 
case specific training for targeted customers. (Especially important 
around local maps and datums used).

* It seems like there is core functionality that we can probably all 
agree to use as a starting point for collaboration. What is it? This 
might be our best pilot focus area.

* We could also define a best practices formula for building training 
material that we all adopt, addressing structure, writing style, etc. 
This is something a senior technical writer could define, (and could be 
extended to other OSGeo projects and to the greater Open Source 
community). This would help students who are progressing through 
multiple training courses as they'd become familiar with writing styles. 
Would you be prepared to adopt such a guide (assuming it is better than 
what you already have)?

* We'll need to agree on a license that everyone can use, probably 
Creative Commons by Attribution.

So for those of you wanting to collaborate around training material - 
how can we help you do that? How can you help others?

[0] 
https://wiki.osgeo.org/wiki/Season_of_Docs_Ideas_2019#Leveraging_Google.E2.80.99s_Season-of-Docs

[1] https://wiki.osgeo.org/wiki/Season_of_Docs_Ideas_2019#Interested.3F

-- 
Cameron Shorter
Technology Demystifier
Open Technologies and Geospatial Consultant

M +61 (0) 419 142 254

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