[IAEP] (engineering) capacity building

[Bastien]

David Farning <dfarning at sugarlabs.org> writes:

> Of the successful not-for-profits and community organizations I have
> studied, one of the common threads is a near maniacal emphasis on the
> importance of contributors feeling the impact of their contribution on
> the project.

I think it's easier for newcomers to step in when the work done is both
collaborative and open.

We certainly have a sense of openness but what about collaboration?  How
many activities are developed by more than one developer?  How much of
the core Sugar code get more than two eyes taking care of them?

Maybe we could have a policy that promotes activity written by at least
two developers.  Maybe this can be a tool to foster more collaboration
and more pedagogical interactions between us.  Thus the docstrings of
functions and the documentation for activities will surely increase,
both in quality and quantity.

> Christoph and Bastien, the writers, notes that the productivity of new
> contributors is enhanced by good documentation.  

Well, I've been raised under Emacs umbrella, so I might sometimes be a
bit fussy about documentation :) Anyway, Emacs illustrates what I mean
by self-contained documentation: you don't need to exit Emacs to read
it's documentation and to learn how to start developing stuff.

> Tomeu does a cost benefit analysis. (Is the cost of including and
> maintain this code worth the benefit it provides?)  He notes that it
> _can_ be frustrating to engage participants who are not able to
> contribute in a meaning full way.  

Hey!  Learning Python is on my todo list so I might not be such a
participant anymore anytime soon :)

-- 
 Bastien