Open Stack

On Fri, Sep 4, 2015, at 02:22 PM, Rochelle Grober wrote:
> OK,  Here goes.
> 
> Many newbies, especially ones whose communication culture varies from
> that of the "traditional open source contributor," try to start small,
> learn the way the community works, then expand their participation as
> they feel more comfortable in their understanding of the community.  That
> often translates into:
> 
> 1. Start following mailing list(s)
> 2. Read specs and/or blueprints
> 3. Read patch reviews
> 4. Try to comment on reviews
> 5. Join IRC meetings/channels for more interactive discussions
> 
> There are variations, of course, but you can get the idea.
> 
> Now, take people who are in technology at corporations and you have:
> 
> + Most people have windows laptops or desktops
> + Those that are familiar with Linux/*nix either have separate
> workstations, dual boot, etc. but don't use the Linux "productivity"
> toolsets as they need to interface with all those other employees on
> windows.
> + Most start interacting with OpenStack from their company laptop/desktop
> as that is where their mail is, so the mailing lists come through
> windows.
> 
> What would make their transition to OpenStack participation "easier" or
> "friendlier"?  How about:
> 
> + a short, concise document that will get them their logins to launchpad
> and review.openstack.org *from a windows environment*.  Important:  It
> should just work.  This includes keys, so instructions on cut and paste
> that does the right thing is also important.
Both launchpad and review.openstack.org (Gerrit) provide web UIs that
run in your browser and should be identical experiences regardless of
operating system, hopefully we can get by with a common set of docs for
these items. Gerrit does also accept code via ssh which is where things
get tricky on Windows, comments on that below.
> + a concise document with instructions to find and install one or a small
> selection irc clients for:  Windows, IPhone, Android. Keep these simple.
> Again, these need to *just work*.  Also a *very short* tutorial of
> finding the right channels and joining them.
> 
> Once they are commenting on reviews, participating in IRC channels, the
> next step is submitting a patch.  Again, the first ones will likely be
> specs or docs or calendar, or other non-project code submissions, so what
> is needed here is:
> 
> + a concise document with *easy* tool(s) for getting a working git/gerrit
> install on their Windows environment.  It should all be in one document
> rather than scattered through three or more.  A place (sandbox?) where
> they can test to see if they can do it is really useful.  Be prepared for
> all sorts of questions about proxies and firewalls.  If you are up front
> about "do this from a public network to see how it works before you try
> it from your company's network," you will likely have both fewer
> questions and less frustrated people.  Again, a simple tutorial with
> submitting a first patch, finding it on review.openstack.org, and
> pointers to simple tutorials on git amend and rebase will help a lot.
Given that all the docs, the calendar, other non code projects run their
builds on Linux and the code projects typically don't run on Windows at
all it might be more beneficial for the new contributors to dive right
in with a Linux VM on their workstations/laptops/clouds. They will be
able to check the output of their work locally and gain familiarity with
the build and test tools in use by OpenStack. I also expect that much of
the community will have an easier time helping new contributors on Linux
in general. Part of being prepared for questions of all sorts is
recommending tools that you are comfortable with.

One way to implement this may be to build a virtualbox or docker image,
publish that, then provide docs on running them on Windows.
> 
> In general:
> 
> Every time critical keys are changed/updated (due to security patches,
> moves, etc), a *large* banner should appear on the related websites with
> a pointer to instructions on how to update the git/gerrit configuration.
I think this idea has been talked about in the past and just needs
someone to implement it. I (and other Infra cores) would be happy to
point interested volunteers in the right direction. Likely to require
some Javascript, HTML, and CSS hacking but shouldn't be too bad if
familiar with these things.
> 
> Does this provide enough detail to be actionable?
Definitely gives us a place to start. Hope these comments are helpful.

Clark