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Open Source Community Growth as a User Experience Problem
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:Date:
    2012-07-18

:Speaker:
    Asheesh Laroia, Karen Rustad

:Slides:
    http://cdn.oreillystatic.com/en/assets/1/event/80/Open%20source%20community%20growth%20as%20a%20user%20experience%20problem%20Presentation.pdf

Open Hatch
==========

+ Open source community help
+ User experience design
+ Links

  + http://bit.ly/oh-cookbook
  + http://openhatch.org

Improving User Experience
=========================

+ Foster and encourage volunteer enthusiasm
+ Create clear, welcoming entry points
+ "User" in this context: contributor
+ Know for whom you're designing!
+ Know the "workflow" for newcomers (shopping cart metaphor)
+ It's like conversions in e-commerce, but for code users
+ See: "funnel effect" 

Goal 
----

Get more people down the funnel

Solutions
---------

+ Get more people (hard)
+ Remove steps (aka remove friction)

  + Research why a step eliminates lots of people

+ Or make steps easier/faster/more informative
+ Where in the process would *you* give up!

Encourage People To Edit
========================

+ Identify tasks to work on!
+ Publish a wishlist/TODO list
+ Make it very clear how to get started, setup, install

  + Test your docs!
  + Get people to follow the docs to install

Case Studies
============

nano
----

The text editor (that replaced pico)

+ For patch docs: "send 'it' to the nano address"

  + Send what exactly? The patch?

GNOME
-----

GNOME Love project

+ "Get involved" link: Good
+ Index page: too much detail, confusing/overwhelming
+ Get involved steps are in the wrong order

LibreOffice
-----------

Easy Hacks project

+ "Developer" and "Contribute" links: Good (both link to same page)
+ Build step is optional and last resort: Good
+ List skills required for each step: Good
+ List of "easy" hacks for suggested fixes: Good

UX Cookbook of Strategies
=========================

Fedora Design Bounties
----------------------

+ "One-click shopping" for OSS contributors
+ Quarterly blog post announcing winner w/ prize
+ Winner gets committer perms
+ Specific tasks: reward is LOVE

Open Hatch Training Missions
----------------------------

+ Cross-project skill checks
+ Automated training sessions
+ Learning without embarrassment
+ Clear progress tracking, improved feedback

Gentoo GSoC Tracking
--------------------

+ Quantitative community mgmt
+ Interns check in regularly w/ mentors
+ Iterative tracking of the progress to a goal

Wikipedia Revert Message A/B Testing
------------------------------------

+ Auto-detection of vandalism to pages

  + Discourages legit new/undeducated users

+ Rejection sans rejection
+ How to reject patches without crushing souls?
+ Rejection email links to "Talk" page

Summary
=======

+ Better retention is possible
+ Diversity is key!

  + Consider accidental bias by high barriers to contribution

+ If you ask for **specific help**, you'll probably get it!
  
  + Delegate to users ("You: fix this!")
  + Wishlist/todo list is a Good Thing™.