[04:09:00] howdy [04:09:21] o/ [17:09:55] hi valeriej [17:10:03] Sorry. [17:10:22] Hey there aharoni sucheta andre__ et al. :-) [17:10:30] hola [17:10:32] sumanah: Hello. I don't know why I couldn't connect to the hangout. [17:10:50] you weren't the only one. [17:10:51] Sometimes weird voice/video plugins spit at us! [17:10:53] yeah. [17:11:03] there were at least 3 people who were having trouble connecting or staying connected [17:11:05] and there are always problems with international connections. [17:11:17] Hi! :) [17:11:31] ok, sorry for all this [17:11:36] a lesson for the future [17:11:43] yeah. I remember hearing some Wikimedia folks saying that they had to give up on using G+ hangout for outreach & editing sprints; bandwidth and connectivity were just not good enough. [17:12:07] OK! http://etherpad.wmflabs.org/pad/p/OPW-checkpoint Let's share updates, focusing on the things we need to solve or improve in order to complete all projects [17:12:15] Thankfully my 3G is working now :D [17:12:23] Whaaah, my computer just froze. [17:12:25] qgil is running this :-) I'll try to shut up until it's time for Mariya & me to talk [17:12:36] I mean hi. [17:13:28] I was planning to take notes at http://etherpad.wmflabs.org/pad/p/OPW-checkpoint but with IRC at th same time it won't be possibl [17:13:32] hi priyanka_nag [17:13:45] hello aharoni [17:13:47] Hi priyanka_nag glad you can connect. Do you ever use a dedicated IRC client? That's what I usually prefer, so I can keep logs [17:13:50] On the etherpad, if you click the person icon in the upper-right hand corner, you can add your name and choose a color that will highlight the text you edit. [17:13:54] Let's have the meeting an I will take care of the notes, perhaps asking you for some help to complete them [17:14:00] okay [17:14:11] ok, there are still pople missing but it's time to start [17:14:32] Oh I just added my blog link there, are we not supposed to do that? [17:14:42] sumanah: I generally use X-Chat [17:14:49] Some context for the idlers of the channel: this is the checkpoint meeting of https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Outreach_Program_for_Women [17:15:14] Let [17:15:30] Some problem here...I will just reconnect my net-dongle...and be back in 3-4 mins [17:15:44] hi sumanah [17:15:45] Let's start with a request I got from the OPW admins: getting your blogs aggregated to our Planet... [17:16:03] http://en.planet.wikimedia.org [17:16:08] and everybody :) [17:16:09] * noted, will pass on [17:16:12] although I'm not sure whether this is possible in our case, I don't know the policies of that Planet, and there is no "MediaWiki Planet" [17:16:30] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Planet_Wikimedia#Requests_for_inclusion [17:16:32] sumanah, what do you think? [17:16:45] Should be fine, it's reasonably liberal. [17:16:48] qgil: I think it is desirable and fine to aggregate all OPW blogs to en.planet [17:16:50] also, not all interns are having blog posts, athoiugh that is fine [17:17:07] I've been poked about not blogging enough. [17:17:12] We have Nikerabbit's posts there and we had GSoC interns' posts there [17:17:22] Strangely nobody can complained that all the posts that I have done have utterly sucked. [17:17:25] has* [17:17:32] I particularly like being able to see people's progress [17:17:42] ok, then we will request their aggregation. Thanks, and next point. [17:17:47] Isarra: I wasn't sure whether you would be open to that complaint. [17:18:01] sumanah: Ah, so it was there but you held it back? [17:18:04] Yes. [17:18:05] This explains much. [17:18:13] * aharoni realizes that except Nikerabbit very few people write technical blog posts about MediaWiki. [17:18:21] The main point of this meeting is to check how are you doing in general and whether you see any problems in competing your projects in the next... 5-6 weeks. [17:18:23] Some of our posts go onto the WMF blog. [17:18:27] Feel free to give feedback; I may not heed it, but it's still appreciated. [17:18:34] sumanah, Thanks for going through that post ^_^ [17:18:47] Do we actually need to complete the projects? [17:18:59] Sometimes when I see people's blog posts I am able to give them useful feedback - always glad when that is possible [17:19:03] Because I'm not sure mine could be completed. Like... ever. [17:19:05] Isarra, by default yes, that is the idea [17:19:09] You're getting bite-sized parts of a project, Isarra. [17:19:23] And what's completion? [17:19:58] Isarra, what matters is to have a task defined. Then it's easier to see when it is completed. [17:19:58] It will never be complete. [17:20:09] Isarra, do you ave tasks defined? [17:20:24] Some. [17:20:42] Sorry, I'm detracting from this overall thingy. >.< [17:20:45] mitevam: do you see problems re completing your project in the next 5-6 weeks? [17:21:05] we can talk about more specific task definition if you like later. [17:21:07] mitevam: I believe right now you & James_F & Ariel are solidifying your goals so now is a good time to check [17:21:39] sumanah yes, a part of my project is just being defined [17:22:00] so I will make sure to keep the scope reasonable [17:22:17] priyanka_nag: valeriej sucheta I do want to know about your obstacles as well [17:22:26] and I don't see any problems except for potential health issues [17:22:38] Too bad Teresa isn't here -- Dereckson maybe you can speak for her? [17:22:40] Not to focus on "completion" alone: we need to be able to evaluate your time here. [17:23:20] someone (starting with the OPW admins, continuing with the WMF budget owners paying the internships) will ask: how was it? And we need a way to answer based on more or less measurable facts. [17:23:25] mitevam: cool, good. are you running into communication problems, or pushback from the community that stops you from being able to do useful things, or domains where you feel very much at sea? [17:23:26] We've started hosting bug days. In fact, one is going on right now: http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Bug_management/Triage/20130219 [17:23:30] Yes...well, had some small issues but did get a chance to interact with my mentor face-to-face for an entire week, after which much of the obstacles are cleared... [17:23:51] priyanka_nag, good to hear! [17:23:55] priyanka_nag: What kinds of issues/obstacles were those? I am curious and want examples so we can fix these kinds of things better later [17:24:06] Ya sure... [17:24:07] or, earlier, I mean, in later GSoC and OPW programs [17:24:17] valeriej: :-) thank you and andre__ for multitasking [17:24:30] There doesn't seem to be much to actually quantify what we've done here, is there? [17:24:33] heh. We try, we try. [17:24:35] sumanah, Not much as of now. I have written everything on that blog post :) [17:25:27] Isarra, I will check with jorm and you to understand better the tasks you are supposed to work on. [17:25:42] Well, the MediaWiki CMS has some issues with the JavaScript files...well, won't really call them issues as such, but problems. Most values used in those files are hard coded values due to which changing anything on the template becomes a big issue. [17:25:58] We are (hopefully) going to have a lot of stuff published in the next 2 weeks, which will be quant stuff. [17:26:04] Interesting! [17:26:13] I had been struggling with these files for sometime till finally found ways to deal with them... [17:26:17] i need to get a flow portal set up on enwiki and on meta. [17:27:01] btw, some of the "what I've learned" lessons from midway through GSoC 2011 https://blog.wikimedia.org/2011/07/22/mediawikis-gsoc-students-halfway-through-projects/ included �Unit testing is boooooring, but ends up saving you a lot of time!� & �That spending time talking to everyone involved in the process from start to finish (devs, community maintainers, etc.) saves a truckload of time later on.� and �Where do I start? A lot. I th [17:27:01] ink the biggest thing is probably managing a large project and time management, which I still have a lot to learn on.� [17:27:26] danke, THO [17:27:42] TH0? [17:27:48] Thehelpfulone, [17:27:58] no problem :) [17:28:16] sumanah, yeah The Helpful One used to be my wiki signature, so people abbreviated it to THO [17:28:30] Used to be? What is it now? [17:28:37] Thehelpfulone [17:28:42] Oh. [17:28:52] (I thought I'd keep my username and signature the same to avoid confusion) [17:28:57] (A bit of context: priyanka_nag is working on pushing gadgets developed locally on projects to being more reusable in all languages. These gadgets are not developed with a lot of planning ahead, but sometimes grow to be bigger and more important than they were supposed to be. As do a lot of other software projects.) [17:29:12] priyanka_nag: ok, so the hardcoded JS stuff -- this was an issue because you're refactoring the JS files so they can be used on multiple wikis in various languages. Is that correct priyanka_nag? [17:29:36] aharoni: ah, so it's gone from solely documenting these gadgets into actually refactoring them! wow! [17:29:55] yes sumanah ...that's exactly what I was trying...rather am trying. [17:30:09] Well, not all of them :) I picked a couple that seemed important and useful, and that seemed realistic to complete. [17:30:24] priyanka_nag: ok! so, were there any other obstacles that you had trouble with in the first half of OPW? [17:30:47] ok, so priyanka_nag sucheta mitevam and valeriej seem to be on track - Isarra is also active (but we need to find out a fair way to define/ assess the work) [17:31:00] is this a fair summary? Teresa is missing in this meeting, Mark as well [17:31:01] I would say that one issue that slowed mitevam & me down was health stuff, which is unavoidable, and also communications which is more my fault -- it took us a little trial and error to get into a regular daily meeting rhythm [17:31:10] Well, as suggested by you, as soon as the 20-30 mins struggling mins are over, I start bothering aharoni :P [17:31:20] Good, good :-) [17:31:31] it's also okay to bother people in #mediawiki and the internationalisation channel :-) [17:31:38] I've done stuff. Not sure what I've done but it has been stuff. [17:31:44] Or so the voices in my head tell me. [17:31:51] And some voices outside my head. [17:31:56] what are your experiences with the community, beyond your mentors? [17:32:05] did you ask / get help from others? [17:32:06] Which community? [17:32:27] Are you in regular contact with other people thanks to this OPW activity? [17:32:37] I've run into mediawiki community, wikimedia community, wikimedia foundation community, wikipedia community.... [17:32:40] #mediawiki . wikitech-l and suroundings Isarra [17:32:51] Oh. They're insane. [17:33:11] ...in a good way. Usually. [17:33:11] heh. [17:33:40] * sumanah waits for mitevam to speak up :-) [17:33:41] Isarra, are you enjoying this project? [17:33:50] Aye. [17:33:53] good! [17:34:12] that is one basic way to measure success [17:34:15] Not entirely sure which project this is anymore, but I'm told that's a personal problem. [17:34:46] about the community I guess I was a little more shy reaching out to people the first few times but I've noticed everybody was very helpful so now I just go and ask directly and hope I'm not being a pain:) [17:34:58] Isarra, we will work more on that part. [17:35:55] mitevam and valeriej happen to be active in the topics / channels where I'm more active as well, I wonder how are things going with sucheta and priyanka_nag [17:35:59] mitevam was specifically reaching out to wikitech-l and #mediawiki but also beyond that -- she researched and emailed dozens of people in our enterprise community [17:36:14] Re: experiences with community - My experiences have been good. We engage the community with bug days. I keep up with messages on wikitech-l and have sent a few, myself. [17:36:32] Well, I am there on the channels, but somehow I don't talk much there... [17:37:04] talking about telling help from other members than mentor, I would like to thank YuviPanda for as awesome session on Gadget building... [17:37:11] priyanka_nag: do you ever have a topic you think about bringing up, or a question to ask, but get a little shy? [17:37:17] (Isarra's primary project is Flow. For a short term I have tasked her to work on some MDI stuff with Maryana because a) the Flow work has entered a . . . slow. . . period; b) the MDI work complemented some of her volunteer work; and c) it was a chance to work cross-departmentally in a context-switching situation, which happens ALL THE TIME but you never get taught how to deal with it.) [17:37:27] * sumanah looks up MDI [17:37:38] Multiple document interface? [17:37:48] Context-switching? [17:38:10] sumanah: Not actually... I feel free to bother aharoni or YuviPanda every now and then :P [17:38:40] okay! whenever I hear "somehow" I want to dig into that and turn it into actual reasons :-) [17:39:01] * sumanah is also grateful to Yuvi [17:39:31] valeriej: do wikitech-l and #mediawiki ever seem unfriendly or intimidating? [17:40:09] About the community.. I am just back from Language Engineering Summit, Pune. I got to meet a few of the community members. Honestly, it felt like family :) Much more sweeter than that.. And yes, I stay on the IRC channels as well, was not much active in the past one week though :) [17:40:28] sumanah: Not that I can recall. I've attempted to help a couple people looking to contribute, as well. [17:40:45] I also have a question for all 5 of the interns which is: how often do you feel *UNPRODUCTIVELY* lost? (sometimes one feels productively lost -- like, "I'm swimming around learning things and having fun" -- so I'm not talking about that, I'm talking about feeling drowning or overwhelmed or sad) [17:40:49] valeriej: great! [17:41:16] I feel helplessly lost when facing the english wikipedia community. [17:41:25] Nod. I've felt that too [17:41:27] I remember mitevam and valeriej sending email(s) to wikitech-l explaining their project or a specific activity. Do you think this was useful? If you haven't posted yet, did or will you consider? [17:42:08] Given their specific projects it's probably quite useful to at least some folks, but that would depend some on the project, I'd expect... [17:42:48] When I start to feel unproductively lost, I try to switch to another aspect of my project. It helps to get away from the task at hand for a bit then come back. [17:42:55] sumanah it happened to me once when I was just not sure what of all the things I had in mind I should do and what my priorities should be and I sent you a long email which helped in two ways ...just writing helped me clear things in my head some + I got your comments:) [17:43:16] priyanka_nag, sucheta did you reach out to wikitech-l? [17:43:31] qgil, I haven't, no. [17:43:39] Well qgil ...not actually.. [17:43:46] Never needed to. [17:44:04] valeriej: Yeah, I do that too. Unfortunately sometimes you can only do it for so long before OH GODS THE COMMUNITIES THEY'LL EAT US ALIVE... [17:44:06] I mean... [17:44:13] Re: sending emails, I prefer to have specific questions or request specific comments. I don't think I get as good feedback if my requests are more general. [17:44:28] Isarra: Yes. I know what you mean. [17:44:29] makes sense, yeah [17:44:34] Well, more seriously, being patient tends to increase odds of finding someone to help. >.> [17:44:38] priyanka_nag, it's not only about needing to, it is also about sharing your work and inviting others to learn about and get involved [17:45:17] qgil: Okay...will do that then [17:45:29] qgil: I have never really thought about that. :) Thanks, will do that for sure. [17:45:38] I believe it is good that all of you try once during the 3 months you are here working full time in your projects [17:46:00] Full time? [17:46:01] As mitevam says, writing down things for others helps yourself in the first place [17:46:13] Isarra, that is the idea, yes [17:46:28] What exactly does that mean? [17:46:39] about 40h week, I guess [17:46:51] a full time internship [17:47:10] Let me give an example of why informing wikitech-l is a good thing: [17:47:17] I ex[pected a point like this would be clear by now, but it's never too late :) [17:47:33] (I mean about the full time internship) [17:47:53] just a few days ago someone showed me a demo of something he had made. I asked "did you know that [other person] is working on a very similar thing?" The answer is no; neither of them had posted to wikitech-l about their projects. So they duplicated work :( [17:48:28] I guess I'm not really sure what full-time means in the context of online stuffs. Considerable time is put in, of course, but... at least for me it's been all over the place, even at four in the morning, as jorm could attest to. [17:48:33] also several times I've seen "I am working on project ____" and someone responds and says "here is a tool that will make your work much easier!" [17:49:10] Isarra, you can organize your time as you wish, but the OPW internship is supposed to be your main activity during these 3 months. 40h/week is a useful convention. [17:49:38] Well, it has been that. [17:49:45] jorm: what does MDI mean? [17:49:53] Isarra, then no problem. [17:50:02] Micro Design Improvements. [17:50:49] We have 10 minutes left. Sucheta, anything else you want to share? [17:51:08] fwiw https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Micro_Design_Improvements [17:51:48] (sucheta only to balance the IRC log abit) :) [17:52:20] Or anything else the rest of you wants to share / ask ...? [17:53:03] There is something I'd like to ask you and sumanah about after this, qgil, but it's not important. [17:53:52] I will pay a closer attention to your user / project pages and I will also schedule meetings with each team in the following weeks, not to leave everything for the last meeting at the end of the OPW [17:53:56] Isarra, ok [17:54:30] k. i'm gonna get a shower and try to get into office. [17:54:38] Bye all! [17:54:48] wait interns [17:55:07] I have ~8 min now and can talk till my next meeting :-) [17:55:29] The OPW is asking for visible activity on your projects in order to process the second payment of the internship [17:55:48] I hope there is no problem with those payments, but if there is anything let me know [17:55:57] that's all I had to say :) [17:56:07] ggil, I shall take care of that. Sure. I just had a very nice week at Pune, working at RedHat's office. ( Which slightly made me feel good, since I was a little sad that I don't get to work at SF office :P ). My code got merged there. The gadget workshop that we did, together with YuviPanda went quite well. [17:56:21] * YuviPanda looks around [17:56:33] * Isarra wraps YuviPanda in bacon. [17:56:46] sucheta & co, note that it's the OPW admins who check the activity, not me [17:56:59] Thanks sucheta valeriej jorm Isarra mitevam priyanka_nag qgil marktraceur Dereckson James_F YuviPanda aharoni andre__ and anyone I've forgotten! [17:57:00] I mean, it's not me who says OK to the payments, they find out directly [17:57:07] +1 [17:57:10] * marktraceur waves at sumanah  [17:57:12] How will they check the activity? [17:57:17] oh yes, I think we have atleast 3 people now who are writing Gadgets who weren't before (BPositive, RangiloGujarati, PlaneMad, and possibly Vatsala). It was a lot of fun too, doing it with sumanah and harsh :) [17:57:22] ah marktraceur you were here [17:57:31] s/sumanah/sucheta/ [17:57:32] err, sucheta and harsh. [17:57:35] Yes...I was also fortunate to be with aharoni ,sucheta , YuviPanda and the rest of the Wikipedia Language Engineer team at the Language Summit in Pune. [17:58:00] yeah, and I hope I helped priyanka_nag understand some bits of slightly complicated JS too :) [17:58:08] Great to see the Indian activities going so well! [17:58:14] sucheta: I think you're lucky in that you've actually gotten to meet your mentor! Valerie and Andre haven't met yet! [17:58:23] qgil: I was in IRC the whole time, only got here physically for about 30 minutes of the meeting. Would have responded to pings, but I don't think I got any. [17:58:25] I pinged ya, Mark. [17:58:34] qgil: indeed. Me and sucheta are thinking of doing one in Kolkatta in a few weeks time. [17:58:46] I thought I had. [17:58:50] I think the only way we could is if I went to SF. [17:58:56] qgil: but follow up is still a bit hard. I'm doing a lot of one-on-ones with PlaneMad over GChat to help him over. [17:59:08] sumanah: I think you meant priyanka_nag, since sucheta hasn't met mark yet [17:59:14] sumanah: I don't see it, but it's cool, I was here, read the backscroll [17:59:14] About the OPW meeting: ok, thank you everybody! [17:59:17] (though I'm asking her to apply for Wikimania) [17:59:25] Not really OPW work during last one week. But a LOT of meaningful stuff. A LOT. [17:59:26] valeriej: or I should plan a roadtrip in Southern USA! [17:59:28] YuviPanda: True but she has at least met WMFers [17:59:49] valeriej: or you could come to the Amsterdam hackathon in May [17:59:58] Andre and I will probably be there [18:00:02] sumanah, I haven't met YOU, yet! [18:00:05] andre__: I've done that. It was about 22 hours to drive to San Jose from Sour Lake. [18:00:05] True! [18:00:17] I want to! [18:00:17] sumanah: I guess Teresa and I met, but I'm maybe only half of her mentor? :) [18:00:29] True! [18:00:30] sumanah: true! It was a wonderful and very friendly atmosphere. [18:00:50] Isarra: would you rather talk with Quim now and me later, or maybe both of us together later today? [18:00:53] Awwww [18:01:06] I guess I was a really lucky one, I got to meet sumanah during the application process :) [18:01:14] Yeah :-) I am very glad about that [18:01:17] we got to meet *twice* [18:01:18] Huh. [18:01:24] *jealous* [18:01:30] sumanah: I shall post pictures sometime soon. I think sucheta and Nikerabbit invented a game called 'what-nothing' which was fun. [18:01:32] Well, after all these meeting talks, I really feel happy and fortunate to have met aharoni during the language summit and also during the GNUnify days :) [18:01:38] Yes :-) [18:01:45] * YuviPanda got to meet sumanah twice too, I think. [18:01:48] oh, three times! [18:01:55] sumanah: I think I'd like both of you and jorm present so I can hide behind him. Would that be... practical? [18:02:13] Not that he'd necessarily want me hiding behind him, but... I'm a little scared. [18:02:25] Sure. I have something starting right now, so, in about 30 min? we can do a conference call on the phone [18:02:27] sumanah I [18:02:28] do you have a working phone? [18:02:31] grrrrrrr [18:02:35] i can't do 30 minutes. [18:02:36] :-) [18:02:41] i can maybe do an hour. [18:02:44] I can do that [18:02:54] I think I need to leave in an hour for another meeting. [18:02:57] Or is that two hours? [18:03:02] Nevermind, that's in two hours. [18:03:17] OK! qgil do you have time in 60 min? [18:03:26] in 60 mins yes [18:03:28] sumanah I am about to go for today, I don't have anything specific to ask I think, is there anything you have in mind ? [18:03:33] Yay, thanks guys. [18:03:36] mitevam: nope! enjoy your evening. [18:03:42] ok! [18:03:59] Isarra: jorm qgil: I'll send out an invite with the phone # [18:04:01] thank you ! and have a good day everyone who is in the "still day" part of the world :) [18:04:07] thanks sumanah [18:04:08] off I go :) thanks all [18:04:14] mitevam: you too :) good bye. [18:04:23] Er, my phone is kind of dead. Is there any other way to do it? >.< [18:05:10] Ah, fudge. [18:20:45] YuviPanda: publish photos where? [18:21:15] Nemo_bis: I usually publish to flickr and then import to facebook [18:23:22] * Nemo_bis is curious about the game [18:24:26] YuviPanda: I imported a couple of photos of you from flickr https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:GNUnify_2013 [18:26:07] Nemo_bis: wah! Thank you!