Learnings from Summers of Code

Facilitator: Leslie Hawthorn, Google

Leslie will share stories and learnings from 3 years of overseeing Google's Summer of Code program. Participants will hear about the range of ways in which Summer of Code has worked with FLOSS projects around the globe, with a focus on best and worst practices. Leslie will also explain how nonprofit open source projects can benefit from the SoC program.

Leslie Morgan Ben Scott Stephen Skip Adam Josh Louis Matthew

Community Development Discussion with Leslie Hawthorn of Google.

This was a well-conducted, lively interaction with a compelling collection of community catalysts.

Fundamental intent of community development is to build on knowledge while not re-creating the wheel.

In response to a question to Leslie about how her position with Google complements their mission, she said by helping entities to get more work unique done that can be found once and always shared.

Leadership is Free and should expanded. It can be easily expanded without the expense of capital. -LH (not quite verbatim, but pretty close. -rsb)

Google has been built on FOSS and they want to expand the community that has created it.

Monetizing google's opening of internal code has not been the motivation. The view is not what I lose, it is what I gain!!!!!!!!!!!

The question then becomes how to foster communities without simply dumping cash on them.

A key need in any community is for there to be a person who is a good story teller. They must understand why the project is valued. They must know how to move the project forward in the face of conflicting personalities.

Disagreements can (and should) lead to forking instead of dissolution.

A question was asked about the practice of building communities across time zones and cultures.

Finding a native speaker who knows the marketable idiom is the way to learn about the culture which you are trying to address.

Joomla has 60 different communities – but one INCLUSIVE central project repository. This fosters the incredible pace of innovative development from a constantly evolving, diverse, and inclusive culture of developers and documenters.

How do people go from being on the peripheral to becoming a core developer?

If people don't like the power dynamic in a software development community, then they are confronted with the personal responsibility of DIY(do it yourself).

How to enter core developer status is the same problem of how to develop leaders in a company. Motivation.

The quality of the community contributes to a project's perpetuity.