Who Wants To Collaborate On An Opensource Project?

Community
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I’ve read the ‘How Tos to make forum use easier’ and ‘General Discussions Guidelines’, and I think this is the most appropriate forum for this topic. If not please correct me for future reference. And sorry, this isn’t a witty post :-p

On to my topic…

First of all, hello, nice to meet you all!

I’m one of those closet developers, where I’m pretty active in the communities of the tools I use, but I don’t often visit general forums like these.

My intent is not to be rude, or to avoid giving back to the community. In fact, the reason is because I’m so busy working on open source code that I hope the community will find useful. My time is divided between writing code and documentation, research through google and various books/documents, and spending time with my little girls. Since I have so much to do and only 24 hours in the day, I feel the biggest contribution I can make, and also the most productive (other than spend time with my girls), is to crank out at much code as I can, and to work on improving my skill set so that my code contributions continue to improve.

But I’ve found that I’ve run into a problem caused by my focus. I have a project that I’m very passionate about and I want to see if I can get others involved and have fun collaborating with other folks and get a discussion going regarding design decisions and implementation. I love the social aspect of open source projects, and I’ve recently left the main community I was a part of due to lack of faith in the direction the project was going and the management style.

Now I find myself a sole developer on an exiting project with no one to share it with, and no one to get feedback from. I’m not complaining at all. I love what I’m doing, that’s what matters.

But back in the day there were more resources to find other developers that are interested in getting involved with a project. I can’t quite remember the site names of most of them, but I remember that after I finally learned enough about code to be able to do something worthwhile I would be able to go to these sites and connect with other developers and hone my chops on an existing project. Sourceforge was one of those resources.

For some reason I’ve got an over powering urge to just go running around the web announcing that I’m working on a project and if anyone is interested they can contact me, because I don’t want to promote/spam about the project, I just want to get some interest and find a few people that understand what the heck I’m talking about and have some fun creating something.

The main problem I’ve had with that is that most sites require a minimum amount of posts in order to reach out to the community in that way. I can understand that, but I really don’t think it’s fair to those communities if I around creating filler posts just to mention that I’m looking for folks to help collaborate. I’m trying to be respectful and do this the right way, or at least the way where my concience doesn’t bother me.

There are plenty of freelance sites, but this is open source, and the goal is to have fun and be proud of what we are making (not just talking about me, but the open source community in general).

Just to cut off some comments, this is how I’ve been informing folks about my project’s activity:

  • It’s is on github and I try to keep issues current
  • I have a project specific twitter account and tweet often
  • I have a project specific fb page
  • I have just created a Google+ page
  • I’ve just started a project specific google group and have been posting my thoughts on some design decisions I’ve been contemplating
  • I’ve got a project specific IRC channel
  • An article has been written about my project on a very reputable web site

I want everyone to know what’s going on and informed about the latest developments. I also want folks to know that the project is active. I encourage everyone to leave feedback and get involved. But other than the article that’s been written, people have to know that the project exists. If you don’t know something exists, how can you be aware of any communication that project directs towards the community?

What are the best resources to let people know that your project exists and that it highly promotes feedback and collaboration? Are there any communities that I’m unaware of that is specific to developers that are actively looking for open source projects to work on, or where open source projects can announce that they are looking for collaborators? Can you suggest any resources that might help with this process?

It might seem like I’m just trying to promote my project in this thread, but I’m really not. If I’m having this issue (not really an issue per say, more along the lines of ‘I just don’t know’), then I’m sure there are many other folks out there that might be having the same issue.

Maybe sitepoint can add a forum along the lines of ‘collaboration opportunities/volunteer help wanted/looking for project help’? There is a

I’m open to suggestions and a friendly point in the right direction. Thanks!

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I find it a little odd that I didn’t receive any feedback regarding this post, but I’ve had time to think about the situation, and have come to some conclusions regarding what I can do to improve the situation for mysql.

Check it out and please feel free to leave some feedback: http://jbwebware.com/home/content/networking-fun-and-profit

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You got me over night :slight_smile: and I suspect my staff are all thrown by your smart and non-spammy approach! :wink:

Anyway, you’re right – most forums DO have an issue with this kind of post and for a while there we would have as well, but I’m trying to turn this place on its head a bit and encourage smart motivated people like you to get involved in the community, and in order to do that we need to give something back.

So for those reasons, and because I like your idea, I’m going to move this thread to the News and Announcements forum where it might get more attention. I’ll feature it as well. I’ll pose it as a thread asking for collaborators, because that is more likely to attract attention than asking people where you can go to find collaborators. The old bait and switch. :wink:

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Sounds great Hawk, thank you!

If it wasn’t for the social side of Open Source software, and the people involved, I might have lost interest long ago. Also, there might not be ‘Open Source’ as we see it today. Maybe just a lot of freeshare/shareware like in the ‘bad’ old days :wink:

P.S. Pay no attention to the typo’s behind the curtain! lol

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I’m always interested to read about a new CMS. I didn’t find the Features section really answered the kinds of questions I have up front, though. I’d prefer to read a conceptual overview of what the CMS offers at a glance, rather than start with technical details about how to install it. By conceptual overview, I mean something like a comparison of how it compares in functionality to other systems like WordPress, ExpressionEngine and Perch etc. That helps to give me an idea if it’s the kind of thing I’d like to use or not.

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I hear you ralph, and thank you for the feedback.

I agree with you, and right now my main target audience is other developers, folks that don’t mind getting their hands dirty, and folks that understand what an alpha and beta release really is, and who might understand that’s it’s actually really exciting have a hand in the direction of a project.

But I did come to the same conclusion as you, where I needed to communicate with everyone and express my views, and what AllianceCMS is all about, it’s goals, and what it’s going to offer as we move forward towards a stable release. You can find that info in the ‘Not-Your-Typical-CMS’ wiki article: https://github.com/AllianceCMS/AllianceCMS/wiki/AllianceCMS:-Not-Your-Typical-CMS

If you have any questions please let me know. I’ve am available to answer questions or explain what I can, and I’m open to suggestions and feedback. There are no stupid questions, and there is no such thing as negative feedback. So called ‘negative feedback’ is actually one of the best ways to find out what needs improvement!

As a side note: I don’t want to open up a free-for-all for project devs to go nuts sharing about their project here without sitepoint’s approval, but I have something I’m working on, and idea for a “community in between the communities”, for all Open Source community members, from users to devs to doc/blog writers, etc… It’s somewhere to stretch your legs and take a walk around to socialize, a virtual “water cooler” if you will, before you head back to your favorite tool(s) community.

I’ve started a Google Group for it: https://groups.google.com/forum/#!forum/bits-and-giggles

It’s called ‘Bits and Giggles’ :slight_smile:

The first post should give you an idea of what it’s all about. To Hawk/Sitepoint staff, if you feel this is spam, please do not approve this post, or delete it at a later date, no offense will be taken. I’ll work on getting the word out in a different manner :slight_smile:

This is not a project, it’s an attempt to start a project/technology neutral community for folks in the OS space. I don’t have a site for it yet, although I do have the domain (wait a minute, do I sense an opportunity for collaboration!?!? lol)

If you’re interested, stop by and say hi, shoot the hey, talk about what your working on, or what ever. Just saying :slight_smile:

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Ah, that’s great. Thanks for that, and well done on presenting it in such a clear and logical way. Perhaps make sure to link to that on the home page of the web site. :slight_smile:

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Very good suggestion, ty :slight_smile:

[Edit]

Whoops, it is there actually, the link titled “Why Another CMS?”. Maybe I should be more descriptive in that title.

Changed the link label to “Learn About AllianceCMS!” :slight_smile:

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That’s better … although I should have seen it before. :rolleyes:

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I can see why you’re so passionate about this project and it looks really exciting. Also the presentation is great and very clear which helps.

As Hawk said, we have been a bit (or a lot) tight with links but that’s because of the amount of spam we receive. That means being a tighter with everyone because the rules should apply to all of us.

But we do obviously want to encourage interesting and legit projects like this and then a link is never a problem.

I do encourage everyone interested to participate. There’s no better way to improve as a programmer than participating in a project like this.

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I feel you, and I do understand the situation.

It’s like anything that has ever existed. Something starts out as a really great idea, then the knuckleheads (spammers in this case) come out of the wood work and mess things up for honest folks like us.

It’s really great to see that such a vibrant community as this one has active leadership and moderation that actually looks at individual situations. There are a lot of places where people don’t care enough, they just pigeon-hole something, throw a label on it, and then resolve issues based on that label, not even considering that things might not be so darn cut and dry.

I really love the personal feel of this place. And not just with the staff/moderators, but with community members too.

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That’s nice to hear! We are trying to make it a friendly and interesting place to visit. :slight_smile:

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I’m excited about what I’m doing, and I’m not a junior dev by any means, so I face major feature design decisions on a daily basis.

This stuff is so much more fun when there are two or more brains working on something.

I’m not looking for a minimum commitment, no pressure at all. Let just get together on Skype or IM and chat it up. This is an exciting project, and it’s fun to put together quality code.

I’m going out of my mind from not having another brain to bounce things off of.

If you’re new to PHP this would be a great way to sharpen and improve your skill set.

I use modern tools and framework components if there is one, or build them if needed. I stick to PSR recommendations, I lean towards current ‘best practices’ if prudent, and I’m using this as a learning tool at the same time by strengthening my knowledge of design patterns, unit testing, and all the other cool tools that are at our disposal.

So get back to me if you’re either bored or if you’re burned out and want to play around with a no stress project where you can actually have a say in it’s design, rather than just fixing bugs in an existing system.

BTW, I actually do have code, and it’s even installable using a web based installer.

Hit me up!!!

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I just wanted to give everyone an update to let you know that my project is still going strong and I would like to get more people involved.

Please check out the alliancecms link in my signature and come by to say hi :slight_smile:

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If anyone is interested, I’ve just posted a request for feedback regarding a pretty large design change that is halting development until I work out the details. Here’s the link if anyone is interested: https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topic/alliancecms/kbZQzEDuI9w

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the project which category is it? and as a “web server” are you going to use?

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AllianceCMS is a Content Management System that is being designed to create advanced community sites, a form of social networking site on steroids.

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This is pretty awesome and I think it definitely has a future. I’ve been throwing around the idea of creating a similar CMS or at least a high-level framework-like structure for a little while now. I have been involved with a community based site for the past couple years where other groups have joined in and moved some of their stuff to the site. Most of these groups each have their own sites, with their own hosting and own programmers and everything, so I got to thinking “Why not create a universal structure for them?”

I was a pretty big fan of MySpace in it’s prime and I loved the level of control you had over your page. Of course it was all not supposed to be there and completely hacked in with exploits, but I think that if you allow people that sort of control but limit them just enough that it doesn’t become a mess, that it could work.

It’s cool to see someone on the same train of thought I have been on. Too bad it’s PHP. :frowning: I really have no interest in the language and I need to enjoy the language I’m working in to do something in my free time. But maybe we can bounce some ideas off each other in the future.

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@mawburn: What is your language of preference?

One of my main goals is simplicity, and out of all of the server side web dev tools that I’ve used, installing php software is as simple as it gets. Upload with FTP, aim your browser at your domain, and follow some prompts.

And with the promising look of HHVM, and maybe even a little Hack, the scalability and speed issues can be addresses. Zephir looks promising too.

I’ve explored other options for a language, and have actually been looking around the landscape the past couple of weeks.

The only reason I’m even looking at other options is because of the type of site that can be created using AllianceCMS. It is geared for communities, hopefully large communities.

I don’t like ruby from an installation stand point. I was trying to install <popular-app-name-here>, which is a Ruby/Rails Project Management suite, and the steps to get it working, especially on a shared hosting environment with CPanel, is just ridiculous. There is no reason I should have to install so many things, then execute 10 commands, then mess with configs, just to get a web app running.

Don’t get me wrong, the same type of thing is happening in the PHP world when it comes to Composer. Yes, Composer is nice if I want to add 3rd party libraries to my existing project, but if my intent is to download a fully working system so I can upload it and install it, don’t make me download your code base, then use composer to install the dependencies, before I can use it. What is the purpose, so your repo is smaller? Blah, that irks me lol :-p

Right now my thought is that if I’m going to move from a scripting language then it would be because of performance, minimal usage of server resources, scalability, and features that are offered by the language, and who the majority of the end users are. If the majority of AllianceCMS users (site admins) have their own infrastructure or plan on using the cloud, then they will probably be more knowledgeable users, and they will probably be more technically savvy and not mind a more complicated installation. Then again, I’m a more knowledgeable user with my own server and I still didn’t want to go through the junk I had to in order to get a Ruby/Rails app installed :wink:

Computers were designed to do common repetitive and mindless tasks. So computers should do that stuff, not make me do it. If I have to perform the same 15 steps every time I want to install a Ruby/Rails app, then why is it not an automated process? I’m not a Ruby guy, so I really don’t know, but I think part of it is because us techies like to feel like we are gods of the computer and like typing cryptic commands into the computer to make it do our bidding. It makes us feel POWERFUL!!! But I think I want to spend more time getting the job done by using software, rather than using a secret handshake to get the darn thing to run :smiley:

Back to my thoughts on language. I wouldn’t move from one scripting language to another (well, Hack is probably the only one, since it can be in the same file as php, and it’s easy to refactor and port php functionality to Hack functionality).

I think if I were to make a transition to another language then that language would be Go (or golang, if you want to be able to search for it :slight_smile: ).

It has all of the above points I mentioned as requirements to move to another language, it’s a pleasant language to use, it’s a modern and forward thinking language, but most of all, it supports concurrency and makes concurrency easy to use.

But then again, installation becomes an issue again, unless you have full control of you servers or are hosting AllianceCMS on a cloud.

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Yeah, PHP is great for being able to run anywhere. My reasons for not liking it are purely personal, I just don’t enjoy it. A good part it comes from a recent long-term project I backed out on that left a bad taste in my mouth. :slight_smile:

I’m a full time Java developer and I have a lot fun there. I’m not sure if I would suggest it or not. It’s a recent job move and I’m currently exploring some frameworks in that area in my free time, just for the fun of messing around and learning, nothing serious (yet). Specifically Play has caught my eye. It can actually be packaged into it’s own standalone server, so it can basically just be installed on a VPS and ran out of the box. Of course it’s got it’s own drawbacks.

I read your Introduction on your Google Groups post and noticed you had C#. Why is ASP.Net MVC not a consideration? With the recent open sourcing of the compiler, I can see it really taking off. Mono has been at the point where it’s a serious and viable consideration for hosting. I hope to see good things in the future of C#. It’s a great language. Windows VPS hosting is fairly inexpensive and ASP.Net MVC has a good bit of support on a lot of Shared Hosting plans.

I remember when Go was launched and I haven’t too much from it since. Is there a large community behind it?

*Note: I’m just throwing random ideas out there.