Topics

Propose topics for us to discuss here.

• Blended Development (italicized blue = probably self-contained effort; red = will probably need more hand-holding with edX engineers; bold green = on blended board)

  • We have an opportunity to outsource technical debt or technical investments through the Blended Development model. What are some possible projects to propose?

    • Frontend replatforming

      • Miscellaneous MFE-ification +1

        • NOTE:

          • For feature parity, the frontend rewrite wasn’t tough (based on experience with Logistration hackathon)

          • When APIs are missing, they can opt for BFF (Backend for Frontend) APIs for simpler features

          • There is probably some low hanging fruit here but also some fairly complex ones that would be less approachable.

      • Studio as an MFE

    • Backend replatforming

      • XModule => XBlock Conversion (FWIW, this is a planned project)

      • Move authn to its own service

      • Theming

    • Deprecations

      • Shopping Cart

      • Pattern Library Removal

      • Old LMS profile & account settings pages

    • Feature Spec Documentation - Document how different parts of the platform work.

    • Better support for ed tech standards and external content:

      • LTI Provider work

      • Bringing xAPI/Caliper integration over the line (already started by Appsembler and RaccoonGang)

    • Tech Investments

      • Pub/Sub messaging (maybe this is something we’d want to do ourselves on second thought) -1

      • Separate celery worker containers for edxapp in devstack

    • Feature Dev

      • edX Live (along the lines of what George’s hackathon team demoed)

      • Shopify Integration

      • Netsuite Integration

      • Notification Framework

    • Upgrades

      • Automated code cleanup via pyupgrade (six removal, remove deprecated code patterns, etc.) +1

      • Python 3.8 upgrade (3.5 support ends later this year) +1

      • Django 3.0 testing (get ahead of the curve this time) +1

      • ElasticSearch 5 upgrade

    • OEP Compliance

      • Better compliance with highest-priority repo health checks +1

    • Warnings & linting

      • Better Python warning reporting from test suites, fix existing warnings

      • Make edx-platform score 10/10 in pylint (might be more INCR-ish)

  • If we outsource projects to multiple development teams outside, how can we scale development without (1) edX engineers being bottlenecks, (2) further increase in the platform’s complexity, (3) causing production fires?

    • ORA & Teams as an example

      • ORA is non-trivial (maybe 2x complex as Teams)

      • Need a tech owner that coordinates the dev

        • Treat the external devs as part of your team

        • Developed in line with internal expectations

    • Internal “tech owner” / “reviewer”

      • Can be a burden unless reviewed externally first

      • Higher expectations on the internal dev

      • Blended role - not just an engineer anymore

    • Training the community to develop behind feature toggles

    • Sharing pager duty of edx.org

  • Notes

    • edX Engineers: ~80

    • Community Contributors: ~150

    • Project Size: generally larger than INCR project size

    • Project Type: scope is clear; requirements are clear

    • Developer expertise: intermediate-level engineers

    • Blended JIRA Project

• Review Arch-BOM’s Q4 goals and projects (and where we are with Q3).

  • 3 T’s

    • Toggles

    • Testing

    • Tech Ownership

      • Who takes ownership of ownership?

        • Tooling and maintenance: Arch BOM

        • Accountability: Engineering Leadership ceremony on a quarterly basis

  • FYIs

    • Arch and Engineering Challenges (2020)

    • Bokchoy Experiment

      • Planning to turn off most bokchoy tests (not a11y tests)

      • ADR in progress

      • Accepting Risk over Development efficiency

    • Upcoming Survey will be sent to Engineers soon

      • Input into Platform theme priorities

      • As a pre-assessment metric for the Arch team

    • Repository Dashboard being created for Q3

      • Framework for automated checks

      • Examples: Makefile, tox.ini, openedx.yaml, etc.

      • Align on which constraints need to be consistent across repos and which don’t