When selecting communication tools for an open-source community like ours, certain key criteria should be considered. The tables below highlights what we believe to be the most important ones and indicates which of our tools and the tools used by other communities meet these criteria and which do not.

1. Discussion Forums

Discourse is open source, a favorite within our community, and already serving our purposes well. There does not seem to be any reason to move to another discussion forum.

2. Messaging Platforms

Although Slack is one of the preferred communication tools within our community, it does have some drawbacks. Some of the more sticky issues are that it is not open source, its history is not as searchable as Discourse's history, and Slack history disappears after 6 months. Asking a question in Discourse will benefit the community more than asking in Slack.

The table below explores a few alternatives:

• Discourse Chat: Using Discourse Chat in place of Slack would mean we would be eliminating one communication channel (as Discourse Chat sits inside of the Discourse forum we already use). However, Discourse chat makes it difficult to manage channels, no way to remove a user from the channel only users themselves can leave the channel.

• Mattermost: Mattermost is similar to Slack and shares some of the same drawbacks, however, it is open source, and retains history forever.

• Zulip: Offers many of the same features as Slack (image embeds, @-mentions, file uploads, logging, and more) and is open source. It features multiple streams (the same as channels or rooms).

3. Issue Tracking / Project Management

Github is well-liked within the community, already widely adopted, and already used for version control. Although it is not open source, it does not seem pragmatic use a different tool for issue tracking.

4. Knowledge Bases / Wikis

Although Confluence is one of the preferred communication tools within our community, it is proprietary. The table below explores alternatives:

• Discourse Wiki: Using Discourse Wiki in place of Confluence would mean eliminating one communication channel (as Discourse Wiki sits inside of the Discourse forum we already use).

  • Example of a Discourse Wiki (notice the “back to forum” link in the top left)

  • Editing and creating wiki posts

  • Styling wiki posts

5. Collaborative Documents

Google Workspace offers a range of powerful tools, but is not open source. It also requires collaborators to have Google accounts in order to edit documents or comment. The table below explores alternatives:

• Collabora Online: open source

6. Collaborative Design

Figma is where the design library for the edX theme of the Paragon Design System lives. Although Figma is not open source, and doesn’t make cross-organization design collaboration very easy, it does not seem to make sense to move to another design tool.

However, since Miro is proprietary, it might make sense to replace it with an open source alternative. The table below explores alternatives:

• Excalidraw: open source

7. Video Conferencing

Our community uses mainly Google Meet for online meetings. Besides being proprietary, Google Meet has some other downsides including having to have a Google account for hosting meetings. Guests may have limited features compared to users with Google accounts. Zoom is also used sometimes, but the free tier has time limits for group meetings.

The table below explores alternatives:

• Jitsi: You can self host it or use it on the public instance at meet.jit.si. It's got customizable URLs that make it easy to share links with friends you want to meet with, in-call chat, administrative controls, and call recording. It's very actively developed.

8. Surveys / Polls

The Open edX Community tends to rely on Google Forms when collecting feedback from our community. Although Google Forms is a useful tool, it has some drawbacks such as being proprietary, having limited customization options, offering only basic question types, and storing data on Google’s servers.

The table below explores alternatives:

• LimeSurvey: open source

Description of column titles

• Open source

  • Is the tool open source?

• Searchable

  • Does it offer search functionality for content or messages?

• Public/Private options

  • Does it support both public and private settings for content or communication?

• User-friendly

  • How intuitive is the tool for users, both beginners and experienced?

• Retains history

  • Does it save and allow access to past content, messages, or changes?

• Actively maintained

  • Is the tool regularly updated and supported?

• Threaded conversations

  • Does the platform allow for nested or threaded replies to messages?

• Community adoption (minimal / moderate / widespread)

  • How widely used and accepted is the tool within the Open edX community?

• Version history

  • Does the tool track changes and allow rollbacks to previous versions of content?

• Real-time collaboration

  • Can multiple users collaborate at the same time in the tool?

• Templates

  • Does the tool offer templates for faster creation or organization?

• Screen sharing

  • Does it support screen sharing during meetings or presentations?

• Recording options

  • Does the tool allow users to record meetings?

• Customizable

  • How flexible is the tool in terms of personalizing its appearance?

• Logic & Branching

  • Does the tool allow conditional logic or branching based on user responses or actions?

• Analysis features

  • Does the tool offer built-in features for analyzing data or results?