2024-02-20 CC Working Group Meeting Notes

 Date

Feb 20, 2024

 Participants

• @Sarina Canelake

• @Xavier Antoviaque

• @Cassie Zamparini

• @Felipe Montoya

• @Maria Grimaldi

• @Omar Al-Ithawi

• @Adolfo Brandes

• @Jorge Londoño

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🎥 Recording and Chat Log

• Video Conferencing, Web Conferencing, Webinars, Screen Sharing

🤖 AI-Generated Meeting Summary

Otter transcript & summary

Quick recap

The team addressed the impact of recent layoffs and reorganization on the project's maintenance, including the increase in the "elephant factor" and the need for adjustments to facilitate broader participation. The team also considered a proposal from Axim to improve the current open edX release process, including the idea of assigning maintainers the responsibility of fixing bugs reported by the BTR after the testing process is completed. The team also discussed the importance of maintaining a bug-free repository and the responsibilities of the repository maintainer. The team also discussed the introduction of a management tool to prevent micromanagement and foster goal-setting discussions.

Summary

Impact of Layoffs and Reorganization on Project Maintenance

Xavier discussed the impact of recent layoffs and reorganization on the project's maintenance. He highlighted that the changes have led to an increase in the "elephant factor", meaning more organizations or individual contributors are involved in project maintenance and development. He suggested that this might require adjustments to facilitate a broader participation. Felipe mentioned leading initiatives related to the changes. Xavier also encouraged others to contribute more to the project. Sarina acknowledged hearing her name and confirmed her participation in the discussion.

Axim's Proposal for Open edX Release Process Improvement

The team discussed a proposal from Axiom to improve the current open edX release process. One of the suggestions was to assign maintainers the responsibility of fixing bugs reported by the BTR after the testing process is completed. The team also discussed the potential for maintainers to be responsible for fixing issues they introduced. The idea of having a nightly branch for tutor plugins to be tested continuously was also proposed. The team agreed to continue the discussion and involve the Maintainer's Working Group for their input before making any decisions.

Maintaining Bug-Free Repository: Roles and Responsibilities

The team discussed the importance of maintaining a bug-free repository and the responsibilities of the repository maintainer. Adolfo and Sarina shared their perspectives on the maintainer's role, with Adolfo emphasizing the importance of fixing bugs and Sarina advocating for a community spirit. felipe also contributed, but his input was unclear. Maria highlighted the role of the book triad in fixing bugs during the testing period, stressing the priority of fixing release blockers. She raised a question about the appropriate intervention of the book triad when maintainers do not prioritize certain bugs. Xavier agreed on the importance of collaboration but emphasized the need for clear task assignments.

Commitment Increase and Testing Takeover Proposal

The team discussed a proposal from the BTR working group to increase their commitment for every open edX release and take charge of the testing process. Omar suggested that his team could dedicate some of their QA capacity, which Adolfo agreed would be helpful. Omar also expressed interest in contributing to the payments and e-commerce repos, but noted that their use of it was inconsistent. Xavier suggested that Omar could still contribute by committing to basic parts of maintenance, even if he couldn't push the development forward significantly. The team agreed to continue the discussion in March when the testing plan is due for release.

OKRs for Results-Driven Objectives

Jorge expressed the need for a clearer framework to measure the impact of their community's efforts, proposing the implementation of OKRs (Objectives and Key Results). This system aims to better understand the community's output and outcomes. Adolfo requested examples of what such a system might look like, and Sarina expressed support for the idea. Jorge agreed that providing examples could be the next step. The discussion also revolved around the implementation of results-driven objectives as opposed to output-driven and the use of OKRs as a flexible framework that allows teams to devise their own strategies to achieve high-level objectives.

Introducing Management Tool to Prevent Micromanagement

The team deliberated on the introduction of a management tool to prevent micromanagement and foster goal-setting discussions, as proposed by Xavier. The plan was to begin with a wiki list for the first year and expand it in the second year. Jorge agreed to hold an asynchronous discussion on objectives. Xavier also touched upon advertising, contributors' increased responsibility, and changes in acceptance and maintenance. A broad announcement about these changes was planned. The implementation of core contributors as backup reviewers on repositories was also discussed. Xavier initiated a discussion about potential changes related to project reviews, but Cassie clarified that they were waiting for survey results before proceeding. The involvement of Ellie in project reviews was mentioned, but no further details were provided. Xavier also raised the issue of assigning reviewing parts of project proposals, but no clear response was given.

Upstream Reviews

Xavier and Cassie discussed the upstream reviews on pull request and the need for more core contributors to be involved in the reviews. Cassie mentioned that a similar product level process is being discussed by the Product Working Group. Xavier also mentioned the need for reviewers for debugging persistent issues and plans to follow up with Braden. Cassie updated the team on the progress of the survey and the need for a clear cutoff time due to late check-ins. Lastly, Jorge discussed the community's efforts on maintenance and proposed improvements to the Open edX release testing process. The team agreed to review and provide feedback on these proposals.

Next steps

• Sarina and Adolfo will discuss and align the expectations for maintainers in the new strategy.

• Omar will consider contributing to BTR QA and may coordinate with the testing manager.

• Jorge will write a brief post explaining the OKR framework and providing examples that could work for the community.

 Discussion topics

Discussion topics for the agenda are tracked at https://github.com/orgs/openedx/projects/62/views/1 - to add a topic to the agenda, add a ticket to the project, in the column “Upcoming meeting agenda”. Alternatively, add it to the table below and ping @Xavier Antoviaque or @Jorge Londoño .

 Decisions