[Olpc-sysadmin] Volunteers may already be making a gitorious hub (instead of gforge)

Greg Dekoenigsberg gdk at redhat.com
Wed Oct 22 11:11:15 EDT 2008


On Wed, 22 Oct 2008, Mel Chua wrote:

> Volunteers may already be creating a community-run alternative to an
> OLPC gforge, which we decided VIG wouldn't do in yesterday's meeting.
>
> I just (to my quite happy surprise) got a note from some volunteers 
> (independent of yesterday's discussion) mentioning that the fellow 
> behind http://gitorious.org/ wants to set up, maintain, and customize an 
> OLPC-specific install of the (or alternatively, come up with a way 
> community members can tag their gitorious.org projects with 'olpc').
>
> Sample project (I clicked randomly on one):
> http://gitorious.org/projects/python-markdown
>
> This is totally volunteer based, for independent community code projects 
> (probably Activities, it seems). They seem to be doing this on their own 
> with the understanding that they won't be getting any official 
> resources/support from OLPC... though I don't think they'd refuse them, 
> if 1cc offered.

Which is exactly what you should do, as quickly as possible.

> This is a heads-up email in case there's something they should
> know/do/not-do while trying this out.

One of the most powerful tools you all have at your disposal is the 
capacity to bless independent work as "official".  We have used this 
tactic a number of times in Fedora-land, and it's almost always hugely 
successful.  You've got people who are talented, dedicated, and 
enthusiastic enough to get a project off the ground that is *all about 
you*, and they are doing it *without your help*.  If you embrace them, 
they will become the absolute bedrock of your community for years and 
years to come.

So my advice: vet them, read their mailing lists, make sure there's no 
hidden crazy, and then figure out how to make them the official 
"activities gang" or something.

--g


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