Scoping ideas for SSI Fellowship application

[Arielle-Bennett]

Hi all, I'm in the process of brainstorming ideas around my SSI Fellowship application, due 7 October (https://www.software.ac.uk/programmes/fellowship-programme)

I'd really like to have my project focus on open source at the Turing and building on some of the past conversations around measuring contributions, OSPOs, policies etc with the open source service area.

I know there's issues open about the technical side: #41 #9
and some open about the less technical side: #15

Winning an SSI fellowship would also bring a small amount of money to support this work. It's not enough to pay someone to work on it sadly, but it could cover costs of a hackathon or workshop for folks who want to try and either brainstorm ideas for a case study, finalise the tool in development and run some analysis, or draft ideas for a policy to put together. What we actually did would depend on what people are interested in contributing to!

As the fellow (or one of the fellows maybe if others are applying) I'd be happy to lead on getting events organised and outputs finalised.

Could people please comment below and maybe we can arrange a discussion soon about any potential ideas? Alternatively, if I've missed the boat and someones already got an excellent idea worked up to submit, a heads up would also help as I'll scope other ideas in that case.

[llewelld]

It's great to hear you're applying and especially good that you're thinking of targeting open source at the Turing. I'm not involved in the GithHub analyser task (#9) but would be definitely be keen to participate in hackathons/workshops that cover this or related topics.

In addition to the topics you already highlighted, there's been some interesting discussion recently around software development approaches (e.g. scrum/agile) at the Turing and the question of how open source, which has its own methodologies, traditions and practices, fits in to this. There are some great examples of projects that really embrace open development (Turing Way and Autspaces spring to mind) but maybe these are the exception rather than the rule (I'm thinking that many projects are technically open without actively encouraging public contributions)? Maybe this would fit under the OSPO topic.

Anyway, the topic of open source at the Turing looks like a rich seam to mine. I'd definitely support your application.

[llewelld]

Added to the project board to increase visibility.

[mhauru]

Glad to hear you're applying! #9 is finally getting somewhere. We've set up an instance of GrimoireLab and pulled in data from all of Turing's public repos, and are currently trying to understand what data is there and what we could extract from it. Happy to talk about it and how it might fit into your application. Feel free to come say hi at #github-analyser too, if you're interested.

[Arielle-Bennett]

Just to note, I'm brainstorming ideas here: https://hackmd.io/@Arielle-Bennett/rydGafRT0/edit thoughts welcome on what else I'm missing and/or ways which we could also use the funding which comes with the fellowship to support the work

[Arielle-Bennett]

🎉 I got shortlisted! The final presentation is here: https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1NmbQ16XyUgWVz-M3DrGMJQLS6HLjkgAsJZ8YglzgIc8/edit?usp=sharing

I broadened out the survey around open source contributions to the wider RSE/researcher community rather than just the Turing to make it more widely applicable.