Webdev/Goals
Webdev is a group of web developers involved with or just interested in the Mozilla Project. But why have a group? What do we want to do?
I dunno! Let's make some random guesses and see how they sound!
Contents
Increase / Support Contribution
Mozilla is supported by paid and unpaid contributors. In order to better pursue the goals of the Mozilla Project, we should make it easier for contributors of all kinds to find ways to contribute to our projects. Webdev in particular should work on making it easier for developers to find projects that could use help, find specific tasks that are suitable for them to complete, and be recognized for their contribution.
Supporting Actions
- Maintaining lists of good first bugs / mentored bugs for projects.
- Maintain the GetInvolved page for Webdev.
- Reduce the barrier to entry for developers, such as making dev instances easy to set up or writing good developer documentation.
Connect Webdevs across the Project
Once upon a time, there was a Webdev team in the Mozilla Corporation, which the Webdev group descends from. But there are people across the Project who are doing web development. Persona? That's web development. Webmaker? Absolutely! Local community sites? Those had to be developed in a web fashion!
These disparate groups can benefit greatly by communicating, and it is useful for the Webdev group to work to facilitate communication by making these groups aware of eachother and their work.
Supporting Actions
- Encourage webdevs to sign up for the dev-webdev mailing list and share useful information on it, including:
- Information about open web developer positions, to leverage (the best verb) our network of friends!
- Announcing when we ship major projects / libraries.
- Asking questions!
- Holding the monthly Webdev Extravaganza in order to cover the latest happenings in the Webdev group, and encouraging people across the project to attend.
While there are a few people in Webdev that are suspected of knowing everything there is to know, most of us have some knowledge that others would benefit from learning. This is a similar goal as connecting webdevs, but in addition to facilitating communication, we also want to work on ways of documenting the knowledge of our community in order to benefit us all.
Supporting Actions
- Maintaining code libraries and documentation for those libraries that make common tasks we do easier.
- Documenting the technologies we use in our projects so that others can see how we already solve problems (Answering "I want to add text-search to a Mozilla site, what should I use?").
- Documenting best practices, style guides, etc. that raise the standard of quality within the Project.
Engage other Web Developers
Webdev itself is a group of pretty cool folks, but it's important to interact outside of the Project as well. There are millions of people who aren't involved with Mozilla who can help teach us and could benefit from our knowledge as well. Thus, Webdev should help promote the work that we do to the greater web development community. Not only does this facilitate knowledge sharing, it helps us promote ideals that fit with the mission.
Supporting Actions
- Contribute back to projects that we use heavily.
- Blog / tweet / share info about the projects coming out of Webdev.
Social Networking
Let's face it: humans generally like interacting with other nice humans. As a group, Webdev should encourage people to be kind to eachother and provide opportunities for general social interaction among the group. This is especially important for remoties, who may not live in areas where there are a lot of like-minded people who can talk about subjects they're interested in, and webdevs who aren't on a team with other webdevs and want colleagues to talk to.
Supporting Actions
- Pretty much any of the meetings we have help here.
- #webdev on the Mozilla IRC server.
- Outreach to people who aren't currently part of Webdev but could totally be.
