pages tagged nmprocesszack's home pagehttp://upsilon.cc/~zack/tags/nmprocess/zack's home pageikiwiki2012-11-12T21:12:18ZDebian newcomer experience surveyhttp://upsilon.cc/~zack/blog/posts/2012/11/Debian_newcomer_experience_survey/2012-11-12T21:12:18Z2012-11-12T21:06:42Z
<p>In recent times we have worked quite a bit to improve the
<a href="http://nm.debian.org">NM process</a>, i.e. the process
newcomers go through to become members of the Debian Project. As it
happens, I've just read <a href=
"http://people.ubuntu.com/~nhandler/blog/archive/2012/11/Debian_Developer.html">
Nathan's recent post</a> on his NM experience and I think it is a
perfect example of the joining experience we are trying to offer to
<em>all</em> newcomers.</p>
<p>But examples, be them positive or negative, are only anecdotal.
To evaluate a process one needs actual data and someone analyzing
them, ideally with a scientific approach. This is why I'm happy to
host below a <strong>guest blog post by Kevin Carillo</strong>, who
is doing a pretty thorough scientific study about how newcomers
join a wide range of Free Software projects, including <a href=
"http://blog.lydiapintscher.de/2012/11/08/guest-post-newcomer-experience-in-kde-and-other-foss-communities-survey/">
KDE</a>, <a href=
"http://news.opensuse.org/2012/11/07/newcomer-experience-in-opensuse-and-other-foss-communities-survey/">
OpenSUSE</a>, <a href=
"http://blogs.gnome.org/gnomg/2012/11/07/newcomer-experience-survey/">
GNOME</a>, and Debian, of course!</p>
<p><strong>TL;DR</strong>: if you started contributing to Debian
after January 2010, there's a <a href=
"https://limesurvey.sim.vuw.ac.nz/index.php?sid=65151&lang=en">survey</a>
for you; participating will help us improving the NM process even
further.</p>
<p>Kevin's guest blog post follows.</p>
<hr />
<h1>Newcomer experience in Debian and other FOSS communities -
Survey</h1>
<p>My name is Kevin Carillo. I am a PhD student currently living in
Wellington (New Zealand) and I am doing some research on Free/Open
Source Software communities.</p>
<p>If you have started contributing to the Debian project after
January 2010 (within approximately the last 3 years), I would like
to kindly request your help. I am interested in hearing from people
who are either technical or non-technical contributors, and who
have had either positive or negative newcomer experiences.</p>
<p>The purpose of the research is to work out how newcomers to a
FOSS community become valued sustainable contributors.</p>
<p><a href=
"https://limesurvey.sim.vuw.ac.nz/index.php?sid=65151&lang=en">The
survey is online</a> and will be available until Tuesday, 27
November, 2012.</p>
<h2>Inspiration from Debian New Member</h2>
<p>Debian is a successful community that keeps attracting new
contributors and that relies on a very unique way to handle the
integration of new contributors: the <a href=
"http://nm.debian.org">New Member process</a>.</p>
<p>The idea behind the NM process is that it is some sort of
filtering procedure allowing to only retain the individuals who
have the potential to become valued sustainable contributors in
Debian. Within Debian, there is a lot of enthusiasm and pride
around the NM process as it seems to be functioning pretty well but
the question is: Is this really enough to ensure that Debian
remains a healthy and growing community? How does it compare to the
way newcomers are integrated in other large projects such as KDE,
GNOME, or in other non-Linux related communities such as
Mozilla?</p>
<p>I have to admit that the Debian NM process has been among the
main sources of inspiration that made me embark in this research
project. I have kept being quite impressed when talking to people
who had gone through the process as all of them came out of it with
a real passion for the project and love for its community.</p>
<p>When reflecting on the reasons why the NM process succeeds, I
have a feeling it is some instance of ritualized socialization. In
other words, barriers and initiation rituals that require some
effort from newcomers, generate members with higher commitment and
sense of identification towards the Debian community.</p>
<h2>What do newcomers really experience?</h2>
<p>The main assumption that motivated this project is that
attracting new members has become crucial for a large majority of
FOSS communities but this is not a sufficient condition to ensure
the success and prosperity of a project. A proportion of a
community's newcomers must contribute to the well-being and growth
of the community.</p>
<p>Keeping all that in mind, FOSS projects have thus to do a good
job at "socializing" their newcomers and turning them into 'good'
contributors. Doing a good job here means that FOSS projects shall
ensure that they help generate citizenship-like behaviors from
newcomers by designing appropriate newcomer programs and
procedures.</p>
<p>FOSS communities rely on a wide array of initiatives to
facilitate the integration of newcomers but it seems like the other
side of the coin is less understood: What do newcomers really
experience? And how does this influence their contributions and
actions within a project?</p>
<h2>How is this study going to help Debian?</h2>
<p>The data will help gain insights about the experience of
newcomers within the Debian community. In addition, it will allow
to understand how to design effective newcomer initiatives to
ensure that Debian will remain a successful and healthy
community.</p>
<p>The dataset will be released under a share-alike <a href=
"http://opendatacommons.org/licenses/odbl/">ODbL license</a> so
that Debian contributors can extract as much value as possible from
the data. Since this survey also involves other large FOSS projects
such as Mozilla, KDE, Gnome, Ubuntu, Gentoo, OpenSUSE, and NetBSD,
it will also be possible to compare practices across projects in
order to identify what works from what does not work when
facilitating the integration of newcomers.</p>
<h2>About the survey</h2>
<p>This survey is anonymous. The raw dataset of everything one
fills in the survey will be released under the ODbL. Since all the
questions but one are optional, one is free to control the amount
of information they are giving away about themselves.</p>
<p>I expect the survey to take around 20 minutes of your time.</p>
<p>If you know members of the Debian community who you think would
be interested in completing it, please do not hesitate to let them
know about this research.</p>
<p>I will post news about my progress with this research, and the
results on <a href="http://kevincarillo.org">my blog</a>. Don't
hesitate to <a href="mailto:kevin.carillo@vuw.ac.nz">contact
me</a>.</p>
<p>--- Kevin Carillo</p>