Season of Docs (similar to GSOC but for documentation)

Google Summer of Code (GSoC)
1

https://developers.google.com/season-of-docs/

There is a new program like Google Summer of Code that focuses entirely on creating technical documentation for open source projects: Its called “Season of Docs”

2

Yes, they announced that at the latest GSOC meeting.
The idea is similar to GSOC, but with these differences:

  • Not for students, but for professional tech writers
  • Not paid

So I’m really not sure if it will attract many candidates. In any case we could see with our GSOC friend projects if anyone is interested in participating…

3

We should still push this somehow to get exposure, don’t you think?

4

Hmm the deadline to apply is tomorrow https://developers.google.com/season-of-docs/docs/timeline
I know the folks at openscad applied: https://www.openscad.org/gsod-2019.html But I don’t know of any other project that did it…

Honestly I don’t really know what we could ask to potential interested people… Write tutorials? Write some guides? But about what specifically? Make the wiki better? But that’s a very sensitive topic, and people coming “from outside” to do heavy work on the wiki is likely to cause problems…

Also, personally I don’t really want much to spend time on this because I think it will require some, and I’m already not able to dedicate all the time I want on other areas of FreeCAD… But if anyone else would want to give it a try, I think setup a wiki page similar to the openscad one, and fill the form at https://developers.google.com/season-of-docs/docs/get-started/ until tomorrow is all that’s required, and might be doable.

The ball is yours now @Kunda1 :smiley: Interested?

5

Sorry, I missed the deadline for this. We can better prepare for it next year. :nerd:

6

Yes! Both BRL-CAD and OpenSCAD have applied, let’s see how that goes for them, next year we can prepare better!

7

I think though, highest priority should be getting documentation written.

  • Documenting the structure of .FCstd files (fully up to date, incl. App::Link) so other apps can read FC files
  • Document FEM (see where we’re at after @m42kus’s GSOC gets merged)
  • Document TechDraw
  • Implement a documentation workflow for PRs (especially that change the API)
  • Decide how we will proceed with @m42kus’s work with sphinx and doxygen and nail down a workflow

References:
https://www.freecadweb.org/api/namespaces.html
https://www.freecadweb.org/api/classes.html
https://www.freecadweb.org/api/functions.html
https://www.freecadweb.org/api/hierarchy.html
https://www.freecadweb.org/api/modules.html

8

Let’s think about applying for the next ‘Season’

9

Kunda1 did the season not arrive? They apparently are accepting org applications currently, until 24th.

https://developers.google.com/season-of-docs/docs/get-started.

There are multiple wiki pages that could use some changes I guess. I don’t know if translations are accepted as well.

yorik, kkremitzki I had messaged you separately earlier, but I guess this is also a good place.

10

We could apply, there is still time (deadline for registering orgs is march 24th). However, as I read in https://developers.google.com/season-of-docs/docs/admin-guide

  • We need people to take charge of this. I can, but I don’t have enough time available to do it alone.
  • We need a clear list of tasks to be done. That’s basically the difficult point here.
  • We need mentors.

Anyone willing to work on this?

11

Is there an example of tasks? What I didn’t find in the link is the type of funding that’s available here (small funds for individual articles or month long stipends) and the amount of work that would warrant it. Then again I probably didn’t look well enough.

There is probably some polishing possible in the B-spline pages of the wiki but I don’t know how much work it’ll entail.

Translation also seems to be a good project if that’s acceptable.

12

I don’t think translation is what they are after, because the idea is to “hire” technical writers.