Thanks to some great input from contributors and partnership with team reps, the MetaMeta Meta is a term that refers to the inside workings of a group. For us, this is the team that works on internal WordPress sites like WordCamp Central and Make WordPress. team has added automated recognition for a number of non-code contributions!
For example, WordPress.org profiles will now show contributor activity such as:
- Translating and reviewing strings on translate.wordpress.orgWordPress.org The community site where WordPress code is created and shared by the users. This is where you can download the source code for WordPress core, plugins and themes as well as the central location for community conversations and organization. https://wordpress.org/
- Publishing lesson plans, workshops, and courses on Learn WordPress
- Publishing handbook pages
- Mentoring a WordCampWordCamp WordCamps are casual, locally-organized conferences covering everything related to WordPress. They're one of the places where the WordPress community comes together to teach one another what they’ve learned throughout the year and share the joy. Learn more.
- Manual props received in the #props channel in Making WordPress
All new updates, and upcoming plans for automated recognition of contributor activity are tracked in GitHub. If there are other activities you think we could auto-magically record, please share in the comments below!
Trialing inactive pledge notifications
Capturing all this great contribution activity also means inactive pledges are more easily identified. There are a number of reasons that a pledge might be inactive: it’s not a great time for that company or individual to contribute, it’s an aspirational pledge and they don’t know how to contribute just yet, or perhaps they aren’t interested in contributing anymore. It could also be that what they are contributing isn’t being recognized yet!
Whatever the reason, knowing which pledges are active is helpful information for Make Teams working on big projects that need contributors. Knowing which pledges are inactive also gives us an opportunity to reach out to see what support those pledges might need, and a chance to connect. The notification process intends to help Make Teams and contributors with these areas.
This is not to remove or erase contributions – in fact, pledges that don’t get any response after a grace period will simply be deactivated, and can be reactivated at any time. All contributions will continue to be displayed on .org profiles, regardless of if the pledge is active or not.
For all teams
To start, the Meta team is exploring sending an email to any contributor who hasn’t logged in for three (3) months. This email will check in, see if the contributor needs some help in connecting with a team, and ask that they log in within the next 30 days. If the contributor does not, their pledge will be deactivated.
Testing a future notification system
To test a notification process that will best support the future of Make Teams and contributors, the Meta team has been exploring options with the Training and Polyglots teams. These teams will trial a more comprehensive, automated notification system for pledges.
For starters, this notification system will notify pledges to those teams without any recent contribution activity. Similarly, they will be offered support and given a grace period before the pledge is deactivated. This proposed schedule and notification system is currently being discussed in issue #205.
The Training and Polyglots teams have offered to help by giving feedback on these notification systems. Based on feedback received, the Meta team will make iterations before rolling this notification system out to other Make Teams.
How you can help shape 5ftF
If your team would like to participate in email notifications, please voice your interest in the comments below! The Meta team will connect with you to help you get set up.
Another way is to help identify other contributions to recognize. A lot of time and effort is given to the WordPress open sourceOpen Source Open Source denotes software for which the original source code is made freely available and may be redistributed and modified. Open Source **must be** delivered via a licensing model, see GPL. project every day. As Josepha recently said on WP Briefing, “Building our culture of generosity helps us to better recognize and celebrate each other for all of our contributions… if we see more and more of the same type of contributions being celebrated, then we can also work toward automating those as well.” If you see those contributions, say it! The Meta team can look into automating recognition of that contribution, to start.
Last but not least, share your thoughts on the suggested notification system. What’s missing? What would you change to better support active and inactive contributors?