Category Archives: Events

Doc Sprint San Francisco, April 3

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The Google offices in San Francisco are nestled in a cluster of buildings the erstwhile center of the caffeine universe and the headquarters of Hills Bros. Coffee. It was here, where beans were once unloaded from ships, roasted, ground, canned, and shipped to supermarkets all over the U.S., that we attempted to apply the same level of industry to the production of more modern commodities: Web Platform Docs.

Eschewing the brown water of days gone by, we embarked with (good) coffee and breakfast in the Google cafe, which was right next to our designated conference room.

The Doc Sprint was a lot of fun…and rewarding, too! I probably gained at least five pounds, though, with all the great food. -Dan Stormont

Peter Lubbers had expertly made all the arrangements and had all of the name tags ready for participants, so getting in, grabbing a bite, and getting to work were unhindered.

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Julee Burdekin spent the day helping contributors on the CSS Properties project: Macy Wong, Carlos Araya, Heather White, Emuvente, Angela Lau, Dan Stormont, and Doug May touched 47 properties, including reviewing existing properties, adding samples, and working on new properties. The status of 32 properties was updated, including 6 moving into review, and 16 reviewed. Great work!

Other outstanding contributions:  Richard Trott cranked out more small-but-indispensable edits than should be humanly possible; Tony Sukiennik, explained the WebVTT format in the audio-video API ; Jack Chi, cooked up a nice XHR example; Romain Briand translated our main page to French; Pius Uzamere pushed a lot of bits for HTML span and other elements; Linda Sager improved the Web Typography and other conceptual articles. Folks found lots to do on the site, and they chipped in some great content!

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Ryan Lane, our man at MediaWiki worked on the Evil Session Bug, made an initial site map of WPD, published the skin in Wikimedia’s Gerrit, and got an initial development environment set up in Wikimedia Labs to run experiments. [Late breaking update: I dare say, it looks like Ryan fixed the infamous Evil Session Bug!!!]

After a delicious lunch (again in the Google cafe, gourmet all the way, etc.), Michael Mullaney, CEO of Sencha delivered a rousing presentation on SVG filters. (Doug Schepers is kicking himself for not being there as you read this.) Michael’s presentation followed the detailed article he contributed on the SVG feColorMatrix element with several image and code examples. People use the word, “awesome” too much, yes. But Michael’s contribution to WPD and the wider community is dictionary-definition awesome.

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More celebrities: Christian Heilmann came by to chat with us as we drank (Californian) beer and munched on finger foods in the Google cafe over-looking the Bay bridge. Always fun to hang out with Chris!

I am glad I participated in the Doc Sprint. It feels great to make a contribution and learn in the process! Now I’m hooked. :) -Angela Lau

We raffled off a ChromeBook, and Carlos Araya took home the prize. Congratulations, Carlos!

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Thanks to everyone who came to this event! In all we had 43 participants at the local doc sprint and several who were there in spirit via TCP/IP. Our stats are incomplete because I was only able to gather three hours of data – and if I missed your contributions in the items above, please accept my apologies.

Having great fun doing this and it’s a nice feeling to contribute and being part of this exciting and important endeavor. Great lunch at Google SF campus is a cherry on top! Thanks, Google for hosting. -Linda Sager

Also, we especially thank the 20 participants who contributed their responses to our survey. These results are encouraging in that they show some improvement in this doc sprint over previous sprints, and they offer many pointers to where we can continue to up our game. Keep the feedback coming!

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So on this, the birthday of Herb Caen, champion of three-dot journalism and old-school canned brown water (that’s right, Frisbeetarian that I am, I just couldn’t resist a paean to Caen; for those of you who didn’t grow up in San Francisco, that’s why the elipses between paragraphs appear above), we humbly submit for the times yet another collaboration of Web Platform Docs, and dedicate it to Herb.

 

How we’re working, at WebPlatform.org

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I thought I’d share some thoughts this week on how we are working towards making web standards documentation rock more here at WebPlatform.org! We knew it would be challenging to deal with this much content, especially as we are mostly volunteers with only a finite amount of time available to work on the project. We’ve already achieved much, working towards our goal of making WebPlatform.org the definitive client-side web technology documentation site, but there is still much more to do. This is why we opened it up to the wider community as an alpha.

The plan has always been to include the public as early as possible. The web does, after all, belong to all of us. To facilitate getting things done, we have a number of communication means at our disposal. We have a number of discussion methods available including IRC and a mailing list. These are mostly used for general communication, such as announcing in-person Doc Sprints, soliciting feedback and discussing current and future work. For focusing on particular tasks, we:

  • Identify specific tasks to work on. To make the work more manageable, we have started to split it into manageable chunks and we work on each item in turn.
  • Discuss these tasks via our regular communication means, and also have more involved discussions at our regular weekly meetings, simultaneously held on teleconference and IRC.
  • Record task priority lists and who is working on each task, at our beta requirements page.
  • Create detailed task plans to outline how the work will be done, with subtasks, and people assigned to complete them.
  • Get on with the tasks!
  • Speed up task progress with intensive bursts of work at Doc Sprint events.

Current priorities

At the moment, the main topics we are focusing on are CSS properties and JavaScript APIs. Our plan is to perfect the topic pages for these two major areas over the next two to three months. This is where you come in! If you are knowledgeable and passionate about these areas, please get in touch with us to find out how best to contribute. If you don’t wish to contribute to either of these focus areas, and wish to work on something else instead, get in touch anyway, as we will be able to find something for you to do.

The next Doc Sprint we have coming up is in Berlin, Germany, this week — we expect to make a lot of progress on our priority tasks there!

Register Now for W3Conf and Web Platform Doc Sprint, 21-23 February in San Francisco

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In just a month W3C and Adobe are teaming up with other partners to host a developer conference and a Web Platform Doc Sprint.

W3Conf, W3C’s conference for developers and designers, is coming up on February 21-22 at the Regency Ballroom in San Francisco. This is not just another conference on web development, but a showcase on the most pragmatic aspects of web standards, stuff you can use today. The opening session, delivered by Mozilla’s Janet Swisher and W3C’s Doug Schepers, will feature Web Platform Docs and community involvement. Other speakers who have contributed to WebPlatform.org include CJ Gammon on digital books, Lea Verou on CSS secrets, and Alexis Deveria on cutting-edge web features, along with many other great presentations. See the full list of speakers and talks on the W3Conf site. The closing keynote on CSS layout is by Eric Meyer, and a twist on the classic browser panel will give voice to an authoring tool vendor and a developer and designer from the audience (maybe you!) to represent the view from the trenches.

The accompanying Doc Sprint to bolster the content on Web Platform Docs will be held the day after the conference, Saturday February 23rd, at the Adobe office. This is a free all-day event where you can meet the developers behind WebPlatform.org, and learn how you can help create content on Web Platform Docs, or even take the lead in areas that you’re an expert on. Contributing to Web Platform Docs is a great way to let your light shine.

Come join us for both events! Register for W3Conf with the promo code webplatform and get $120 off the fee. And don’t forget to register for the Doc Sprint… it’s free, and a great way to get involved.

The 1st European Doc Sprint is Feb 8+9 in Berlin!

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People all over the web are contributing great ideas and tools, and the momentum for viable, open, global web standards is growing every day. Unfortunately disparate, inconsistent, and outdated information still needs to be collected and perfected in one place we all can rely on.

WebPlatform.org is an idea that is coming into being through corporate sponsors, open web stewards, and — most importantly — individuals who are taking charge and creating a workspace for quality documentation. Everyday people volunteer their ideas and their time and build great content in a single place. But we still have a lot to do.

Logo of Web Platform Doc Sprint

One way we get folks inspired is through our Doc Sprints. These concentrated days of documentation work allow people to get started, really get stuck in, and make rapid progress. They also provide direct face-to-face contact between community members who previously only chatted online. Doc Sprints are places with lots of great ideas flying around. Bugs get addressed on the spot. Mini projects spring up and get prototyped and utilized right away. But mostly, it’s a time to gather together individuals who care about the web to work towards common goals.

So without further ado … it is a privilege to announce that the very first European Doc Sprint is taking place, in Berlin, on February 8-9, hosted by Adobe.

The main focus will be on improving WebPlatform.org content, but in addition we also want to put weight on encouraging web community managers to run their own Doc Sprints. If you are a web community manager and would like to organize a Web Platform Doc Sprint of your own, we would love you to join us in Berlin so we can give you the information you need to get started! Make sure you select the appropriate ticket category on registration so we can have your special Doc Sprint Starter Kit prepared for you.

Join us in Berlin. And if you can’t be there in person, please join us on the Freenode IRC channel #webplatform. We are looking forward to seeing you at the first ever European Doc Sprint!

Agenda, more information and registration:
http://web-platform-doc-sprint-berlin.eventbrite.com

Doc Sprint Mountain View

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A splendid time was had by all! On Wednesday, December 12th we gathered at Google in Mountain View, California to work on Web Platform Docs. We had over 35 attendees who worked on the site for a whole day. Google provided snacks, beverages, lunch, and a wine/beer reception afterward with live music. There was, of course, the usual t-shirts, and other cool swag – see below.

Premium Web Platform Doc Sprint Swag

Many of the attendees were new to Web Platform Docs – we registered 15 new users. So we spent some time early on walking them through the site and the Getting Started pages. Once they got going, they caught on pretty quickly. Having a group of folks doing a small task across a broad area really makes a big improvement. This is the power of a doc sprint, turning what would be a tedious and daunting chore into something doable; having company makes it fun and many hands make light work.

Matthew and Tony

We also had several people who just knew how to pick up a shovel and start digging. Many of these folks follow this forum, the e-mail list, the IRC channel, and other forums; they and you are lending your expertise where it really matters. One area of expertise you may have that we can really use is in the domain of user testing, heuristics, and user experience design. These docs sprints provide a perfect laboratory – albeit without the one-way glass. If you’ve been behind the glass, you probably would prefer the chummy doc sprint to that sterile, Observer effect-infected environment. The data is bound to be better, too.

As it is, we have only a limited amount of data from this doc sprint, and none of it scientifically sanitized. Here’s what we got:

  • Attendees: 35+
  • Commits: 375 (apprx.)
  • New WPD members onboarded: 15
  • Pictures: see: G+ event and Meetup.

Dilip, Dickson, Scott Eliot, and Ming Ming

Search

  • Renato developed a Web Platform Search Companion search extension to Chrome. Install this extension from the Chrome Web Store. Just type “wpd”+space on your Chrome omnibox (that box where you type URLs) and the extension will be activated. Then, type whatever – a CSS property, for example, and you will get direct URLs to the corresponding webplatform.org pages.
  • Dan implemented a MediaWiki search extension, helping to resolve bug 19401. This, too, provides pop-up results, but in the Search field on the wiki page.

New articles

Other Updates

Impressions

Lacking any methodology whatsoever, and while at the same time juggling three questions at once – I know, you’ve been there, too – I gathered the following impressions from the session.

  • Most of the attendees were familiar with web development concepts and technologies
  • Some attendees were exploring web development for career opportunities
  • Some attendees were attending the doc sprint looking for business opportunities
  • Some attendees were here to help build the barn – pure generosity (yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus)
  • Many people had trouble reading the Getting Started documentation
  • Most people were forgiving of the site’s usability shortcomings (like the infamous session ID loss).

And on. I have more, and I’m sure you do, too. Point is, we need to set out to prove or disprove some of this stuff and develop some metrics around our community, how much they know, why they’re in this, how well our documentation reads and works, how well our user interface performs.

Next steps

Part of our doc sprint methodology should include appointing someone (or some many) to gather user feedback – go around asking pointed questions, challenging participants to solve specific problems, just like one of those highly-paid consultants in there with the (bribed) user test subject in the room with the big mirror that everyone tries to pretend isn’t there. This person should be dedicated to that task, gathering user feedback only, and to reporting the findings – not like this blog post, but much better. We could develop a standard questionnaire, assign points to ranges, the whole nine yards. The goal is to figure out how well our site works for contributors, and we don’t need to be too data-centric to accomplish that, but if we could chart our progress against changes, that would be a bonus.

With each doc sprint we do, we’re getting better at running these, and @peterlubbers is developing a “Doc Sprint in a Box” that captures some best practices and provides tools to make it easier for any of our members to start a doc sprint. We welcome any pointers from attendees and others running doc sprints as well. We need to keep having an active conversation about how to best use our doc sprints to develop the site and its content.

Thanks to everyone for their dedication and contributions!

—Scott Rowe

Web Platform Doc Sprints off to a Good Start

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On Saturday, November 3rd we held the first ever Web Platform Doc Sprint* at Adobe in San Francisco. It was a joint effort by Adobe, the San Francisco HTML5 User Group, and Google. We had a great and very productive day and onboarded 34 brand new members. The majority of the 50-60 attendees stayed the whole day, from 9 am until after 5 pm) and, from reading through the logs, I see that we made over 800 changes to the site that day. We had people working on tasks that ranged from simple to very complex. Some folks spent the whole day writing in-depth documentation while others dove into backend architecture tasks or created new prototypes of possible new site features. 

SFHTML5 Web Platform Doc Sprint at Adobe

A huge thanks to Adobe for not only hosting the event, but also providing breakfast, lunch, dinner, a full bar, and awesome swag (the exclusive WPD notepads)! Everybody went home with a new WPD t-shirt as well (they came in just in time). Good times all around. Pictures of the event can be found on the SFHTML5 event page.

So now it’s time to keep the momentum going! The next WebPlatform Doc Sprint is already planned for December 12th at Google office in Mountain View. Scott Rowe and I are organizing that one and we will have some really cool, exclusive swag items. You can sign up at http://goo.gl/iBkiu. We hope you’ll join us.

* A doc sprint is a period of concentrated effort by a number of people to improve documentation.