[consulting] and they call it drupalcamp
Henri Poole
poole at civicactions.com
Sat Feb 25 08:15:00 UTC 2006
On Sunday, I sent an email to Dries about a Drupal Camp suggesting:
> Our primary objective will be to get some of our own people trained, but
> it seems to me that the entire community needs more trained talent.
> We're excited to join forces with others on this or any other ideas that
> might be brewing to bring up a talented crop of new coders.
Sector Wide Shortage of Drupal IA Talent:
At CivicActions, our objective is clear: We need more talent,
especially in the competency area of theming and IA. IMHO, there are far
two few available contractors who are available and who know this cold.
We have a classic supply problem and a very big (and growing) demand for
brilliant designers and engineers. We don't seem to be alone with this
problem.
Build A Bigger Overall Market:
We also subscribe to the idea that we are part of a rising tide and that
the we (individuals and firms alike) will all benefit if there are more
trained Information & Interaction Designers who are versatile to expert
with Drupal. This points to a longer term strategy (sector wide) to get
hundreds of new people trained over the coming year(s) on Drupal. The
offer from Resnick at the University of Michigan is a great tactical
opportunity to support this broad strategy in 2007. This will help
Drupal in general, and it will help the firms that need talent and more
opportunities for Drupal pros.
Decentralize Training:
In my opinion, something to consider would be to *decentralize* training
- agreeing and planning for multiple firms and individuals that host
drupal camps. If this happens, we would all benefit from a policy to
open license our content, and focus our individual camps on specialized
training in all of the areas mentioned in this thread (not limiting our
ideas this early in the game).
Training Diversity:
In short, I don't see a reason to say that any one or two or three
tracks is the 'right' approach this early. They are all great. It seems
to me that we could let the 'free market' determine which camps are in
demand, and let the best in-person trainers create a healthy competitive
market.
Open License Policy:
Boris, I would imagine that the entire community is very happy to hear
that Bryght is (and has been for some time) on board with Creative
Commons Attribution Share Alike licensing policy. With CivicActions,
that makes two firms at least, which is a good start. Are other
potential camp organizers willing to make a similar commitment?
- Henri
> So perhaps in terms of structure, there are 2 separate tracks for the
> first half of the first day, or the first day completely, and then
> everyone comes together.
>
> I think the objectives of drupal camp are really 1 and maybe a little of
> 3 (as defined below). Community and client facing stuff--marketing and
> evangelism--is another story all together, and not really the stuff of
> DrupalCamp. It is the kind of stuff that happens at DrupalCon and at
> other conferences like PDF and Net2 and NTEN.
>
> Noel Hidalgo wrote:
>
>> Aaron, you bring up a great point!
>>
>> I see three objectives of a drupal camp.
>>
>> 1. Developer Training - as a user/client, i clearly see the need to
>> have a wide depth of developers (from php to css) to keep the "system"
>> alive. I am not at a "shop" but i work in a "shop" where unfinished
>> modules/functionality hinder my offices' ability to produce successful
>> campaigns. So yes, developer training MUST be A key component of
>> DrupalCamp. I only wonder how to structure such an environment to make
>> it work.
>>
>> 2. Drupal Exposure to the masses - I see too many non-profits
>> resorting to a community of closed systems. While i know there isn't
>> one shoe that fits everyone, Drupal Camp provides opertunites for
>> Non-Profits, Vendors and Developers to be under one roof to "chat."
>> ... and i fundamentally believe that Drupal can be that one CMS to
>> rule them all. ;)
>>
>> 3. Community Development - for me this is not just a community of
>> technology, but a progressive community. the more opportunities where
>> we create open communites to foster ideas and create change is good.
>> drupal camp provides an opportunity for people in a geographic region
>> to network and is physical manifestation of the digital community they
>> work in.
>>
>> To achieve these three goals, i see two, possibly three, tracks.
>>
>> 1. expert - a group of developers who have
>> html/css/php/xhtml/tableless-design/w3c-standards mad skillz and who
>> work for two days to put that package into the Drupal framework. the
>> structure of this class is clearly above my head...
>>
>> 2. experienced - people who are comfortable with html/css/php/etc and
>> want to learn about module development, themes, bast email best
>> practices (ie civicmail, lml, external vendors, whitelist, blacklist,
>> etc), etc...
>>
>> Some have expressed that the first two tracks could be integrated, but
>> I would clearly fit into the experienced category not expert. Is this
>> a clear synthesis of previous conversations?
>>
>> 3. novice - exposing the novice user to the drupal world and creating
>> business opportunities. very similar to CitySoft's non-profit
>> discussions on CMS solutions.
>> - RFP scope, writing, submitting, vetting of vendors
>> - selecting a hosting provider/vendors
>> - how to build a site, what modules to use, wether or not civicspace
>> is the best solution
>> - troubleshooting with your hosting provider
>> - theme hacking
>>
>> the discussions i've had with my co-worker, Scott Trudeau, leads me to
>> believe that the discussion on the consultant list indicates there is
>> no need for a third track. i know if someone presented me track 3 a
>> year ago, my therapy bill would be a lot smaller. ;)
>>
>> what do vendors think?
>>
>> Noel
>>
>>
>> On Feb 23, 2006, at 1:51 PM, Aaron S. Pava wrote:
>>
>>
>>> I think the key question here remains "what is the objective" of the
>>> camp/weekend?
>>>
>>> For me (at CivicActions) the biggest need we have right now is not
>>> module
>>> development (plenty of PHP pros are already doing that) or additional
>>> Drupal
>>> functionality - but finding *available* quality developers who have the
>>> html/css/php/xhtml/tableless-design/w3c-standards mad skillz _already
>>> solid_
>>> and who just need to put that package into the Drupal framework. (a
>>> bit like
>>> Aaron Welch's presentation at OSCMS for Beginning Drupal Programming,
>>> but
>>> for a WEEKEND, led to qualified, kick-ass developers) You _could_
>>> coordinate
>>> it with a conference... Or just plan 3-4 of them for the year in
>>> different
>>> parts of the country...
>>>
>>> I see 12-18 developers in the class. $500 or so... Two or three days.
>>> Folks
>>> like Chris Messina, Matt Westgate, Aaron Welch, Rich Orris as
>>> facilitors.
>>>
>>> This is not about core development - or documentation. This is about
>>> building solid developers, not code.
>>>
>>> Aaron
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>> -----Original Message-----
>>>> From: consulting-bounces at drupal.org
>>>> [mailto:consulting-bounces at drupal.org] On Behalf Of Zack Rosen
>>>> Sent: Wednesday, February 22, 2006 6:15 PM
>>>> To: A list for Drupal consultants and Drupal service/hosting providers
>>>> Subject: Re: [consulting] and they call it drupalcamp
>>>>
>>>> As posted here:
>>>> http://www.zacker.org/drupal-camp
>>>>
>>>> The CivicActions folks are starting to organize the first
>>>> "Drupal Camp", a multi-day intensive Drupal developer
>>>> training program.
>>>>
>>>> Why?
>>>> Every Drupal shop I know of is in a crunch of Drupal
>>>> development talent. The limit on their ability to take on
>>>> more and bigger projects is not from lack of sales leads or
>>>> lack of management capability, it is simply there are not
>>>> enough seasoned developers on hand to pay to work on Drupal
>>>> development projects. An experienced and talented
>>>> web-application developer will take a bit of time to learn
>>>> Drupal inside and out and get up to speed developing complex
>>>> websites, so it is not simply a matter of bringing in fresh
>>>> talent, we need fresh Drupal talent. The Drupal economy is
>>>> rocketing skyward and this problem will only become more
>>>> intense in the forseable future. This is an immediate and
>>>> growing problem that we need to start solving now.
>>>>
>>>> Who?
>>>>
>>>> 1. Drupal newbies sponsored by their parent companies
>>>> (CivicActions, Trellon, etc)
>>>> 2. Drupal engineering experts to lead the class. Anyone
>>>> up for this? :) (Matt Westgate, Crunchywelch provided he
>>>> doesn't drown?).
>>>> 3. Other Drupal folks in the neighborhood also might want
>>>> to get together for a code sprint or to discuss Drupal projects.
>>>>
>>>> When?
>>>> At Vancouver Josh and I floated out the idea of doing it in
>>>> conjunction with the Personal Democracy Forum on May 15th.
>>>> This dates
>>>> works with me, does it sound reasonable to you?
>>>>
>>>> Where?
>>>> If we do it in NYC in conjunction with PDF, I can think of two
>>>> possiblities off the top of my head:
>>>>
>>>> 1. The Tank
>>>> 2. EyeBeam
>>>>
>>>> I will follow up with my contacts at both of these venues tomorrow.
>>>> Does anyone know of another possible venue?
>>>>
>>>> Curriculum
>>>>
>>>> We should make sure that whatever is taugh and learned at "Drupal
>>>> Camp" is recorded and synthesized for posterity. We want to
>>>> have many
>>>> more of these in the future so we should aim for publish-able
>>>> curriculum that can be later posted on Drupal.org.
>>>>
>>>> Next Steps?
>>>>
>>>> 1. Gregory Heller is organizing a consultant conference call to
>>>> talk about this and other issues shortly on the consultat mailinglist.
>>>> 2. David Geilhufe proposed we look into the former Ars Digita
>>>> training camps. I'll sign up to follow up and do some research and
>>>> try to talk to folks involved in organizing them.
>>>> 3. We need to figure out a data / location. Unless someone can
>>>> come up with a better data / location than PDF on May 15th let's go
>>>> with that. I will start looking seriously into venues tomorrow.
>>>> 4. We need to line up the teaching staff and get firm
>>>> commitments
>>>> from vendors to sponsor newbies. I can take this on starting Friday.
>>>>
>>>> Thoughts?
>>>>
>>>> -Zack
>>>>
>>>> On Feb 22, 2006, at 5:59 PM, Gregory Heller wrote:
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>> Perhaps the problem sets could include things like:
>>>>> Port a contributed module from 4.6 to 4.7?
>>>>> Integrate bug fixes or patches for a module
>>>>>
>>>>> they could be submitted by the community, or culled from the forum
>>>>> http://drupal.org/forum/51
>>>>> any revenue generated could go to defray costs for space, food,
>>>>> trainer's and organizer's time, back to drupal, and maybe to the
>>>>> "student" in an amount no greater than the cost of the camp (if
>>>>> there is
>>>>> a cost associated).
>>>>>
>>>>> Another option could be completing an entire website
>>>>>
>>>> project for a non
>>>>
>>>>> profit organization.
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> David Geilhufe wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>> Back in the dot com boom, a company called ARS Digita did "boot
>>>>>> camps." I like the name "Drupal Camp"
>>>>>>
>>>>>> These basically were 2-5 day training sessions for developers. You
>>>>>> went the camp, learned some basics and then completed some "problem
>>>>>> sets" collaboratively with the folks at the boot camp. A
>>>>>>
>>>> problem set
>>>>
>>>>>> would be something like creating a module. Perhaps the
>>>>>>
>>>> problems could
>>>>
>>>>>> be something like:
>>>>>>
>>>>>> 1. Create a basic module.
>>>>>> 2. Create a module that exercises parts of the Drupal API
>>>>>>
>>>> thoroughly.
>>>>
>>>>>> 3. Create a new theme
>>>>>> 4. ?
>>>>>>
>>>>>> This would also be a great addition to the handbook for folks to
>>>>>> self-study.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> If someone with more drupal skills were to work with me, we could
>>>>>> come
>>>>>> up with a few problem sets to start putting together on
>>>>>>
>>>> the Handbook.
>>>>
>>>>>> david
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>> ------
>>>>> Gregory Heller
>>>>> http://www.CivicActions.com
>>>>> http://www.GregoryHeller.com
>>>>> AIM/SKYPE: GregoryHeller
>>>>>
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>>>>>
>>>>>
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>
>
--
Henri Poole, CivicActions, LLC - (510) 684 3180 - poole at civicactions.com
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