Community Team Weekly 2024

Community
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Ubuntu is about opening doors, not just on our computers, but between us. As we step into 2024, think of Ubuntu as a bridge connecting worlds, ideas, and people. It’s an invitation to anyone, anywhere, to join in and make a mark, no matter how small it may seem. This year, we’re breaking down barriers, simplifying how you can contribute, because every bit of help, every idea brings us closer. Together, we’re not just building software; we’re crafting a space where everyone belongs, where every effort is valued. Let’s make 2024 the year we all come together, making contributing easier and more meaningful than ever.

Canonical’s Community Team is part of that effort, aiming to support the community in being successful. Here you can see what we’ve been up to each week. To make it easier to follow we’re keeping this topic locked, but if you have questions please post a new topic in the community category.

Nostalgic? Check out what was going on in 2023.

Want to skip ahead to the latest news? Click here.

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Pulse 2024#01

Dates: January 2 – January 15

Just getting back into the new year. Hope you enjoyed the holidays!

  • We hosted two sessions of the flavor sync meeting on January 8, 2024. We communicated the meeting beforehand, ensured needed resources were present, and we posted a meeting recap on the Ubuntu Discourse.
  • We created a list of events that the Community team is going to support during 2024. We created an automated estimation tool via google sheets to streamline merchandise ordering process.
  • We consolidated all Ubuntu Summit 2023 feedback left during various retrospective meetings and feedback forms into a single document. We created a single list and prepared action priority to address various items that need improvement.
  • Did you speak at the Ubuntu Summit but didn’t receive your speaker certificate? The remaining certificates are all in the mail, so you should receive them if you shared your address.
  • We created moderator space and rooms for the Ubuntu Matrix project. We listed those in the documentation draft.
  • Find us at FOSDEM and State of Open Con! Conference mini-sites are up at Community Conferences · Canonical / Ubuntu Events (Indico)
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Pulse 2024#02

Dates: January 15 – January 29

  • We prepared slides about Ubuntu Summit and Synchronicity projects for the virtual mid-cycle roadmap.
  • We worked with the Canonical finance team to process payment for Ubuntu Summit 2023 video editing work.
  • We collected Ubuntu Summit 2023 sentiment analysis from Social Media.
  • We tested email notifications and Mjolnir upgrades on staging instance of the ubuntu.com matrix homeserver.
  • We supported data platform team with creation of matrix rooms, we enabled moderator bot. We published the room in the public directory, and listed under the Juju space.
  • We gathered IP addresses for our Matrix-IRC bridging request to be sent to IRC libera.chat.
  • We created a github issue requesting changes to the room publishing access list on the Ubuntu Matrix homeserver. This ensures that all official rooms on the Ubuntu Matrix homeserver follow the server guidelines for moderation.
  • We announced changes in Launchpad that allow users to add their Matrix IDs to their Launchpad accounts.
  • We created an initial set of moderation documentation for the Ubuntu Matrix homeserver.
  • We created documentation on how the process to have official rooms works for the Ubuntu Matrix homeserver.
  • (This happened before FOSDEM actually) We created some quiz cards for FOSDEM. Find us there for some nice prizes!
  • We researched alternate finance mechanisms and third party tools for Community Donations Applications processes.
  • We documented our current CDA process from start to end.
  • Begin shipping for FOSDEM and working out some special merchandise
  • Tested various newly landed features in the staging instance of Matrix
  • Meeting with the design team on community pathways. We’d like to create more opportunities for design contributions
  • Working with the Launchpad team to make communication to LoCo groups more simple
  • Finalizing the schedule for UbuCon @ SCaLE
  • Preparation for the 24.04 Wallpaper Competition
  • Surveyed a few different options for integrating the CDA process with our finance and task management systems
  • Gathered some usage metrics from synapse for a presentation
  • Can you believe it is already mid cycle?
  • Worked with snapcrafters to give them more access to their own snaps
  • Our IS DevOps team is going to upstream a feature on Indico to allow granting exceptions to allow individuals to modify their registration. We mainly need this for our internal sprints.
  • Worked with others in the community on IRC bridging and Matrix documentation
  • Preparation for FOSDEM quiz
  • Setup Discourse Events & Calendar plugin and created How To doc
  • Started working on new sizzle reel for SCaLE booth
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Pulse 2024#03

Dates: January 29 – February 12

  • We processed CDA requests for Pulse 2024#3.
  • Published announcement of Ubuntu 24.04 Noble Numbat Wallpaper Competition on the Ubuntu Discourse: Noble Numbat 24.04 Wallpaper Competition
  • Created a custom graphic featuring the Noble Numbat mascot for the Wallpaper Competition.
  • Scheduled social media posts to promote Noble Numbat wallpaper competition.
  • A new Ubucon site was made in partnership with members from the Ubuntu community. You can visit it now by going to: https://ubucon.org/
  • We created, approved, and published Matrix moderation documentation.
  • We modified the Matrix documentation frontend per Matrix Council request. We removed one layer to improve navigation, and we switched categories and articles classification to be more in line with the diataxis framework.
  • We worked with the Ubuntu Matrix homeserver room owners, raised awareness of the upcoming federation and moderation challenges. We encouraged adoption of the moderator bot and CoC reminder on all public, listed rooms.
  • We started a discussion with the support team at IRC provider libera.chat to understand requirements and expectations for a Matrix-IRC bridge. We reached an understanding to get the bridge started, and added items to our roadmap to provide additional required and nice to have features to the bridging infrastructure.
  • We reached a decision on solutions to be used for the new Community Donations Application process.
  • We considered Netsuite as a platform for our new CDA process. We discussed with the Finance team and noted all PROs and CONs in preparation for a decision on CDA process.
  • We considered OpenCollective as an alternative to manage the CDA and donation fund reports. We discussed this matter with the Legal team and noted details for platform comparison.
  • We explored tools and platform alternatives to improve community donation application processes. We listed PROs, CONs, risks and costs/effort for each.
  • State of Open Con happened in this pulse and there was a bunch to prepare. It was a great event, you should consider it for next year!
  • Working with IS DevOps to talk about mailing list mode in discourse 3.1, as part of our work to modernize mailing lists
  • Spoke with some flavors on collaborating on the wallpaper contest
  • Sent speaker banners to UbuCon speakers and prepared some social messaging
  • FOSDEM happened in this pulse as well. We had a mobile stand, which was quite refreshing.
  • There were a bunch of teams interested in moving to Matrix that we helped get set up
  • Shipping merchandise is still quite a pain, we tried to make things easier with little success.
  • Supported our local Ubuntu Community in Nigeria on bringing new non-code contributors to Ubuntu
  • Noble Numbat wallpaper competition is live!
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Pulse 2024#04

Dates: February 12 – February 26

  • We reviewed and revised merchandise formula for Q1 orders. We also updated a list of ordered items.
  • We reviewed and took decisions on all community donation applications for Pulse 2024#4
  • Scheduled social media posts to promote Noble Numbat wallpaper competition.
  • We created, reviewed, and uploaded two how-to documents on the Matrix projects, focused at room creation and configuration
  • We published an update and announced Ubuntu Matrix homeserver go live on the Ubuntu Discourse
  • We worked with the IS DevOps team and the Ubuntu Community on Matrix to test the new Federation proxy. We also enabled Ubuntu.com room searching from federated servers.
  • We started a discussion with the support team at IRC provider libera.chat to understand requirements and expectations for a Matrix-IRC bridge. We reached an understanding to get the bridge started, and added items to our roadmap to provide additional required and nice to have features to the bridging infrastructure.
  • We reached a decision on solutions to be used for the new Community Donations Application process.
  • Ubuntu Summit 2024 planning is starting up!
  • Finalizing some contracting for event sponsorships
  • Brainstorm chat with Ubuntu Africa folks on future community events
  • Making some progress on ubuntu.com SMTP. Not quite as satisfying for the moment, but at least some next steps!
  • We’re starting to explore some open source community metrics and how they could help us
  • There have been a few meetings with comms and A/V teams regarding the Ubuntu Summit
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Pulse 2024#05

Dates: February 26 – March 11

  • We reviewed and revised merchandise formula for Q1 orders. We also updated a list of ordered items.
  • The Canonical Staff badge on a few of our discourses is now updated
  • Scheduled social media posts to promote Noble Numbat wallpaper competition.
  • We reviewed retrospective and feedback items for Ubuntu Summit 2023. We selected appropriate priority and action items.
  • We created a form to spotlight projects and contributors for the Ubuntu Summit 2024
  • A new Ubucon site was made in partnership with members from the Ubuntu community. You can visit it now by going to: https://ubucon.org/
  • We worked with Ubuntu Kylin to create a space and two rooms on the Ubuntu Matrix server. We enabled the moderator bot, we listed CoC reminders, we listed the space and rooms under the server directory and we added the space to the main Ubuntu Community space
  • We created, reviewed, and uploaded two how-to documents on the Matrix projects, focused at room creation and configuration
  • We started a discussion with the support team at IRC provider libera.chat to understand requirements and expectations for a Matrix-IRC bridge. We reached an understanding to get the bridge started, and added items to our roadmap to provide additional required and nice to have features to the bridging infrastructure.
  • We created a Jira Service Management workflow to handle Community Donation Applications requests. Based on our experience with the JSM platform, we created an evaluation document from the Community Team point of view.
  • We implemented a new guest travel policy for community contributors. Any Community Donations Fund applicants that get travel approved, can now use ATPI, Canonical travel partner to book their flights and accommodations.
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Pulse 2024#06

Dates: March 11 – March 25

  • We changed configurations of the #ubuntu-release-testing Matrix space. Configured RSS bot permissions in announcement/news rooms, consolidated a few of the chat rooms into a single one, and informed rooms users of the changes.
  • We supported the Ubuntu volunteers and Canonical staff at SCaLE 2024 by creating digital assets, flyers, and presentations.
  • We organized and hosted 2 sessions for the March Ubuntu Flavor Sync. We also posted a meeting report on the Ubuntu Discourse.
  • The results for the wallpaper contest are in! Check out the winners.
  • Wallpaper winners and finalists now have their badges. Will you be an Artful Aadvark next time around?
  • The community wallpapers have been packaged and are available in ubuntu-wallpapers
  • We reviewed retrospective and feedback items for Ubuntu Summit 2023. We selected appropriate priority and action items.
  • We created a Web & Design brief for the creation of Ubuntu Summit 2024 assets. This has to take into account the 20Y anniversary, location, and overall branding strategy.
  • We created a Web & Design brief to create the Ubuntu Summit landing page. We reviewed with stakeholders, discussed with project managers, and submitted to the Web & Design teams.
  • We confirmed that the EA team signed contract with the venue for Ubuntu Summit 2024
  • We created a launchpad group for Matrix bot accounts. Ubuntu Members and Canonical staff can request a bot account to be added to this group, so it can use SAML and log on the Ubuntu Matrix homeserver.
  • We proposed separate Synapse worker nodes for media management. This will help the Matrix homeserver scalability, preventing media heavy tasks from slowing or affecting the whole Matrix homeserver.
  • We tested the snapped IRC bridge with the help of the community. The snap functions well and has feature parity with other implementations of the same bridge: matrix-appservice-irc
  • We’ve made sure there is a UI Freeze Exception for flavor wallpaper updates, as the logo assets werent previously available.
  • There has been a new flavor sync meeting! Check discourse for the meeting notes.
  • Following the staff badge changes on discourse.ubuntu.com, we’ve had some internal discussions to see if there is a better fit.
  • The Ubuntu Africa community is sponsoring an event, we supported them with some logo usage guidelines.
  • The mastodon instance ubuntu.social will be hosted by Canonical. We’re working out parts of the transition.
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Pulse 2024#07

Dates: March 25 – April 8

  • In collaboration with Alfred Neumayer from the UBports project, we published an article on building Snap packages on Ubuntu Touch: Creating Snaps on Ubuntu Touch | Snapcraft
  • We discussed Canonical engineering presence at the upcoming DebConf 2024.
  • We worked on Community Donation Applications for Pulse 2024#7. We reviewed and approved 2 applications for LFNW.
  • We created a Web & Design brief for the creation of Ubuntu Summit 2024 assets. This has to take into account the 20Y anniversary, location, and overall branding strategy.
  • We created a Web & Design brief to create the Ubuntu Summit landing page. We reviewed with stakeholders, discussed with project managers, and submitted to the Web & Design teams.
  • We created an Indico event for Ubuntu Summit 2024. See Ubuntu Summit 2024 (25-27 October 2024): Overview · Canonical / Ubuntu Events (Indico)
  • Canonical is a sponsor for UbuCon Asia 2024! Check out https://2024.ubucon.asia/ for more details.
  • Created an event page on events.canonical.com for UbuCon North America. You can learn more by visiting: https://events.canonical.com/event/50/
  • Drafted and shared letter of support for upcoming UbuCon North America.
  • We published Matrix documentation: Abuse report, management of ignore list, recommended room settings, regain control of a room, moderators, contact the Matrix Council.
  • We discussed synapse maintenance tasks for the Ubuntu Matrix homeserver. We reviewed the spec written by IS DevOps.
  • We worked with the IS DevOps team to define statistics to capture on the Ubuntu Matrix homeserver.
  • We tested the snapped IRC bridge with the help of the community. The snap functions well and has feature parity with other implementations of the same bridge: matrix-appservice-irc
  • We discussed community branding with Merlijn from the CC and some folks internally. Our design team will work on some updates to capture the points Merlijn raised.
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