Since desktops aren’t that easy to take with you in your luggage, I won’t be reachable during those two weeks, apart for the lucky few that happen to know my cellphone number.

While planning this post I suddenly realized that maybe this post doesn’t have that much use. I’m not as much a part of the community anymore like I used to be. Not that I played a very important role or did a lot, but I did more for Ubuntu that I do now. Most of my contributions consist of bug reporting and an occasional suggestion or patch.

However, I would like to do more for Ubuntu. Maybe I should start working on Ubuntu Wanted again. When I’m back I’ll reconsider the project. Current options are: completely abandon the project, continue work on the current code and my favourite: examine the posibility of extending Launchpad to do what Ubuntu Wanted was ought to do.

Some of the changes to Launchpad could be:

• Extend profiles to include personal skills, both given by the user and measured on an Ohloh kind of way
• Extend team applying for moderated teams, e.g. to require certain skills, provide details about the application procedure and more
• Allow teams and people to create tasks and to assign them to projects, like the way branches already work

There is obviously much more that can be done , e.g. I didn’t include the mentoring system for example, but I will have a closer look on the possibilities and problems when I return. Meanwhile, if you have suggestions, please leave a comment. However, please refrain from spamming since I won’t be there to check if Askiment fails to filter everything.

At the moment(revision 4) the module works and can be used as a full replacement for the D5 version. You don’t need to have an adapted version of the OpenID module, that is only needed if you want to use Launchpad as the single sign-on provider.

The module won’t be specifically modified for Ubuntu Wanted, because the hooks it provides to request team information are already enough.They can provide us with enough information to ensure that the person that places the task actually is a member of the team he’s placing it for.

If we want more information about the teams, e.g. contact information, we’ll need something else. However, that won’t happen soon, especially since I’m not aware of a Drupal module that implements the Launchpad API, but also because it isn’t an essential feature. If you do happen to know such a module, please tell us.

This allows us to use parts of the great Ubuntu LoCo Drupal project and gives some improvements in the Form API and other parts of Drupal. We’ll have to adapt the official Launchpad modules, though. At the moment they only support Drupal 5.

To ensure theme compatibility and to have a cleaner theme I copied the theme from the Ubuntu LoCo Drupal project and made some small adjustments. We’re going to redesign the theme in the future, but I thought this would provide us with a more solid base.
The artwork was moved to a separate branch and can now be downloaded from lp:~ubuntu-wanted-dev/ubuntu-wanted/artwork.

The trunk is located at lp:ubuntu-wanted.

This was probably caused by Ohcount also counting the safety copies. The possitive side of this all that instead of 3117 extra lines of code, the rewrite only resulted in 509 extra lines of code. Much better, probably.

MVC-pattern rewritten
The MVC-pattern is now applied more strictly.

in the changelog.
After several days of work I know managed to let the code do roughly the same with 3117 lines of code more, which means the codebase has almost doubled.

Why would I do this? Why would I make such an effort to expand the codebase so much while there doesn’t change a lot to the external behaviour?
Because now the MVC-pattern is applied strictly and the models can do more than just presenting information it’s just a matter of connecting wires when you want to add a page. No need for writing lots of queries.
Because of the new store function it’s going to be a a lot easier to add AJAX functionality and it already makes it easier to update entries.
The data is loaded into Model::data and when you call Model::store() the data is compared to a copy (Model::_data_copy) and all changes are written to the database.

Now on something different: I created a milestone for Ubuntu Wanted called usable, if all bugs and blueprints marked for that milestone are finished/fixed we can start with testing Ubuntu Wanted in a Real Life Situation. I found milestones a lot easier to use than mind maps, so I’m going to dump the mind map I blogged about earlier in favour of Launchpad.

Lets show some stats! Everyone loves stats!

I let Ohcount examine the branch before and after revision 18, which gave these results:

Before

Examining 79 file(s).

Ohloh Line Count Summary

Language          Files       Code    Comment  Comment %      Blank      Total
—————-  —–  ———  ———  ———  ———  ———
php                         31       2173       1020      31.9%        646       3839
css                           9        2122            73        3.3%        185       2380
html                      31          397              9        2.2%         172         578
sql                           1            44             33      42.9%           11           88
javascript              2            16              4       20.0%            2            22
—————-  —–  ———  ———  ———  ———  ———
Total                      74       4752       1139      19.3%       1016       6907

Platforms detected: PHP, SQL, Drupal
Tools detected: None

After

Examining 118 file(s)..

Ohloh Line Count Summary

Language          Files       Code    Comment  Comment %      Blank      Total
—————-  —–  ———  ———  ———  ———  ———
php                        64       3431       1922      35.9%       1010       6363
css                            9       2122           73         3.3%         185       2380
html                       64        802            18        2.2%         328       1148
sql                             1          46             33      41.8%            11          90
javascript               3           31               8      20.5%             4          43
—————-  —–  ———  ———  ———  ———  ———
Total                    141      6432       2054       24.2%       1538      10024

Platforms detected: PHP, SQL, Drupal
Tools detected: None

If you feel like helping the project out a bit, have a look at the usable milestone page to see if there’s anything for you.

• MadsRH, assisted by Pasi Lallinaho, is responsible for the theme, when they’ve come up with something in HTML or in the form of a Drupal 5 theme it can be committed, but it’s not the most urgent task at the moment.
• We’re going to use a Launchpad-teams based model for task posting. Applications are going to be managed by team administrators and tasks can be assigned to teams. If you are or know someone who has got experience with the Launchpad plugins for Drupal, please contact me.
• In order to get more developers we’re going to look around and (slowly) make Ubuntu Wanted more well-known. This includes asking at LoCos, blogging about it and just asking everyone you think might be interested in doing some coding. If you are reading this blog and would like to help with some coding, leave a comment or drop by at #ubuntu-website @ FreeNode.
• We should just start working.

Since Ohloh now supports Bazaar it’s now possible to add the branches of Launchpad projects to ‘the open source network’. I immediately created an Ubuntu Wanted project to Ohloh.

The results of the very fast code analysis:

• (i) Mostly written in PHP
• <!> Short source control history
• <!> Small development team

The first point isn’t a warning and the rest is solvable, just join the development!

Widgetpower:

• New theme design of MadsRH
  
• How to gain manpower
  
• Discussion of feature set and scope

If you’ve got a suggestion for a meeting point, please leave a comment, but keep in mind we can’t change everything.

The Google Calendar item.

Now all I have to do to finish the rewrite of Ubuntu Wanted is getting the forms for editing and adding a task and the managing page to work again. Especially  the managing page should be much easier to create with the new system.

However, I’d like to have your opinion on the code. What do you think of my design discussions? Did I write well? How do you think about the way I use certain structures? I don’t really ask for in-dept code reviews, although I’d really like such a thing, but I’d like to have some response, a little bit feedback before continueing with coding other functionalities of Ubuntu Wanted. If I’d have made a serious mistake and I or someone else would discover it when some complex features have already been implemented, rewriting would be much harder than now it isn’t even merged with the stable branch yet.

If you’d have the time to even leave a small comment, you’d be very helpful.

Recent revisions

20. By Sense Hofstede 2 minutes ago

Not working current state of the model rewrite. ToDo: skill-task bridge and let the views use the new model interface, currently they’re broken.

via “Ubuntu Wanted devel version” branch in Launchpad.

I’ve just commited the 20th revision of Ubuntu Wanted to my working copy branch of it. In this revision the largest part of the new model interface has been done.

Although it yet has to be integrated and the Model::store() function doesn’t work, the basic functions are working.
Most of the code has been moved to the Model class itself, which was abstracted.

Based on the input of the Model::init() function the Model::load() function generates the query and executes it. The only thing the extended models currently do is giving the table name.

All data is stored duplicate, a read only and a working copy. You can freely edit the working copy. If you’re done you can either revert the changes you did by executing Model::clean() or save them by executing Model::store(). That method will compare both data copies and will only update those variables and rows that were changed.

Other new things: Model::reload and Model::purge.

I still need to create a skill-task link, but I’ve already got an idea. I’m going to give the task model a method that creates a list of needed skills and request the skill model in the controller — need to figure out some kind of dependency system — and adds the references to the data of the skills used in each task entry.

Feedback is very welcome, just like programmers.

• Ubuntu UDSJaunty IceCast Community Room
• Ubuntu Wanted blueprint for the UDS schedule

The gobby server is at gobby.ubuntu.com.

Although I won’t be there physically, I am going to semi attend it via the internet. However, explaining things via IRC is harder than saying it out loud, even though my English speaking isn’t that good. To give the attendees a good overview of the current state and ideas I’ve created a document, which can be found here:

http://files.qense.nl/ubuntu-wanted-uds.odt

See Hear you then!

I created this image to show you the current progress:

http://files.qense.nl/features.jpg

If you see a thing on there you’d like to help out with, please contact the Ubuntu Web Presence Team or me.

The program can also export (X)HTML, like you can see at their website. I haven’t tested that, I don’t think that it can add anything to the overview. If you do think it’s useful for UW, try to convince me!

If you’ve got a suggestion, please leave a comment too.

I’m going to update the image each time a new revision has been comitted to the main branch.

I’m currently looking on the theme MadsRH created and the suggestions Huge Brant made. I’ll try to implement it as soon as possible so new pages or additions to the views would incoperate this design and the designers can see the fruit of their labour.

If you’d like to help with Ubuntu Wanted, please ask in #ubuntu-wanted @ irc.freenode.org or contact the ubuntu-website team or me.

The reason why you didn’t hear much of me was that school was consuming a lot of my time. Even though I did have a holiday, I didn’t have much time to spend on the project. Next to that I had problems with reinstalling Ubuntu Intrepid Ibex, which turned out to be caused by a badly burned CD.
Overall, UW didn’t got as much attention as it deserved and should have gotten. The theme MadsRH created from the original Brainstorm theme hasn’t been applied yet and the promised task-admin-queue hasn’t been committed to the Bazaar repository.

This is currently the rough planning for UW: first I want to finally finish the admin queue, resulting in a system that theoretically could work.

After that the ‘browsing experience’ needs to be improved, which I first want to do by creating overview pages for each skill. These pages are going to have three lists, for each level of experience. Under these lists there can be a link with the text ‘more…’, pointing to a page with just tasks of that level of experience.

When that’s done I can have a look at the theme and the improvement Hugh Brant suggested. But I’m not sure if I’ll give that a higher priority than a search function, which seems quite important to me.

I can’t give a real ETA for all parts of UW, although I estimate that the admin queue is going to be finished in the weekend — if nothing unexpected is going to happen. I just have a rough planning in my head.

If you are interested in helping out, either by suggestions(is there a usuabillity expert around?) or coding and theming, you’re very welcome. Just send a mail to the ubuntu-website mailinglist, come to #ubuntu-website @ Freenode, or contact me.

A good website needs more than just a bunch of forms and lists. That is what MadsRH is working on. He already made this beautiful mock-up:

Ubuntu blogspot: Ubuntu wanted

Now, wouldn’t that look great?

If you would like to help too, please don’t hestitate to send a mail to the ubuntu-website maillist or contact me at #ubuntu-website. Feedback is also welcome, but please keep in mind that big changes aren’t possible (yet) due a lack of manpower.

Here a list of people and the tasks they were assigned to:
Dipatanu(Couldn’t find the real name. Could you apply to the
ubuntu-wanted-dev team, please?): Task submission page
Nicolas Deschildre(nand): Hosting
Sense Hofstede(qense): Task display enhancement, in lists and separate
on their own page, and the application submit form.
Jesper Jarlskov(jarlen): Administration functions

Another meeting will be held at Tuesday September the 2nd at 19.00 UTC.

If you want to see our progress, have a look at http://ubuntu-wanted-dev.ideatorrent.org/ This host automatically uses the latest revision in the development branch(lp:~ubuntu-wanted-dev/ubuntu-wanted/devel), thanks to nand. You have to be a member of the ubuntu-wanted-dev team in order to be able to commit. Would you like to help? Please contact me or nand. We’re often at #ubuntu-website @ freenode.

We do have to pick a date on time and since it’s already Saturday today, it was time to pick one. Because there were no replies it could be that not everyone is confortable with the selected date. My apologizes for that.

The meeting will be helt at #ubuntu-website at 19.00 UTC at Tuesday August the 26th. Everyone interested in helping with Ubuntu Wanted is very welcome. The purpose of the meeting is not to brainstorm about fancy features, but to see who wants to help, divide tasks and discuss technical details. Due a lack of manpower we won’t work on the ‘help offered’ part, but just at the ‘help needed’ part.

(Announcement in maillist: https://lists.canonical.com/archives/ubuntu-website/2008-August/000311.html )

An interesting point was raised during the discussion that took place at the mailist; someone suggested to integrate the volunteer pool that was suggested earlier at Brainstorm in the Ubuntu Wanted site. This would give some great opportunities, e.g. the user could be notified when a role he’s interested in would be placed. This wasn’t the first time someone suggested it, but now I finally agreed with the suggestion. However, I don’t want to make such a radical change without asking other people first. Although I’ve offered to lead this project, I don’t want to be a dictator. I’ve send mails to Pasto, the person that suggestion the volunteer pool, and someone else that offered Pasto his help with coding.

I’ve brainstormed a bit about this site in one of the mails I sent to the ubuntu-website mailist. I’d also like to get some feedback from more people than just the people at the mailist — there are not many people subscribed — so I want to ask you to look at this passage I copied out of my email and tell me what you think of it and the whole idea of integrating the two ideas into one site. Feedback about the Ubuntu Wanted site itself is also very, very welcome.

(…)
I’m now
thinking out loud, so please say it when you don’t agree.
The user only ends up in the volunteer pool when (s)he creates/activates
his/her profile. Than a status can be set showing how eagerly the user
is looking for roles. At the profile are the tasks shown that the user
has fulfilled or is fulfilling within the Ubuntu Community and outside.
Experience and knowledge of software and programming languages should
also be visible.(Should the level of education and age also be visible?)
Other users can write testimonials about the user. However, how are we
going to display experience? Will it be (semi-)automated like Ohloh, by
checkboxes or by text? Should it contain links to other profiles? I
think there should be some automated forms for Ohloh and SourceForge
profiles(and more) profiles and a text area to tell about the current
and past roles. Programming languages can be done with checkboxes,
experience with drop-downboxes.
I think the profile should also have a text area where the user can
tell something about him-/herself.

Getting a volunteer pool would also have the advantage that with certain
tasks, the users that might be interested could get mailed when
something an interesting role would be posted. Especially if the user
could tell the system he’d be interested in a position in a certain team.
(…)

Leave a comment here, or mail me using the contact form. Participating in the discussion at the mailist or contacting me(qense) at #ubuntu-website @ freenode is also good, of course. In fact, I’d encourage you to contribute to the mailist when you’re interested to help, so people other than me can participate.

Thanks in advance.