openSUSE Boosters

The openSUSE Boosters' Team held their first meeting after the openSUSE conference. Francis Giannaros introduced the team in a recent blog post.

These people will be working full time on making it easier to contribute to the openSUSE Project and improving communication within and outside the project. Together they aim to make openSUSE the best Linux distribution, with an open, inviting and independent community. They will work to improve the infrastructure and lower the bar for contributors.

For now the Booster project team has been divided into three groups. One group will be organizing all documentation on how to contribute to the project. They will create a single wiki page with links to all such documentation, including video tutorials so that new people can more easily find what they are looking for.

A second group will be doing the same for the infrastructure, integrating all of it under one umbrella so that people can see all the various web services on one web page. Current web services include user forums, download sites, the build service, openFATE feature tracking, blogs, the weekly news, and much more. There will be a consistent look and feel for each web service landing page. The idea is to group these projects on the portal page, with categories for novices, experienced users and computer professionals so that people can figure out what needs work and where they can best contribute.

The third group will be working on making openSUSE's development Factory branch more transparent. There will be a Factory Status overview page that will allow developers and testers to easily see what packages are failing to build, which one are in need of a maintainer and where more testing is needed.

Future goals include adding social collaboration tools to the distribution and developing an Upstream Attraction Program. Overall they will help to improve communication within the project and help to spread the word about the project to potential contributors.

The mailing list has not been set up yet, but watch for it to get started soon. Meanwhile, contact information for the team members can be found on the openSUSE Boosters' Team site.