OR 2013 Developer’s Challenge Event

Here are the teams that have signed up so far for the OR2013 Developer's Challenge. Want to join an existing team? Reach out and say hi to these guys:

  • Team Name: Mapping Enhancements to Islandora
    • Members: Alan Stanley, Mark McFate, Peter MacDonald, and friends.
    • Idea: To investigate adding mapping capabilities within the Islandora framework.
    • Based on: Original Idea
    • contact: Alan Stanley - astanley at upei.ca

  • Team Name: Ravens
    • Members: Kevin Bowrin
    • Idea: TServer software to enable a RESTful API for "PDF/Eh?" checking (varying levels of PDF\A compliance.)
    • Based on: PDF/Eh?
    • Contact: kevin.bowrin at carleton.ca
  • Team Name: TeamOrchid
    • Members: Seb Francois
    • Idea: Orch ID generic API if possible, integration with EPrints. Creation/Management of ID's from the repository.
    • Based on: Integrate ORCID IDs
    • Contact: sf2 at ecs.soton.ac.uk
  • Team Name: The Good Doctor
    • Members: Don Brower, Jeremy Friesen
    • Idea: Gazetteer service for lookup of hierarchical geo/spatial lookup via coordinates or place name.
    • Based on: Original idea
    • Contact: jfriesen at nd.edu or dbrower at nd.edu
  • Team Name: Bringing the sun to Fedora 4
    • Members: Jonathan Green, Daniel Lamb, Paul Pound, Yuqing Jiang
    • Idea: Implementing an Islandora solr indexer in Fedora 4.
    • Based on: Original idea
    • Contact: jonathan at discoverygarden.ca
  • Team Name: Flower powerD
    • Members: Ryan Scherle, Andrea Schweer
    • Idea: Integrate ORCID with DSpace through providing person lookup functionality in the DSpace submission interface and through backing author name metadata with ORCID IDs.
    • Based on: Integrate ORCID IDs
    • Contact: schweer at waikato.ac.nz ryan at datadryad.org

Want to start a new team? Sign up Here

Check out the current ideas

Background

The Developer’s Challenge has been associated with the Open Repositories Conference since 2008, and has been one of the key events at the annual conference. The traditional approach has been to provide participants with a theme:

  • “Show us something new and cool in the world of Open Repositories” in 2012;
  • “Show Us the Future of Repositories” in 2011;
  • “Create a functioning repository user-interface, presenting a single metadata record which includes as many automatically created, useful links to related external content as possible” in 2010;
  • and “Show us the future of repositories” in 2009.

A core part of the theme for the 2013 Conference (Use, Reuse, Reproduce) is that we need to ensure effective collaboration in the repository community in order to achieve the best outcomes. The goal of the approach to the Dev Challenge for 2013 is to encourage participation from all in the context of the Developer Challenge Manifesto and recognize and encourage great ideas from all corners of the repository community. Everyone can participate in the Developer’s Challenge and we encourage non-programmers and programmers alike to get involved and join in.

Description of the Event

The 2013 Open Repositories conference is being held in Prince Edward Island, Canada’s ocean playground. The Developer’s Challenge will use the same format and approach as with last year’s event, but will add an all-day pre-conference hackfest event. The Hackfest will allow participants to rally around submitted ideas (or one of their own selection) and work in the provided facilities for the entire day.

Process

The OR 2013 Dev Challenge will be “seeded” by the larger community via the submission of ideas of either a general concept or a specific requirement using a specific repository system. These ideas will be presented to the OR community a few days before the event starts and then will be pitched to Hackfest participants in more detail at the Hackfest pre-conference day (Monday). The goal will be to pull together teams and resources around the ideas presented, with some encouragement from the Hackfest Facilitator to develop diverse teams and also make sure everyone is able to participate. Teams will then head off to their preferred locations for the day, and will continue their efforts through the next 2 days of the main conference event, presenting their outcomes to the community at the end of the 2nd day (July 10 - 4:00-5:30). Judges will then consider the presentations, and awards will be given out the next day as part of the closing activities of the main Conference event. Teams will also be encouraged to continue their efforts after OR, including the opportunity to participate in more formal and sustainable efforts.

Examples from the Access Hackfest event and previous OR Dev Challenges will provide some additional information on how this can work:

People who want to participate in the Dev Challenge but can’t attend the Hackfest can still participate by joining an existing team, or coming to OR with their own Dev Challenge idea.

Facilities

While the main conference event will be at the Delta Hotel, the Dev Challenge will have additional off site venues to facilitate productive gatherings of the Challenge teams:

  • The University of PEI Mac Computer Lab - Equipped with 30 iMacs, the Lab is in the Robertson Library and is close to other technology and services at the Robertson Library, including a coffee shop. It will be accessible to people taking part in the Developers Challenge for the entire week.
  • Marc Gallants Studio - The 3rd floor of an historic downtown building, Marc’s is a bar with comfortable seating, wireless and just the right ambience for the Dev Challenge. It will be accessible to people taking part in the Developers Challenge for the entire week.
  • UPEI would be happy to provide participants with server space for their projects if it was considered a useful addition. Let us know your feedback so we can prepare accordingly.

Prizes

The OR 2013 Conference and Sponsors will provide the following:

  • Funds for Main Prize (TBD), Runner Up Prize (TBD) and a Bonus Prize (TBD)
  • A number of Raspberry PI’zes (Raspberry PIs and a number of local prizes) for participants who exemplify the spirit of the Developers Challenge Manifesto.

Additional prizes will be made available where appropriate:

  • Fedora Futures Project will provide a $500 cash prize for the best submission using Fedora 4.

Developer’s Challenge Manifesto

The 2013 Developer’s Challenge is based on past events and is also informed by the Developer’s Challenge Manifesto, which was drafted by Peter Sefton in 2012 and modified slightly with comments from the community.

We want to provide opportunities for growth for our software developers and show our support and appreciation by providing them with an event, the developer challenge, that is fulfilling for them and also valuable for the Open Repositories community.

Through this event we have come to value:

Transparent, fun, open collaboration in diversely constituted teams over individual brilliance and/or groups of like individuals in cut-throat competition.

The creation of new professional networks over the ossification of old ones.

Effective engagement of non-developers (researchers, repository managers) in development over purely developer driven projects.

Work done at the conference over presentation of something prepared earlier.

Innovative ideas expressed in running code over wireframes, hand waving and elevator pitches.

The development of the Open Repositories movement as a whole over siloed development on particular repository platforms.

Entertaining live presentation of challenge projects in a relaxed setting over formal submissions.

That is, while there is value in the items on the right, we value the items on the left more in the context of the developer challenge at the Open Repositories conference.

We hope you enjoy the 2013 Developer’s Challenge in PEI!