Samvera Tooling and Values Working Group

Owned by Esmé Cowles
Last updated: Feb 08, 2021 by Jeremy Friesen

Status

Draft proposal, until agreed on and joined by members from at least three Samvera Partners.

Scope & Objectives

The Samvera community uses a wide variety of tools — including some like Github which are used almost universally by Samvera community projects. The tools and services may continue in use for long periods of time without reexamination, unless one or more motivated individuals proposes a change. So while the options available may change over time, the tools in use will often remain the same unless we actively seek to review and assess them.

Github's recent firing of an engineer reminds us that the projects and service providers may be taking actions that are aligned with the Samvera community values, or opposed to them. We should be more active in assessing the tools and services we use, what alternatives we have, and how those support or undermine our community. In order to allow us to act quickly in response to events, we should prepare for a possible migration by identifying the services we're using, researching the espoused and apparent values of the relevant service providers, and researching possible alternatives, and establishing the process for deciding to switch to an alternative service.

Deliverables & Timeframe

The working group should produce the following deliverables by the end of March, 2021:

  • A list of services and tools that are widely used in the Samvera Community, grouped by service provider
  • For each service provider, links to policies, news coverage, or other resources that document the values the service provider promotes
  • For any service providers that are at odds with Samvera's community values, a list of alternative services that the community could use instead
  • A procedure for proposing and deciding to change services

Meeting Times & Communication Channels

Until discussion warrants dedicated channels, the samvera-tech mailing list and #wg-tooling-assessment Slack channel can be used for this discussion and coordinating meetings. An initial discussion can be held in the weekly Samvera Tech Call to determine if that is an appropriate place for discussions, or if a separate meeting would be better.

Members

Note that Working Groups must have participants from three different Partners.  All members of a working group producing software must be licensed Samvera contributors covered by the appropriate CLAs. Other types of contributions such as requirements, design, best practices, documentation, etc. - do not require CLAs but participants should accept that the materials to which they contribute may be released under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License..

Resources

  • helpful links 

Meeting Notes

  • TBD