onboard @nobodxbodon

[nobodxbodon]

My name is Xuan, and here's my linkedin page, and in my repository are some of my small OS projects.

My main interest is to volunteer for marketing:

• take the most advantage of openness, to market the brand
• attract more contributers

First question:

• could I use other web framework than Aspen when contributing code?

[chadwhitacre]

Huzzah! Thanks for stepping forward! 💃

(For reference: #316 (comment).)

could I use other web framework than Aspen when contributing code?

We use Aspen for three sites, gratipay.com, inside.gratipay.com, and gip.rocks. If you like JavaScript you might check out our widget server, grtp.co. If you like Rails, see gratipay-access-dashboard, which is woefully broken, and should probably be killed if no-one is going to maintain it.

My main interest is to volunteer for marketing:

Awesome! What are your ideas here? What do you think we should do?

my linkedin page

Are you still in San Francisco? I just booked a trip (#867) out there for the next two weeks! We should get together!

[mattbk]

/me crosses fingers that @nobodxbodon likes JS...

[nobodxbodon]

I'm considering to focus on the accounting part and build some kind of monitor/dashboard for cost&income of Gratipay (example: Buffer's matrix). If it already exists, I'll try to improve and integrate it with other parts of the business. This can serve multiple purposes:

• avoid irrelevant cost like this
• better forecast and planning
• last but not least, highlight the openness of the business

I'm currently in the Bay area, but is about 1 hour away from SF. I developed with Python in some school projects, but not quite in business apps, similar with RoR. My main programming languages are Java (in work) and then Javascript (personal projects like browser extensions). Plus MySQL (in work) and a little PostgreSQL in personal project (one small personal project deployed on Heroku used that). I do like JS, mostly as ameteur, why?

[mattbk]

I do like JS, mostly as ameteur, why?

I was mostly joking...by default I've been the most recent person responsible for widgets since I really wanted them to work again.

[nobodxbodon]

I was mostly joking...by default I've been the most recent person responsible for widgets since I really wanted them to work again.

Cool. Your reply drove me to explore why the widgets were broken, in related ticket #103, and this open issue (is there any blocker for this one? sounds like a short change in source code).

Another notice is, there are so many open issues, that a new comer like me can hardly tell which has high priority or severity. Is there some high-level roadmap kind of document that outlines the plan and priorities?

[chadwhitacre]

@nobodxbodon Our roadmap (such as it is) is in the ticket description on the weekly core radar ticket. We do have an accounting system that could use some attention. Want to get together in person next week or the week after? What is your availability?

[nobodxbodon]

@whit537 thanks the radar is pretty comprehensive. I wonder if there's an easy way to show diff between each radar reports, which may tell more clearly what's accomplished and newly added.
The best time for me are lunch time in most weekdays. Otherwise maybe the afternoons of weekends, or some evenings if those don't work. BTW I'm in Sunnyvale.

[chadwhitacre]

I wonder if there's an easy way to show diff between each radar reports, which may tell more clearly what's accomplished and newly added.

I think it will be better to move most of that content to pages on Inside Gratipay (#880). That way we can track history w/ Git. The reason the core radar is so overloaded is that we tried having multiple radars, but that got to be too much (#828) and copying all the extra content to the core radar was the lowest hanging fruit.

this open issue (is there any blocker for this one? sounds like a short change in source code).

@nobodxbodon Wanna tackle this one? :-)

[chadwhitacre]

@nobodxbodon May I add you as a GitHub contributor (so you can make PRs in the main repo rather than in a personal fork) and to the Gratipay money distribution (so you can start taking money! :)?

[nobodxbodon]

@whit537 sure glad to be a contributor. I've no problem with being added to Gratipay money distribution, but most likely I won't take any for a while.

[chadwhitacre]

glad to be a contributor

Invite sent! :-)

I've no problem with being added to Gratipay money distribution

Cool. You'll need to add and verify an email, set it as your PayPal, and add an identity before I can add you to the distribution list.

[chadwhitacre]

@nobodxbodon Picking up from #878 (comment) and gratipay/finances#3 (comment) ... any interest/availability in getting together this Saturday the 12th to bring you up to speed on the finances? SF or Sunnyvale or in between? Coupa in Palo Alto?

[nobodxbodon]

@whit537 sounds good to me. I'm not sure if morning or afternoon is better for me on Saturday. Shall we confirm on Thursday or Friday through email?

[chadwhitacre]

@nobodxbodon Sure, sounds good. [email protected] :)

[nobodxbodon]

Here's a mock of the cost part, based on current finance spreadsheet. After discussion, it occurs to me that links of related issues in github can address the "why" and "how" to each cost for business handlers clearly. They serve as sources for (especially external) tech guys to check details and comment, as well as index of internal how-to documents. It's not a strict UI mock of the page, and mainly demo the content that needs to be associated.

[nobodxbodon]

As a pretotype, how about I start with some mostly static page(s), instead of a Django app, and see if they look right?

[nobodxbodon]

@whit537 may I ask if there's traffic monitoring carried out currently? I see some efforts before.

[nobodxbodon]

@whit537 I wonder if Buffer.com can be used to some important announcements? The free plan seems sufficient for that usage for now.

[mattbk]

@nobodxbodon re: analytics, here's some more: gratipay/gratipay.com#3121

[nobodxbodon]

@mattbk thanks, but wrong link?

[mattbk]

Yes, oops.gratipay/gratipay.com#3034

[nobodxbodon]

@whit537 as I'm looking at the finance spreadsheet again, it seems the top 3 items makes more than half of the cost. I'm interested in the finer breakdown, like the heroku instances involved, etc. These will be necessary for the mock above as well. My guess is there can be savings somewhere, but I won't be sure unless I see what detailed items are burning money and why. Could you point me to some reference issues please?

[chadwhitacre]

Could you point me to some reference issues please?

I'm not sure what issues to point you to about where we might be burning money. :-( Is that what you're asking for here?

[nobodxbodon]

I'm not sure what issues to point you to about where we might be burning money. :-( Is that what you're asking for here?

Kind of. According to the design, each cost should be associated with the reasons and related tech documents like setup steps, so that it'll be easier to review (is it necessary? any alternatives? etc).

As mentioned, the top 3 services (Paramount, Heroku, Travis) makes half of the cost, according to the current finances spreadsheet. So I'm particularly interested in the issues that describe the initial considerations and decision making to choose these services (plans)

[chadwhitacre]

Searching for "paramount" in this repo turns up #831.

Searching "pay for travis" turns up #102.

We've been hosted on Heroku since the beginning, so there's no ticket about initial considerations and decision there. You've seen some of the more recent discussion about Heroku.

I should say that in general we want to pay for services, even if we could get them for free. The reason is to be consistent with our own principles: the whole point of Gratipay is to pay people for things you're grateful they provide! :-)

[chadwhitacre]

Reopening from @mattb at #993 (comment) ...

May I give you admin privileges on gratipay.com, @nobodxbodon?

[nobodxbodon]

@whit537 yes please. Thanks. Could you also share some reference about what admin can/should do? I don't see obvious link in inside. portal.

Besides, is there an existing issue about adding text search ability in inside.gratipay.com? Like those search bar powered by some search engine?

[chadwhitacre]

Grep the code for ADMIN to see what admins can do, we don't have docs.

Besides, is there an existing issue about adding text search ability in inside.gratipay.com? Like those search bar powered by some search engine?

Not that I know of.

Added as admin!

[chadwhitacre]

gratipay::MAROON=> select username from participants where is_admin;
┌─────────────┐
│  username   │
├─────────────┤
│ clone1018   │
│ rohitpaulk  │
│ whit537     │
│ aandis.     │
│ nobodxbodon │
│ mattbk      │
└─────────────┘
(6 rows)

[chadwhitacre]

Next step: shall we give you permissions on the logs repo so you have access to bank statements for gratipay/finances#3 (comment)?

[nobodxbodon]

@whit537 is it the same log repo in #878 (comment)? I see the latest statements are 2016/10. Could you add 2017/01 or if that's not avaible yet then 2016/12?

[chadwhitacre]

is it the same log repo in #878 (comment)?

Yes!

Could you add 2017/01 or if that's not avaible yet then 2016/12?

Done in https://github.com/gratipay/logs/commit/a20223548edaeb72c372c77142d4547117d2df22 through 2017-01!

Unfortunately we lost the detailed CSV for PNC for 2016-11. I thought they gave us 90 days but it appears to be three calendar months. Missed it by two days. :-/ We still have the PDF from that month though, so we can produce a CSV if needed.

[chadwhitacre]

Anything else needed here for now, or can we reclose?

[nobodxbodon]

Thanks!

[chadwhitacre]

Reopening once again to ask ... shall we grant you access to the [email protected] account? That is where we collect invoices and receipts, which you will need if you're to start recording our finances as at gratipay/finances#3 (comment).

[nobodxbodon]

Is that an email account? A bit unusual to me, but OK.

[chadwhitacre]

Why unusual? Sharing access to the [email protected] email account means that we can distribute the work that is associated with that account, including tracking our finances, and managing our billing relationships.

[chadwhitacre]

@nobodxbodon What is the best email to use to invite you to Freshdesk (where we manage vendors@)?

[nobodxbodon]

@whit537 [email protected] please.

[chadwhitacre]

I've invited you to a full-time seat as an agent role with access to the vendors group. You should see a backlog of four pages of tickets that are waiting to be entered into our finances since December when @kaguillera and I started batching those up.

[nobodxbodon]

@whit537 thanks. As this seat costs, is there any other tasks (hopefully not too time intensive) than reviewing receipts, that you think proper for me to handle through freshdesk?

[chadwhitacre]

@nobodxbodon I dropped myself to an occasional seat, so this is not adding to our cost. I think once you get in there, you will find that there is plenty to do to stay on top of the vendors@ queue. :)

[chadwhitacre]

@nobodxbodon I guess let's give you PayPal access for gratipay/finances#38 (comment), ya?

[chadwhitacre]

They have a pretty fine-grained permission model, so we should be able to limit you to read-only reporting perms if that's cool.

[nobodxbodon]

@whit537 read only reporting perms sounds good to me. Thanks.

[chadwhitacre]

Let's try this to start with, may not be permissive enough. Sending login info in private email ...

[mattbk]

Should update http://inside.gratipay.com/appendices/access.

[chadwhitacre]

@nobodxbodon I've dropped you back to occasional on Freshdesk per slack (and I've bumped myself back up to full-time).