[mpw-staff] irc log from Monday night

Tue Apr 10 01:20:49 UTC 2012

Here's the log from tonight's discussion:

(19:53:08) mode (+ns ) by hitchcock.freenode.net
(19:55:11) jesstess [~jesstess at SCRUBBING-BUBBLES.MIT.EDU] entered the room.
(19:55:56) catherinedevlin: oh, hooray, you saw!
(19:56:17) jesstess: Are you expecting Mel?
(19:56:50) catherinedevlin: she'd written earlier that she'd need to
review logs afterward - didn't seem to think there was a time she
could do live this week :(
(19:57:51) catherinedevlin: in any case, I didn't make up an agenda.
Shall we just throw out questions etc. as we think of them?
(19:58:29) jesstess: Sure.
(19:59:31) catherinedevlin: ok - first off, were you thinking we
should have a meeting or rehearsal in person before things get
started?  I took Friday off from work so I'm available as soon as I
can get to Indy
(20:00:09) jesstess: We can. I'm not going to drive at that level of
detail -- that's up to you.
(20:00:15) jesstess: I get in around noon.
(20:00:33) catherinedevlin: ok.  When do you arrive in Indy?  Do you
have other plans before things start on Friday?
(20:00:44) jesstess: I think people running projects should do a full
rehearsal prior to Friday.
(20:00:49) catherinedevlin: oops, you just said :)
(20:01:05) catherinedevlin: you mean, pretend that we're students
going through the project?
(20:01:30) jesstess: The projects are instructor-led, so I mean going
through the content as the instructor would.
(20:02:24) jesstess: Have you looked at the projects?
(20:02:28) catherinedevlin: ok.  I don't have a very clear picture on
how that works - do you do lecturey segments to introduce phases of
the work?
(20:02:53) catherinedevlin: I mostly looked at the Words with Friends
one - the page I found was pretty brief
(20:03:35) jesstess: I'll send an e-mail to the list.
(20:03:37) catherinedevlin: here's what I found:
http://openhatch.org/wiki/Boston_Python_Workshop_5/Wordplay
(20:04:13) catherinedevlin: there's this page:
http://openhatch.org/wiki/Boston_Python_Workshop_5/Wordplay_handout
(20:04:22) catherinedevlin: but it looks like concepts rather than an outline
(20:04:44) jesstess: Right, the instructor leads based on the content
I just forwarded you.
(20:05:24) jesstess: It looks like most of the online material isn't
on the wiki, or at least not linked from the wiki, yet.
(20:05:27) catherinedevlin: Oh, that's much more detailed than what
I'd seen.  Great.
(20:05:46) catherinedevlin: OK, I can definitely rehearse from that.
(20:06:10) jesstess: In general, you should use
http://openhatch.org/wiki/Boston_Python_Workshop_6 as a reference, not
5.
(20:06:29) catherinedevlin: *nod*
(20:07:03) catherinedevlin: Do you want to pick a project?  Mel called Twitter
(20:07:38) catherinedevlin: Should be able to have a projector and a
room per project, though I'm still waiting for confirmation from Indy
LinuxFest on room #3
(20:08:07) jesstess: Let's back up for a second, since I think having
3 projects is going to be a reach unless everything else is really
organized.
(20:08:28) jesstess: I don't see any links to the online content for
Friday or Saturday on
https://openhatch.org/wiki/Indianapolis_Python_Workshop. Has that
material been copied over?
(20:08:38) catherinedevlin: no, it hasn't
(20:09:47) jesstess: Okay, that's pretty important, and you want
people to have time to go through the material and make sure all the
links are working and all the Boston-specific stuff has been removed.
(20:10:12) catherinedevlin: right
(20:10:14) catherinedevlin: I can do that tonight
(20:10:59) jesstess: For Friday, staffers need to know:
(20:11:26) jesstess: 1) what the checkoff steps are. Everyone needs to
get checked off before they leave, or they will forget to do things
that are important for being able to hit the ground running on
Saturday.
(20:11:40) jesstess: 2) how CodingBat works, and what the Friday
CodingBat questions are.
(20:13:04) jesstess: The way we do 1pm - 4pm is:
(20:13:14) jesstess: 1 hour CodingBat, 3 choose 2 projects
(20:13:58) catherinedevlin: sorry, don't understand - "3 choose 2 projects"?
(20:14:20) jesstess: Every person does 2 of the 3 projects. 1 project
per hour, for 2 hours.
(20:14:34) catherinedevlin: oh, OK
(20:15:09) jesstess: But that's a pretty aggressive schedule. I think
for a first workshop these 2 options are more realistic:
(20:15:38) jesstess: 1) Only set up for and do 2 projects (everyone
does the same projects). This also has the benefit of not needing
extra rooms.
(20:16:00) jesstess: 2) Give 1.5 hours for CodingBat and 1.5 hours for
a single project that everyone does.
(20:16:22) jesstess: (2) Is what PyStar Philly did for their first
Boston-style workshop.
(20:17:08) jesstess: What do you think?
(20:17:37) catherinedevlin: ... honestly don't know what to decide...
which project did Philly do?
(20:18:03) catherinedevlin: & did students there seem to need the 1.5h
for CodingBat?
(20:18:42) jesstess: There are infinite CodingBat questions, so it's
not a question of content length.
(20:19:01) jesstess: It means more time for review and more
flexibility if things fall behind.
(20:19:48) catherinedevlin: that sounds reasonable, then.  Is there a
project that tends to be most popular?  It would be nice to choose one
that more people want anyway
(20:21:06) jesstess: Based on our exit survey data, all 3 appeal to
different people. It depends on what kind of audience you think you
are going to get. If they are going to be really into social media,
I'd pick Twitter. If they are going to be engaged by the idea of
cheating at Words with Friends, I'd pick Wordplay.
(20:22:46) catherinedevlin: I really don't know this audience, so...
should we just say Twitter, since Mel's excited about that one anyway?
 & it's kind of the most touches-the-outside-world of the projects
(20:23:45) jesstess: Okay. In that case, the one change you'll need to
make is that we hardcode the location ID for Boston
(twitter_functions.py:BOSTON_WOEID = 2367105)
(20:23:56) catherinedevlin: *nod*
(20:24:22) jesstess: So someone will need to get the source, change
that value to the value for Indianapolis, re-zip the projects, and
host it somewhere and link to it appropriately on the wiki.
(20:25:00) catherinedevlin: right
(20:25:17) jesstess: This means that you can excise the installation
instructions for the other projects and the checkoff items for the
other projects from the wiki.
(20:25:30) catherinedevlin: ok
(20:26:05) jesstess: Have you checked on the wifi and outlet situation
for the workshop?
(20:26:26) catherinedevlin: (we'll assume "someone" on all this is me,
though I'll get a mail to Mel and see if she can take some of it on -
but it sounds like it's a deathly week for her so I won't count on it
unless she says so)
(20:26:45) catherinedevlin: WiFi works well, but we'll need to bring
some power strips.  I'll make sure that happens.
(20:28:20) jesstess: Okay, on to Saturday.
(20:28:41) jesstess: People are always late, so we tell people to get
there by 9:30, with lecture starting at 10.
(20:28:49) jesstess: We have CodingBat questions for 9:30 - 10.
(20:29:32) catherinedevlin: right
(20:29:52) jesstess: Lecture is from roughly 10 - 12 and covers the
material in the e-mail I sent.
(20:29:55) jesstess: What is the lunch situation?
(20:30:19) catherinedevlin: We're having the hotel serve it noon to 1
in our workshop room
(20:30:35) jesstess: Okay, great.
(20:30:36) catherinedevlin: that's pretty much all arranged
(20:31:04) catherinedevlin: should we plan to have TAs around during
the lecture period, or should we turn them loose then?
(20:31:07) jesstess: If there's money for it, having simple snacks
(e.g. granola bars) on Friday is nice, since people often won't have
time to eat before the event.
(20:31:15) jesstess: We also do coffee and snacks on Saturday morning.
(20:31:55) catherinedevlin: I'll see if we can manage that, too
(20:31:56) jesstess: For a 60-person class we have 3ish staff around
to answer questions. A lot of people will have questions 9:30-10, but
it's a hard sell to get volunteers to come over early for that,
followed by the relative silence of lecture.
(20:32:29) catherinedevlin: hopefully, being at ILF means that we'll
have people who are happy to serve intermittently as needed through
the day
(20:36:13) jesstess: What we do from about 12:45 - 1 is quick demos of
cool things you can do in Python.
(20:36:26) jesstess: Oh, that brings up the point -- we have a
projector and all that, right?
(20:36:35) catherinedevlin: yes
(20:36:52) catherinedevlin: do we just need the one, if we're only
doing one project?
(20:37:14) jesstess: yup, the 1 is fine.
(20:37:22) catherinedevlin: ok
(20:37:40) jesstess: The demos are fun. If you, me, and Mel all have
some quick thing to demo for 5 minutes each, that would be sufficient.
(20:37:44) jesstess: I typically do a matplotlib demo.
(20:37:56) catherinedevlin: ah, good
(20:38:12) catherinedevlin: I'll think of something that isn't too
datageeky, maybe a quick vPython demo
(20:38:39) catherinedevlin: yay lightning talks :)
(20:41:54) jesstess: 4 - 4:30 is wrap-up.
(20:41:59) jesstess: I can send you the slides I use.
(20:42:04) jesstess: 2 really important things from wrap-up:
(20:42:34) jesstess: 1) We always have a project night already
scheduled, and we strongly encourage workshop attendees to RSVP for
that event during wrap-up.
(20:42:41) catherinedevlin: right
(20:42:47) catherinedevlin: that's arranged with IndyPy
(20:42:48) jesstess: This is crucial for drawing people into the user group.
(20:42:50) jesstess: Great.
(20:43:13) jesstess: 2) Have a survey link ready and advertise it in
the wrap-up. We even encourage people to stick around and fill out the
survey before they leave.
(20:43:16) catherinedevlin: though I'm fuzzy on what the project folks
do at the project night - continue their projects from the workshop or
work on new projects of their own?
(20:43:19) jesstess: I can send you what we use for that as well.
(20:43:24) catherinedevlin: ah, that would be great
(20:43:33) jesstess: They can do whatever they want. Most people need
to go through a full-fledged tutorial.
(20:43:47) catherinedevlin: ok
(20:44:25) catherinedevlin: (thinking back to Friday night) would it
help to have actual paper checkoff sheets?
(20:45:11) jesstess: I don't feel strongly one way or the other. We
don't have paper checkoffs. But speaking of paper:
(20:45:29) jesstess: People really value having the data structures
and loops handouts printed out.
(20:45:44) catherinedevlin: sure - we'll do that
(20:46:21) jesstess: That is a lot of paper, so it's the kind of thing
I'd print/copy before Saturday.
(20:47:10) catherinedevlin: right
(20:47:53) jesstess: So that's the event. Do you have any questions
about the structure or content?
(20:48:20) catherinedevlin: do you just print from
http://openhatch.org/wiki/Boston_Python_Workshop_6/Data_types and
http://openhatch.org/wiki/Boston_Python_Workshop_6/Loops ?
(20:48:30) jesstess: Yup.
(20:48:43) catherinedevlin: It seems pretty clear now
(20:49:09) catherinedevlin: & I think you've covered my other
questions as we went along
(20:49:15) catherinedevlin: thinking, thinking...
(20:49:48) catherinedevlin: we'll make a bunch of internal signage so
nobody's lost within ILF
(20:50:40) catherinedevlin: wish we could give mass transit
directions, but... Midwest, bah
(20:51:22) catherinedevlin: finally got access to direct email for the
attendees, so I can send out the first of those to-the-attendees
reminders you mentioned
(20:52:03) catherinedevlin: I can't think of anything else right now
(20:53:16) jesstess: Speaking of attendees: it looks like you are at
roughly 20 non-staff RSVPs.
(20:53:30) jesstess: You're going to have some attrition, so it would
really be great to get that number up.
(20:54:11) catherinedevlin: *sigh* yes
(20:54:46) ***jesstess pulls up the advertising list
(20:55:48) jesstess: Has this been advertised to the full LinuxFest
attendee list yet, if there is such a thing?
(20:56:04) catherinedevlin: We've been down that list you emailed,
though for most of the companies I didn't have a personal contact and
had to send to their general correspondence email address
(20:57:18) catherinedevlin: it's been in the ILF publicity for a
while, though I haven't seen a dedicated announcement to the attendees
specifically - that's a good idea
(20:58:34) jesstess: LinuxChix might be helpful. You could try to get
the Ada Initiative to tweet something or blog post something.
(21:00:53) jesstess: We actually get a lot of librarians in Boston, if
you have some librarian connections who can circulate the
announcement.
(21:01:32) catherinedevlin: hmm.... the only librarians I know are in
Ohio, but maybe the IndyPy people know more
(21:02:45) jesstess: It looks like Mel did not contact Girls in Tech
Indianapolis because it was on Facebook.
(21:03:06) catherinedevlin: I'm the one who passed on that & asked if Mel could
(21:03:47) jesstess: Sure, but then Mel passed on it.
(21:04:43) jesstess: I need to go do some other things tonight. Do you
have any other questions before I head out?
(21:04:57) catherinedevlin: no, I think I'm out of questions.  Thanks SO much!
(21:05:48) jesstess: My pleasure. To summarize action items:
(21:05:59) jesstess: 1) get the wiki content copied over and edited for Indiana.
(21:06:01) jesstess: 2) more advertising
(21:06:13) jesstess: 3) prep for the Twitter project
(21:06:18) jesstess: 4) print stuff early
(21:07:54) catherinedevlin: I'll be using this whole chat session as
an extended to-do list, too

-- 
- Catherine
http://catherinedevlin.blogspot.com