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**Mikeal Rogers:** There's a lot of DFLs out there. \[laughter\] I don't know, in my opinion the BDFL model has kind of run its course. I think that the demographics of contributors have changed enough that that's just not a sustainable model for the most part. |
**Jan Lehnardt:** \[55:56\] Yeah, and the few times it really worked is when the people who stepped up to be the BDFL were really exceptional people, and we kind of can't optimize a culture of open source for exceptional people, because they are the exception. |
**Nadia Eghbal:** So you kind of flip it on the other side... Like, we've talked a lot about what maintainers of projects can do to build healthy communities, but if you're a part of a community, how can you help advocate for yourself and for others back to the maintainers? |
**Mikeal Rogers:** Point them to this podcast. \[laughs\] |
**Nadia Eghbal:** Great idea! |
**Jan Lehnardt:** We're coming back to... It's the same as with events - people need to feel safe to effect change. If you don't feel safe at the project, try to get that going; if you can't get that going, find another project. I think that kind of the baseline for this is a code of conduct for a project that defines ... |
**Mikeal Rogers:** I think some projects just aren't gonna change until they hit a point of crisis. You don't necessarily have to feel bad about leaving, or even leaving publicly; that is a good example, and when they do hit a crisis point, that will give them a reason to change, and some context. To some extent, there... |
Alright, I think that's a really good spot to end it on, it's a great little note. So you can head over to RFC.fm for more shows and to subscribe. |
**Nadia Eghbal:** Thanks, Jan, for coming back. |
**Jan Lehnardt:** Thank you for inviting me, and if you ever want me back, I'd definitely be a guest again. I'm looking forward to the next episodes. |
**Mikeal Rogers:** Yeah, we'll think of another topic to nerd out on real deep. |
**Nadia Eghbal:** There's many more. Alright, bye everyone. |
**Mikeal Rogers:** Thanks, bye! |
**Jan Lehnardt:** Bye! |
• Eric Holscher's experience with Python and Django, including how he learned about the importance of documentation |
• The origins of Read the Docs and its growth from 100k views in the first month to much more |
• How Sphinx enabled easy integration with Read the Docs for hosting and building documentation |
• The role of a well-designed interface and aesthetics in driving adoption of Read the Docs |
• Django's emphasis on documentation and how it influenced Eric Holscher's values and approach to project management |
• Eric Holscher's background and how he ended up working at the Journal-World newspaper |
• The inspiration for Read the Docs and its focus on open access |
• The beginnings of Write the Docs conference and its rapid growth |
• The changing cultural perception of documentation in the software industry |
• Efforts to raise awareness and improve documentation practices |
• The importance of documentation in software development is growing, with many developers valuing it as much as testing. |
• Documentation is essential for new projects to be adopted by others, especially open-source ones. |
• A well-documented project can lead to increased adoption and usage. |
• Writing documentation is a fundamental part of being a good software developer, requiring effective communication skills. |
• Documentation can help prevent rework and improve code quality by thinking through the public API before implementation. |
• Documentation needs vary based on type of project and community |
• Different projects require different levels of documentation complexity |
• Markdown is suitable for small projects, but more powerful languages like AsciiDoc or reStructuredText are needed for large API references and complex codebases |
• Documentation should be tailored to specific audiences (e.g. developers vs users) |
• Automation can help with certain aspects of documentation, but some level of human curation is still necessary |
• Different programming methodologies (e.g. Django, Node.js) require unique documentation approaches |
• The challenge of creating documentation is like navigating a sales funnel, where each step increases complexity |
• Standardizing tools and processes can reduce distractions and allow people to focus on writing |
• Embedded documentation in code, such as auto-generated Javadoc-style listings, has its limitations |
• Sphinx is mentioned as a tool that allows for contextualized and up-to-date documentation by intermingling prose content with auto-generated content |
• Write the Docs aims to establish documentation as a core skill that can be developed and valued separately from coding expertise |
• There is tension between professionalizing documentation and encouraging beginners to contribute through documentation |
• Valuing documentation requires recognizing it as an important part of the project, rather than just a "non-code contribution" |
• Signaling the importance of documentation includes requiring documentation alongside code contributions, making it a core part of the development process |
• The importance of documentation as a product in open source projects |
• Incentivizing non-code contributions and increasing diversity in project teams |
• Attracting and retaining contributors through documentation and community building |
• Increasing the value of non-technical contributions to open source projects |
• Sharing knowledge and best practices across communities and conferences |
• Addressing structural issues in software development, such as lack of diversity and exclusionary practices |
• Community building through experimental areas |
• Monetization strategies for open source projects |
• Challenges of incentivizing contributions beyond coding, such as project management |
• Sustainability models for open source services |
• Failures of previous monetization models, including the Red Hat model |
• Empathy and compensation for maintainers of free code |
• Struggles with making a market rate salary while maintaining an open source service |
• Potential contributors to a product are not contributing due to perceived sufficiency of its functionality |
• The company is exploring advertising as a revenue model, focusing on non-intrusive methods |
• They are creating a "newspaper-style" ad experience, hosting ads and not tracking user data |
• Rolling out advertising was stressful due to concerns about alienating users |
**Nadia Eghbal:** I’m Nadia Eghbal. |
**Mikeal Rogers:** And I’m Mikeal Rogers. |
**Nadia Eghbal:** On today’s show, Mikeal and I talk with Eric Holscher, creator of Read the Docs, which hosts documentation for thousands of open source projects. Eric also created Write the Docs, a community for people to meet and talk about writing good documentation. |
**Mikeal Rogers:** Our focus on today’s episode is documentation. We talked about Eric’s experience in the Python and Django worlds, where he learned to value documentation, and why he built a community around it. |
**Nadia Eghbal:** We also talked about why documentation matters, how to incentivize these types of contributions, how documentation changes as projects grow, and what managing Read the Docs looks like from the inside. |
So I’m kind of curious, before we talk about documentation, to talk about how you first got involved in Python, and then also Django. Because I know you lived in Kansas at some point, working on Django, and I think that’s where you built Read the Docs. |
**Eric Holscher:** Yeah, definitely. Do you want the medium or the long version of the story? |
**Nadia Eghbal:** I kind of want long. |
**Eric Holscher:** Okay, cool. So in high-school I started using Linux and Red Hat and all those kinds of stuff, and learned Perl as my first language. Then I went to university to get a computer science degree, but kind of realized that Perl wasn’t really what I wanted to be doing, so ended up doing a senior project i... |
Then when I was graduating, I was like, “I need to get a job!” In hindsight, there was this really fascinating moment where I went to school in Fredericksburg, Virginia, which, if you’re a Zope person, it's actually the headquarters of Zope. |
I had these two job offers coming out of university, one in the town I was living in. I had a really cool apartment, a bunch of friends... You know, it was in Virginia where my family is. Then this other one, in the middle of Kansas, working at a newspaper. But then I ended up actually – they flew me out to... Because ... |
Zope definitely felt like the old school, and Django was the new school. So that’s how I ended up in Lawrence. And then, Read the Docs was actually a Django-Dash project. There was a 48-hour coding competition. I kind of ended up doing a lot of Python development in Django. Django has always focused super heavily on do... |
**Mikeal Rogers:** \[04:24\] You mentioned that Django had amazing documentation from the start and that’s very true, it’s beautiful. Do you want to talk a little bit about what prompted them to have such great documentation, and some of the values there, where that came from? |
**Eric Holscher:** Well, I think one of the big ones is that it came out of a newspaper, right? And the people that created Django were journalists, and English majors, and really people that valued the written word, right? They really were good writers and they really valued that part of the world. I think coming out ... |
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