Write the Docs <3’s open source¶
Dear open source friends,
Send us your developer advocates, community managers, and projects. Tell them of Writing Day and invite them to join us!
In case this is the first time you’re hearing about the Write the Docs conference or you’re unfamiliar with Writing Day, we got you:
- Write the Docs
- The conference focused on all things related to software documentation
- Writing Day
- Is modeled after the concept of “code sprints” or “hackathons”, which are common in open-source conferences – getting a bunch of people together and have them work towards a shared goal, such as creating or improving documentation.
The Write the Docs conference has many enthusiastic attendees. These attendees, documentarians, want to learn new technologies, sharpen their skills, and add to their portfolios. The world of open source has a seemingly endless number of wonderful open source projects. Documentarians want to write the docs, your open source project docs.
It’s a match made at Write the Docs!
But wait, there’s more! This year we have created swag bags, filled with one of a kind items. We’ll be gifting them to the project representatives who attend as a thank you.
Get involved with Writing Day!¶
Ready to get involved?! Submit your project and we’ll add it to our Writing Day project list.
Need help convincing your OSS project community or corporate benefactors on the benefits of attending Writing Day? See Make a case for Writing Day.
Maximize your experience¶
We want you to have a great experience as a project and community. We have found that the projects who get the most value out of Writing Day came prepared in the following ways:
- Writing Day label: Creating a specific event label allows you to identify tasks and issues that are good for new contributors.
- Pre-labeled tasks and issues: Labeling the documentation tasks and issues empowers new contributors to find tasks that interest them.
- Task filter: Creating a task filter helps contributors find issues more easily and see which issues have been assigned.
- Clear onboarding: Ensuring your ReadMe, contribution guidelines, or onboarding instructions are accurate and up to date.
- Specific focus or goals: Projects that clearly define a focus area or a goal for their Writing Day tasks have an advantage when it comes to enticing attendees to work on their project.
- Project overview: Your project overview is a quick pitch that describes your project and what you’re hoping to get out of Writing Day, such as your goals or focus. Need some ideas? Here’s a good example from Writing Day 2022, the Open Web Docs project.
- Writing Day project list: Adding your project to the Writing Day project list promotes your project to our attendees before the event. Many attendees have told us that their curiosity about certain projects incentivised their attendance.
- Project experts: We recommend having 1-2 project experts of some kind at Writing day. We love our developer advocates, community managers, and subject matter experts! You’re welcome to call for virtual reinforcements from your community as well.
Remember, these are suggestions and not requirements. It is perfectly valid to show up to Writing Day the day of, tell us about your project, and ask for volunteers! It’s been done before and it will be done again.
Reminder: Documentarians have a variety of backgrounds and may need additional info to be successful in onboarding to your project!
Make a case for Writing Day¶
Write the Docs conferences bring together everyone who writes the docs – tech writers, developers, developer relations, customer support – making the event an ideal networking opportunity.
Writing Day is a community event modeled after the concept of “code sprints” or “hackathons”, which are common in open-source conferences. The idea is to get a bunch of people together and have them work towards a shared goal, in this case the goal is creating or improving documentation.
This event introduces your project and community to a new audience in your industry. These attendees, documentarians, want to learn new technologies, sharpen their skills, and add to their portfolios. They come to your projects with their own experience and expertise in areas such as technical writing and editing, user experience and research, and customer support. Their collective wealth of experience can help you upgrade your project documentation and create a more inclusive project.
The truth is that it benefits your open source projects and your communities just as much as our attendees. This empowers all of us to work together to create opportunities for each other and bigger, better communities.
Final thoughts¶
Writing Day is awesome and we hope to see you there!
You can email us at portland@writethedocs.org with any questions.
With love, Rose W and the Write the Docs organizing team <3
