[melbourne-pug] Melbourne Community

[Tennessee Leeuwenburg]

I'd love to not do... sorry typo

Tennessee Leeuwenburg wrote:
> Thanks for the 2 strong votes of confidence.
>
> I also vote for some form of peer-review. I'd love to not to that peer 
> review myself, so getting the list to do it makes sense. I think it's 
> (a) nice to have something of yours published and thought thoroughly 
> about, and (b) interesting to see people's opinions of things. A 
> mailing-list review is the easiest. We need a candidate piece of code + 
> short article from the originator, in the form of "An abstract", "the 
> code", "a discussion", "something chatty". I'm happy to take that as a 
> loosely formatted email to myself, edit it in preparation for peer 
> review, then take random mailing list emails and turn them into some 
> kind of coherent narrative.
>
> That could probably form the kernel of the bulletin, around which an 
> e-zine could proudly grow. I believe we have the people here to do 
> something that each of us would be pleased to be associated with, 
> without it being an excessive burden on any one individual.
>
> "In fact I would be happy to submit my own puny efforts and suffer 
> enormous embarrassment in the process. The benefit to me would be 
> incalculable."
>
> Well, that would be great. Perhaps it would get to the point where 
> people *wanted* to submit code for review in order to improve it. It 
> could also spark discussion on hard problems, etc.
>
> As an aside, I bought the ASPN Cookbook and have already found it 
> invaluable. I find it much more useable than the online version, because 
> of the degree of quality control and polish. I am at the point where I 
> don't need a zen master to improve a whole program, I just need a better 
> way to do X, because I can't think how do to X elegantly without a 
> little help. Polish lets you "zoom in" on the most important component, 
> and if you're good enough (most people are), you can take that and make 
> your own code that much better. That's just my 2c, of course.
>
> A piece on big issues in Open Source and/or Python would be neat, there 
> are lots of things I could think of.
>
> Cheers,
> -T
>
> Mike Dewhirst wrote:
>   
>> Maurice Ling wrote:
>>   
>>     
>>> Hi,
>>>
>>> I'm away from Melbourne for 7 months and will only be back next month, 
>>> so I must admit that I've not been following up the happenings.
>>>     
>>>       
>> I live here and have missed maybe one or two meetings and the last 
>> meeting I did attend in Fitzroy didn't quite make a quorum :)
>>
>>   
>>     
>>>> To that end, perhaps I could offer to collate and edit some articles
>>>> into an e-magazine, perhaps bringing the first issue into existence
>>>> around June 1? I would be happy to do put such a thing together, 
>>>>       
>>>>         
>> That is generous - standing ovation from me |||||||
>>
>> and if
>>   
>>     
>>>> anyone has any articles, cookbook recipes or even simple ideas, please
>>>> feel free to contact me. The existence of a magazine of this kind might
>>>> help people feel a bit more connected? Also, if any of the more
>>>> long-standing members of MPUG would care to contribute an article on the
>>>> history of mpug, or personal accounts, that would be great.
>>>>
>>>> If people think this is a bad idea, feel free to let me know that, also.
>>>> Crocker's rules are fine by me.
>>>>       
>>>>         
>> Not in python space and especially not in Melbourne! We vote with our 
>> feet :) See standing ovation above.
>>
>>   
>>     
>>>>  
>>>>
>>>>       
>>>>         
>>> I am largely in favour of this. I feel that in the OSS community, there 
>>> is still a substantial lack of documentation and support for getting 
>>> materials out into the public.
>>>     
>>>       
>> I strongly agree. I'd like to see an open source knowledge transfer 
>> system. More on that in a later discussion.
>>
>>   
>>     
>>> This Melbourne Python Users' Bulletin (or letters) may be a collection 
>>> of published case studies or personal experiences and tutorial-like 
>>> articles. From an academic perspective, I believe that at least the 
>>> technical contents needs to be correct before "publishing", so even 
>>> though it is not a real academic journal, some forms of "technical 
>>> peer-reviewing" needs to take place.
>>>     
>>>       
>> Are you suggesting a mail-list review?
>>
>> Just thinking out loud, I reckon peer review is brilliant in terms of 
>> you guys telling me where I'm going wrong when I show you what I'm 
>> doing. That is because my objective (not necessarily anyone else's) is 
>> to learn and improve my skills in a much more immediate time frame than 
>> would be possible within any formal or academic peer review situation.
>>
>> Speaking for myself, I would strongly support mail-list review of 
>> whatever gets offered. That is where I would gain the most knowledge. I 
>> desperately want to see debate and constructive criticism of everyone's 
>> offerings because I know that's how I'll learn. Just seeing the polished 
>> outcome in the e-zine would not teach me as much. I'm not against polish 
>> I just wanna learn.
>>
>> In fact I would be happy to submit my own puny efforts and suffer 
>> enormous embarrassment in the process. The benefit to me would be 
>> incalculable.
>>
>> There is definitely a niche for polished peer reviewed stuff. Just last 
>> night I placed an order on Amazon for O'Reilly's Python Cookbook. The 
>> cred of the reviewers looks impeccable to me and that is what persuaded 
>> me to spend hard-earned money. Even so, I also visit the ASPN website 
>> for recipes because I see peer review debate and commentary there as well.
>>
>> I think I'm saying we sacrifice bandwidth in the knowledge transfer game 
>> when we add formality. IMHO, absolute best and broadest knowledge 
>> transfer bandwidth is face-to-face discussion with whiteboards on hand. 
>> Next best is either Professor Google or a mail list like this. The 
>> narrowest knowledge transfer bandwidth is to buy and read a book. I'm 
>> not saying anything about the quality of the knowledge - just the speed 
>> and relevance at the time.
>>
>> A peer reviewed e-zine would be great. The peer review would be better 
>> provided people got in and criticised with gusto. Maybe Crocker's Rules 
>> should apply (:
>>
>>   
>>     
>>> I've also just did an initial proposal to Firebird Foundation about 
>>> starting a peer-reviewed journal. (Let's talk about this off-list if you 
>>> are interested) 
>>>     
>>>       
>> Don't be shy - I would be more comfortable being included (or lurking) 
>> in the discussion.
>>
>> Run with it ...
>>
>> Mike
>>
>>
>> But I think the administration and moderation are the same.
>>   
>>     
>>> I can offer my assistance to this e-zine as a form of associate editor 
>>> or sort if needed.
>>>
>>> Cheers
>>> Maurice
>>> _______________________________________________
>>> melbourne-pug mailing list
>>> melbourne-pug at python.org
>>> http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/melbourne-pug
>>>
>>>
>>>     
>>>       
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>>
>>   
>>     
>
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