* Nori Heikkinen <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> [2004:07:09 15:48 -0400]: > on Fri, 09 Jul 2004 11:54:41AM -0700, Carla Schroder insinuated: > > Technical stuff: > > - Scripts, howtos, cool commands- anytime you learn something new > > and cool, no matter how small you think it is, write it up! The > > Linux world is composed of zillions of tiny little things working > > together to make big things. It all matters. > > okay, this is great. but, what kind of stuff? debian-specific stuff? > linux stuff? one of the issues i always have with groups like this > (as MUCH as i love them, as MUCH as they're desperately needed!) is > that they can easily turn into little girls-only LUGs with lots of > emoticons and equivocating -- and i don't feel, from reading the > archives of this list, that that was the purpose of founding > debian-women. (please correct me if i'm wrong.)
No, that is definitely not the purpose. While I believe debian-women can be a great support foundation and people will most certainly form bonds, the idea is to get more women involved in Debian, whether they lean towards development, translations, documentation, or QA work. > i'm totally down with all the other content on this site, and i'll go > sign up for an account now and get involved. i think this is a great > project. but as someone else recently mentioned (erinn? in the > initial list of what should go on the website?), we don't need/want to > duplicate stuff that's already on debian-user. Well, while I recognize this concern, one thing that is potentially beneficial to us (as well as the Debian Project at large) is tweaking some of the stuff they have. We have many potential DD's on this list, I think, but they have to start somewhere. One way to get people motivated is with just normal Debian stuff - many things are overlooked in the quest to become a Big Bad Package Maintainer. For instance, there are about 3000 missing man pages in Debian. Do a lot of people know this? Probably not. Is this an area that needs help? Certainly. My point is that there is a need for some basic guides to these things -- if someone from Debian women writes them, and they prove useful, at some point they can be integrated with the main Debian infrastructure. IMO, this is a win-win situation -- people gain experience while contributing to Debian and they do it in a sub-community they're comfortable with. This goes for things like the NM process, submitting bugs / patches, ad infinitum. A lot of things are obscured and it can take quite a long time to really figure out the Debian infrastructure. Just because it starts in debian-women, doesn't mean it has to stay here. One of the most valuable things we can do in breaking down the barriers is to NOT become a little girl LUG -- I want everyone to integrate themselves with the existing Debian community as well. > maybe i'm missing your objective here, carla -- did you mean stuff > that we've written, or that is somehow woman-specific? > > i hope this message conveys the tone i want it to -- not antagonistic, > just trying to keep us on-message. i'm not criticizing, just pointing > out directions that i've seen women's users' groups go in that i > personally feel are unproductive. i'd love for someone who's been > around the women's lug community for longer than i have to correct me, > or provide a more nuanced point of view ... I didn't feel it was antagonistic. I share the same concerns as you. Perhaps the rosy afterglow has tainted some perspectives; I've always been wary of pointing out negative things because I don't want to turn people off, but I think perhaps adding something in the mission statement to this effect would be helpful. This project is supposed to be action-oriented, and I want people to keep that in mind. -- off the chain like a rebellious guanine nucleotide http://double-helix.org
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