BCC2020

→ Abstract


The presenter(s) will be available for live Q&A in this session (BCC West).

Yo Yehudi 1, Adrián Bazaga 12, Daniela Butano 1, Rachel Lyne 1, K.H. Reierskog 1,
InterMine Collaborators, Gos Micklem 1

1 Department of Genetics, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, United Kingdom
2 STORM Therapeutics Ltd, Cambridge, United Kingdom

Project Website: http://intermine.org/
Source Code: https://github.com/intermine/internships
License: CC-BY + Apache - https://github.com/intermine/internships/blob/master/README.md

Background: Open source software is a project where source code is open for redistribution,
modification, and which doesn't restrict how the software can be used
(https://opensource.org/osd). Many open source projects take the meaning of open source far
beyond this definition by building structured communities that facilitate contributions to the code
base, documentation, and design of the software. We wil share our experiences from building
community interactions into InterMine (an open source biological data warehouse).

Internship programs: Joining open source communities can often be a chal enge to
newcomers, who may not be aware of unwritten rules, community norms, and expectations. To
help change this, projects like InterMine participate in structured long-term programs to help
onboard newcomers. Two programs of note in this domain are Google Summer of Code (also
known as GSoC, https://summerofcode.withgoogle.com/) and Outreachy
(https://www.outreachy.org/).

Unpaid initiatives: Hacktoberfest (https://hacktoberfest.digitalocean.com/) is a month-long
drive to incentivise contributions to open source software. With the "first timers only" initiatives
(https://www.firsttimersonly.com/) InterMine curates, describes, and tags easier issues to make
them extra-friendly for beginners, creating a low-barrier on-ramp for its contributors.

Practical benefits: InterMine has been mentoring interns recruited via GSoC and Outreachy on
a yearly basis since 2017 and is doing so again in 2020. Over this time we have had tangible
production-ready practical benefits from the projects our interns have worked on, including a
registry for listing public instances of our software (http://registry.intermine.org/) and upgraded
SOLR search functionality
(https://intermineorg.wordpress.com/2018/11/15/intermine-3-0-solr-search/).

Contributors are offered benefits such as sponsored conference and hackathon attendance,
community-branded "swag", and recommendations for university and job applications.

Year-on-year, we find interns and Hacktoberfest contributors tend to return in later years in
many ways: as mentors, to offer technical support for their work, and even joining as staff.

Summary: Scientific and research software can strongly benefit from embracing open source
community models and initiatives, gaining both completed practical projects and a greater pool
of skil ed contributors. Thoughtful y designed pathways enable contributors to engage and stay
involved in the longer term, even when contributors themselves come from non-scientific
backgrounds.