Contributors Meetup Async Update - May 16th, 2023 - May 30th, 2023

[Natalia_Choconta (Natalia Chocontá)]

Contributors meetup Async Update

May 16th, 2023 - May 30th, 2023

Welcome to our Core Contributors async update!

1. Working Groups Updates

Working Groups Calendar

BTR Working Group

• Chair: @jalondonot
• Headlines:
  • End of life Mongo 4.2: https://github.com/openedx/wg-build-test-release/issues/288
  • MFE’s update from Slack:
    • ORA grading: pending this PR, on my [Adolfo’s] plate. Should be ready tomorrow.
    • Communications: pending this one. Review on my [Adolfo’s] plate.
    • Learner Dashboard: merging this PR and then creation of an experimental Tutor plugin (the MFE will not be included officially). I’m trying to push Ghassan’s PR forward, but there’s no guarantee it will be merged (that repo is not taking contributions, yet).
  • Backports assessment: https://github.com/openedx/wg-build-test-release/issues/261
• Meeting notes:
  • 2023-05-15 BTR Meeting Minutes
  • 2023-05-29 BTR Meeting Minutes
• Blockers or Calls/offers for help:

Data Working Group

• Chair: @jill & @BrianMesick
• Headlines:
  • Google Analytics 4 is done!
    • Event sink work is merged, course data can be bulk dumped to ClickHouse and will stay up to date in real-ish time as courses are published
    • v1 code issues are winding down, focus is becoming more on data quality, security, performance, and reports
    • Tracking logs on the event bus are in the works
    • A big chunk of v2 is exposing Superset data/charts in LMS.
• Meeting notes:
  • 2023-05-17 Data WG Meeting notes
• Blockers or Calls/offers for help:
  • Get your opinions in to Jenna for future reporting ideas! Especially site admins, what do you need for effective monitoring / alerting?
  • Life beyond OARS: What’s next? How do we make the Open edX data story competitive with other LMSs? How can this group of people help move the community forward?

DEPR Working Group

• Chair: @Diana_Huang
• Headlines:
  • xqueue & xqueue-watcher - time to start deprecating?
    • MIT says they no longer use it
      • There are two MIT courses on http://edx.org that are still using xqueue.
      • MIT runs an xqueue-watcher instance for one http://edx.org course.
    • Let’s make a new DEPR ticket for xqueue and xqueue-watcher.
      • New event bus Redis/Kafka are meant to be the replacement.
• Cleaned out a bunch of unused Jenkins code
• Made a DEPR for Matlab code in edx-platform
• Making sure that our OEPs are updated to clarify how the frontend code
  • Update OEP-11 to clarify past decision around MFE development · Issue #480 · openedx/open-edx-proposals
• Meeting notes:
  • DEPR Meeting Notes (2023)
• Blockers or Calls/offers for help:

DevEx Working Group

• Chair: @Rebecca_S_Graber & @kmccormick
• Headlines:
  • Meet edSPIRIT!
  • Apple silicon issues: Arch BOM maintain devstack within 2u and we are trying to address the myriad Apple silicon issues
  • Regis recently set up an ARM64 CI for tutor plugins which hit many issues
    1. We used to not provide ARM images for Tutor, but starting from Palm we do. Not yet providing images for the nightly branch, but it’s on the list of things we will probably do
    2. Tutor users have to build docker images a lot. Course authoring MFE could not build on ARM because of a missing library dependency (libpng-dev or something). You can see this change on the palm branch of the tutor MFE plugin
    3. Building images takes a long time. Building on ARM was using emulation, which took a long time. New build speed (and new ARM images) improves this
    4. Running MFEs in development: tutor runs all mfes with npm run build, which is resource-heavy and even moreso on ARM with emulation. It makes machines go boom. Investigate BuildKit options to reduce resources consumption · Issue #125 · overhangio/tutor-mfe
• Highlight
  • edx-platform static -assets-without-Python is chugging along
  • Brian S is prototyping an overhaul of Tutor MFE dev
  • new plugins
  • GitHub - overhangio/tutor-jupyter: Integrate JupyterHub notebooks with Open edX
  • GitHub - overhangio/tutor-credentials: Credentials plugin for Tutor
  • GitHub - overhangio/tutor-cairn: Scalable, real-time analytics for Open edX
  • Andrey from eduNEXT decoupled XModule SCSS from LMS & CMS SCSS! Big step on the way to removing Python from the edx-platform static asset buildArbi-BOM finished removing GitHub-hosted requirements from edx-platform as of later today!
  • devstack no longer uses Ansible! All images switched to building from Dockerfiles in the service repos
  • Docs reorg by Brian is almost ready: docs: reorganize sphinx docs for better discoverability by brian-smith-tcril · Pull Request #834 · overhangio/tutor
• Meeting notes:
  • 2023-05-22 DevEx Meetup Notes
  • https://github.com/openedx/wg-developer-experience/issues
• Blockers or Calls/offers for help:

DevOps Working Group

• Chair: @regis
• Headlines:
  • Docker image build time will be drastically reduced in Palm
  • arm64 users (including Apple M1 and M2 owners) will finally be able to run tutor local launch to completion in Palm
  • Next up: improve support for local Kubernetes clusters https://github.com/openedx/wg-devops/issues/4
• Meeting notes:
  • https://openedx.slack.com/archives/C015KC8CN76/p1685371075844279
• Blockers or Calls/offers for help:
  • Who has experience with microk8s/kind/k3s/minikube and other k8s distributions? We need to recommend a specific tool to k8s users for local testing of k8s deployments. Please comment on the issue above if you have an opinion.

Educators Working Group

• Chair: @john_curricume
• Headlines:
  • Educators Working Group
  • Visual problem editor
    • The Visual Problem Editor is a much more visual and user-friendly problem editor provides a more wizard-like problem editor as opposed to the old markdown editor.
    • Status: Live for edx.org, coming in Palm
    • [2U] New Visual Problem Editor
  • Copy/paste in course outline
    • Starting with the ability to copy components, and will eventually add units, subsections, sections.
    • Status: In development; Anticipated live for edx.org in summer 2023, coming in “q”
    • Approach Memo: Studio Copy & Paste for Content Reuse Across Courses
  • Content tagging and taxonomy management
    • Status: In design; Anticipated live for edx.org in Q4 2023, coming in “r”
    • Content Tagging Approach MVP
  • The Product Wiki
    • The product wiki is where the community can follow new product developments from design through implementation, and also get involved with the teams that are building them. Open edX Product Management
• Meeting notes:
  • 2023-05-22 Educator WG
  • Open edX Roadmap • openedx
• Blockers or Calls/offers for help:

Frontend Working Group

• Chair: @arbrandes
• Headlines:
  • Avoiding devstack-specific values post js-based config:
    • Relevant issue
    • Relevant PR comment
  • Enzyme Deprecation:
    • Migrate away from Enzyme tests in favor of React Testing Library · Issue #166 · openedx/wg-frontend
    • React 17 is not being deprecated any time soon, but when we upgrade to 18, the migration is required
    • No new code should be written in enzyme starting now; update OEP-11
  • Upgrades status:
    • Node 16->18 upgrade nearly complete (modulo outliers like edx-platform)
    • react-router 5->6 upgrade is well along, draft PRs already in most repos
    • React 16->17 upgrade next after that, expected to be straightforward
    • React 17->18 blocked by Enzyme issue
• Meeting notes:
  • 2023-05-18 Frontend Working Group Meeting Notes
  • 2023-05-25 Frontend Working Group Meeting Notes
• Blockers or Calls/offers for help:

Large Instances Working Group

• Chair: Braden MacDonald & Felipe Montoya
• Headlines:
  • Innovations for tutor v16 (palm):
    • tutor images build is now much faster
      • registy cache
      • build time cache (built kit)
      • benchmark 35min → ~10 min for a new build | 15min → 7.5 min on a re-build.
      • feat: upgrade to Palm by regisb · Pull Request #827 · overhangio/tutor
      • recent version of Docker (may 2022) and build kit.
  • Checkin with 2U.
    • Ansible is out of the devstack.
    • There is progress in moving to k8s. Studio is one of the next candidates.
    • Moving the LMS would require that codejail is moved in a separate service. 2U will analyze if the current version is sufficient or changes are needed.
• Highlight
  • tutor is still running on mongo 4.2 which ran out of support recently.
  • arbibom is working on the code changes to support the upgrade. Some issues on the edx implementation are being worked on. Tutor work will still be needed.
• Meeting notes:
  • Large Instances Meeting Notes 2023-05-16
• Blockers or Calls/offers for help:

Marketing Working Group

• Chair: Eden Huthmacher
• Headlines:
  • Updates for preparing the eMOOCs conference Registration - EMOOCs
  • OKR Strategy: OKR´S MWG
  • Updated Confluence Page: Marketing Working Group
  • Open edX Marketing Working Group • openedx
• Meeting notes:
  • https://trello.com/c/iukOTQ38/177-meeting-agenda-summary-5-17-23
  • 2023-05-17 Marketing WG
• Blockers or Calls/offers for help:

Maintainers

• Headlines:
  • Maria Grimaldi: Added code-owners. Added dependabot. Need to update docs in the next 2 weeks. Blockers: Need Read the docs set up.
  • Adolfo Brandes: Multiple MFEs
    • Palm Node 18 upgrade focus
      • This is somewhat controversial as the Enterprise MFE has an issue with the upgrade
      • Considering merging the upgrades directly to the Palm branches
      • Node 16 will be out of support before Quince – September
      • Adolfo will focus unblocking the Enterprise issues
      • There is another issue frontend app discussions that is requiring a similar strategy.
  • Edward Zarecor: Still working on a solution for detecting PRs that need the tests run. Blocked by slow GitHub support. Phase 4 will be the monolith, duck. Will work with Feanil to update our Phase 2 status
  • Jeremy Bowman: Hackathon output feat: Added console and streamlit dashboards, fixed SQLite empty values by jmbowman · Pull Request #374 · openedx/edx-repo-health
• Meeting notes:
  • Open edX Maintainer’s Program
  • 2023-05-04 Maintainer’s Meeting notes
• Blockers or Calls/offers for help:

Product Working Group

• Headlines:
  • Feedback on proposal to reorganize the Working Group.
• Meeting notes:
  • 2023-05-09 - Product Working Group Notes and Agenda
• Blockers or Calls/offers for help:

Security Working Group

• Chair: Feanil Patel
• Headlines:
  • Onboarding: For working group members
• Meeting notes:
  • 2023-05-25 Security WG Meeting
• Blockers or Calls/offers for help:

TOC

Hi @antoviaque! what would be the right place to get this information from?

• Headlines
• Blockers and Calls/offers for help
• Meeting notes link

Translation Working Group

• Chair: Eden Huthmacher
• Headlines:
  • Added new Estonian
  • When/How supported language can be added Translation Working Group
  • Github board: Translation Working Group • openedx
  • Your feedback is needed, please share it. · Issue #3 · openedx/wg-translations
  • Test langauge translation in palm demo · Issue #2 · openedx/wg-translations
• Meeting notes:
  • Translation Working Group
• Blockers or Calls/offers for help:

2. Events

• Next community meetup Jun 22, 2023 Open edX Features, Enhancements & Exciting Updates!

3. Projects

Would anyone like to highlight any new or ongoing projects?

4. Next async update and meetup

• Tuesday May 30th - Update async!
• Tuesday June 20th - Join the meetup here!
  • Details and draft agenda on the GitHub board

Please reply to this post with any questions or comments you may have!

[antoviaque (Xavier Antoviaque (OpenCraft) - opencraft.com/help)]

Thanks @Natalia_Choconta !

@Natalia_Choconta

Hi @antoviaque! what would be the right place to get this information from?

For the TOC, as I was mentioning before, the public information on the TOC activities can be found in the meeting reports posted by @e0d on the forum, at: Search results for '#meeting-notes #toc' - Open edX discussions - it’s still missing one of the meetings recap from February which is still being reviewed/worked on, but that should be up shortly. The latest meeting summary is at:

2023-04-11 TOC Meeting Summary

Date: 2023-04-11 Attendees Name (Org) Edward Zarecor (Axim) Ashley Bradford (2U) George Babey (2U) Ferdi Alimadhi (MIT) Samuel Paccoud (FUN) Anant Agarwal (2U) Guests Marco Morales Absent Stefania Trabucchi (AbstractTechnology) Dustin Tingley (Harvard) Governance Norms The TOC held an open conversation about formalizing the governance and participation norms for the body. The purpose of the conversation was to align on our operation model and determine what next steps were required to…

Since this is also public and mentioned in that report as a next step, I can also mention work on an OEP for bringing up topics or decisions to the TOC. It’s still an early draft and hasn’t been reviewed nor approved by the TOC, so take its contents with a grain of salt, but comments welcomed:

docs: OEP 63 - TOC Arbitration (Draft)

[antoviaque (Xavier Antoviaque (OpenCraft) - opencraft.com/help)]

And here is the report for the core contributors sprint checkins - I’m covering for @Dean who isn’t available this week.

Hours

The average reported hours for this sprint are:

For a total of 297h from 20 core contributors.

Core contributor	Hours contributed
Adolfo R. Brandes	62
Kyle McCormick	50
Ghassan Maslamani	33
Andrés González	20
Esteban Etcheverry	20
Ali Hugo	17.75
Matjaz Gregoric	13
Xavier Antoviaque	12.25
Felipe Montoya	10
Ana Garcia	10
Gabriel	9.75
Pierre Mailhot	8
Braden	7
Gábor	7
Zia Fazal	6
Fox	3
Ignacio (Nacho) Despujol Zabala	2.5
Jill	2
Piotr	2
Farhaan	2

Requests for collaboration / blockers

• It’s time consuming to keep checking when a PR needs to be updated, because it’s currently one can’t anticipate when a reviewer would come to review it… I know this probably might not be an issue when maintainer pilot in place? if this is a temp issue then I am okay with it, if not then I hope eventually there would be a mechanism where PR author would expect a reviewer to review it at X time… (Ghassan Maslamani)

What was accomplished this sprint?

Development

• Working on ORA Grading and Communications MFE support for Palm (Adolfo)
• Assisting in the cross-repo Node 18 upgrade (Adolfo)
• Closing out some long-standing frontend maintenance issues (Paragon deprecations, etc) (Adolfo)
• Work on MFE domains PoC with Pedro Martello (Adolfo)
• Creating a tutor plugin for the dashboard mfe (since it’s expreimental for palm) (Ghassan Maslamani)

Reviews

• Reviewed different PRs from 2U to use filters for some features (Felipe Montoya)
• Reviewed the notifications tech architecture (Felipe Montoya)
• Reviewing some PRs (Ghassan Maslamani)
• Reviewed a lot of translations for fr-CA in Transifex during the last 2 weeks. There was a huge bunch coming in (Pierre Mailhot)
• Reviewed couple of PRs. PR 299 and PR 298 (Zia Fazal)

Product & project management

• Added tickets to the Campus Roadmap to reflect some of the Spanish tender requirements (Felipe Montoya)
• Helped coordinate discussion around LTI centralization (Fox)

Events & marketing

• May Open edX Meetup (rehearsal, MC, video recording and video editing) (Esteban Etcheverry)
• Wikipedia article draft in progress (Esteban Etcheverry)
• Created issues and prepared agenda along with Eden, we have two main issue/ticket as we know use github board Translations Working Group · GitHub (Ghassan Maslamani)
• Solved an issue, and suggest to use github action (Ghassan Maslamani)

Testing

• Installed Olive.4 on a test server in our environment to test GA4 port and availability of Cairn. (Pierre Mailhot)
• Run regression of Event routing backend for Palm branch of open edx platform (Zia Fazal)

Governance

• TOC - Review mobile application proposal (Xavier Antoviaque)
• TOC - Draft OEP for escalation process to TOC (Xavier Antoviaque)

Documentation & courses

• Wiki spring clean - Reworked and updated the TOC wiki pages (Xavier Antoviaque)
• Upstreaming course - Create MR & groom tickets backlog

Misc

• Did the onboarding (Gábor)
• Working groups meetings

What went well this sprint?

• May Open edX meetup went smooth. (Esteban Etcheverry)
• More teams are starting to use events/filters for their new features. (Felipe Montoya)
• The onboarding process was long due to paperwork, but successful. (Gábor)

How productive was this sprint?

What have you planned for next sprint?

Name	Plans
Gábor	Helping out around the OpenSearch integration and revisiting the backlog to pick up tasks.
Ghassan Maslamani	- Continue to work on opened PRs - Open baclport PRs when need for plam - Working on this Open edX Light/Express (minimalist version of Open edX) · Issue #169 · openedx/platform-roadmap · GitHub
Pierre Mailhot	Reviewing issues with testing of Palm. Attend Build Test Release Working Group Meeting on 05-29. Probably attend Developer Experience Working Group Meeting on 06-05. Browse through Slack and Discourse. Reviews translations for fr_CA in Transifex.
Xavier Antoviaque	- Review draft survey about CC processes - TOC Meeting - Follow-up summaries & topics - Upstreaming course - Test recording & write instructions

Activity & reporting

Btw, the response rate for core contributors checkins hovers at 40% - so if you are core contributor and don’t fill it, please do! It really only takes 5-10 minutes, and it allows to keep everyone informed of what we are doing.

And if the reason you don’t fill it is because you aren’t able to find time to contribute, reach out! Organizations have committed to give their core contributors, if you don’t get that time we can start a discussion with your organization, to help you get that dedicated time.

All the details can be found on the Listaflow report.