Codeberg 💙 their users - let's show them! #409

fnetX commented 2021年03月04日 22:33:29 +01:00

Hey everyone, as already discussed at the annual assembly, it'd be nice to take our public relations to a next level 🚀. Currently, there's close to no interaction between Codeberg and their userbase apart from this Community issue tracker, a place where people only occasionally hang around.

So we're looking for some means of communication to reach all the users and inform them about new features, call for contribution, ask for funding, launch campaigns etc 💡

Minimal requirements

📢 As a bare minimum, we need some space for announcements. Let's consider these options, having in mind to find a good balance between being visible and not too intrusive 🙊

• personal dashboard
  • full width next to the user / org selection (free space in personal view)
  • half-width on top of the heat map
  • tiny (only on top of the right sidebar)
• login mask (does everyone log in regularly or do people stay logged in?)
• full-width info bar on all pages (like already displayed on codeberg-test.org) - must be dismissable then
• the same but at the bottom of the page, maybe with scrolling text as @kollo proposed
• pop up with a nice greeting (should never pop-up twice)
• using the notification option of Gitea and sending messages to the user 📌

See some Screenshots

GitHub:

How it might look at the Dashboard (better inside the white space on top)

Also, we should consider how we make the banner dismissable, if at all. Personally, I think that small static banners on the dashboard are not required to be dismissable, although it might even be better for PR, since the user notices a new pop up more likely than if the always-visible banner changes. 👀
We could go either for a server-side storage along with the user-data or locally via a Cookie - which might vanish and bring up the announcement over and over again.
I'm not the person to judge on the technical possibilities here, sorry. 😬

What about the style? 🎨 Any inspirations on how to make short news visually appealing? Should they be designed indidually per announcement?

Lastly, we would need a way to let those people pushing the PR for Codeberg easily change the banner. I considered to find a way to define the banner together with blog posts, so a new published blog post could always contain a banner which automagically updates the new banner and links to the blog post.
I think, that most of the time, we'll push an article together with the news, but there could of course be cases where we want to add a campaign site or something else.

Even more user nudging in the future ⭐

More in #414

Probably not relevant yet, just an idea

It might be an interesting idea to work out a 👉 hint system for users to tell them things where they need it. Take a private repo for example, we could say "Hey, please be aware that private repos are meant to prepare releases to the public only" or something like this. This could be extended from "Hey, don't forget to add a licence" on the first repo (or repos without detected licence) to some welcoming messages for new users about checking out the docs etc.

I think, this could become quite annoying if exagerated, so we could break down this idea into some scriptable or at least definable announcement system. ⏬

• show a "Welcome 💙" messages for new users and link to some getting started guide
• users who are active for a year could be asked whether they already considered joining Codeberg
• people could be tagged for extreme resource usage - and told "Hey, don't eat up all our disk space in personal projects" or "Want to store more Gigs than everyone else? Consider a donation to make this possible 💸"
• users which haven't been logged in for a while could be welcomed back
• on extreme productivity spikes, we could show a user some "Big thank you 🤗" or some "Hold on, you're on a commit streak 🚝" if they are contributing steadily
• etc ...

Think you got an impression of what could be possible this way ✌️

Campaigning Ideas 💯

I also wrote down some campagins we could start with

• spring cleaning 🌴 create an event where Codeberg members and those interested in the community meet virtually and work on things in the issue tracker, discuss about open stuff, get hands on and improve Codeberg
• this very same idea could of course be extended to all kinds of Hackathons for the whole community to work on their own projects, clean up their issue trackers 🗑️ or have a "Good first issue" day where maintainers guide into their repos
  • I think it's a good idea to make Codeberg users interact with each other, either via a "Help someone" or "Checkout your neighbours" campaign
• call for action on public Hackathons (usually with social impact), like fighting climate crisis or those that were called to act on the Corona Virus 😷
  • 🌍 by the way, there's this German climate hackathon in a few week: https://neustartklima2021.de/
• bring your friends // favourite projects to Codeberg (not sure if it's really a good idea to advertise for Codeberg, but it's at least a possibility)
• and of course, all kinds of funding campaigns for Codeberg's specific goals

What do you think?

Hey everyone, as already discussed at the annual assembly, it'd be nice to take our public relations to a next level 🚀. Currently, there's close to no interaction between Codeberg and their userbase apart from this Community issue tracker, a place where people only occasionally hang around. So we're looking for some means of communication to reach all the users and inform them about new features, call for contribution, ask for funding, launch campaigns etc 💡 ## Minimal requirements 📢 As a bare minimum, we need some space for announcements. Let's consider these options, having in mind to find a good balance between being visible and not too intrusive 🙊 - personal dashboard - full width next to the user / org selection (free space in personal view) - half-width on top of the heat map - tiny (only on top of the right sidebar) - login mask (does everyone log in regularly or do people stay logged in?) - full-width info bar on all pages (like already displayed on codeberg-test.org) - must be dismissable then - the same but at the bottom of the page, maybe with scrolling text as @kollo proposed - pop up with a nice greeting (should never pop-up twice) - using the notification option of Gitea and sending messages to the user 📌 <details><summary>See some Screenshots</summary> GitHub:<br/> <img src="/attachments/8569598c-54b5-417e-983a-c78761252677"><br/> How it might look at the Dashboard (better inside the white space on top)<br/> <img src="/attachments/62ff533b-b52a-41f8-b7b4-4faf8cee9803"> </details> Also, we should consider how we make the banner dismissable, if at all. Personally, I think that small static banners on the dashboard are not required to be dismissable, although it might even be better for PR, since the user notices a new pop up more likely than if the always-visible banner changes. 👀 We could go either for a server-side storage along with the user-data or locally via a Cookie - which might vanish and bring up the announcement over and over again. I'm not the person to judge on the technical possibilities here, sorry. 😬 What about the style? 🎨 Any inspirations on how to make short news visually appealing? Should they be designed indidually per announcement? Lastly, we would need a way to let those people pushing the PR for Codeberg easily change the banner. I considered to find a way to define the banner together with blog posts, so a new published blog post could always contain a banner which automagically updates the new banner and links to the blog post. I think, that most of the time, we'll push an article together with the news, but there could of course be cases where we want to add a campaign site or something else. ## Even more user nudging in the future ⭐ More in #414 <details><summary>Probably not relevant yet, just an idea</summary> It might be an interesting idea to work out a 👉 hint system for users to tell them things where they need it. Take a private repo for example, we could say "Hey, please be aware that private repos are meant to prepare releases to the public only" or something like this. This could be extended from "Hey, don't forget to add a licence" on the first repo (or repos without detected licence) to some welcoming messages for new users about checking out the docs etc. I think, this could become quite annoying if exagerated, so we could break down this idea into some scriptable or at least definable announcement system. ⏬ - show a "Welcome 💙" messages for new users and link to some getting started guide - users who are active for a year could be asked whether they already considered joining Codeberg - people could be tagged for extreme resource usage - and told "Hey, don't eat up all our disk space in personal projects" or "Want to store more Gigs than everyone else? Consider a donation to make this possible 💸" - users which haven't been logged in for a while could be welcomed back - on extreme productivity spikes, we could show a user some "Big thank you 🤗" or some "Hold on, you're on a commit streak 🚝" if they are contributing steadily - etc ... Think you got an impression of what could be possible this way :v: </details> ## Campaigning Ideas 💯 <details><summary>I also wrote down some campagins we could start with</summary> - spring cleaning 🌴 create an event where Codeberg members and those interested in the community meet virtually and work on things in the issue tracker, discuss about open stuff, get hands on and improve Codeberg - this very same idea could of course be extended to all kinds of Hackathons for the whole community to work on their own projects, clean up their issue trackers 🗑️ or have a "Good first issue" day where maintainers guide into their repos - I think it's a good idea to make Codeberg users interact with each other, either via a "Help someone" or "Checkout your neighbours" campaign - call for action on public Hackathons (usually with social impact), like fighting climate crisis or those that were called to act on the Corona Virus 😷 - 🌍 by the way, there's this German climate hackathon in a few week: https://neustartklima2021.de/ - bring your friends // favourite projects to Codeberg (not sure if it's really a good idea to advertise for Codeberg, but it's at least a possibility) - and of course, all kinds of funding campaigns for Codeberg's specific goals </details> What do you think?

kollo commented 2021年03月04日 22:52:43 +01:00

What about a sort of news ticker? Just small text horizontally scrolling from right to left at the very bottom of the page. Vanishing after say 3 Minutes or with clicking a dismiss button.

<< ++++ Highly important news ++++ << Get involved +++ << +++ bl [x]

Just an idea. It would be different from other platforms.

But to my opinion there are more effective ways to show the users codebergs appreciation than banners or tickers. For example there could be greetings placed into the issues of a repository.
Saying: great project, we really like your app. Did you know .....

Once read, the owners of the repository could close these issues.
Maybe there could be publically hidden issues, only visible to developpers. Issues would be a natural place, would have attention and otherwise dont disturb the user experience. Also with issues there could be a discussions other sort of feedback.

Develloppers want to get attention, and likes/favorits. This could be expressed in this way as well.

On the other hand one probably sould be careful not to spam into the issues or banners.

What about a sort of news ticker? Just small text horizontally scrolling from right to left at the very bottom of the page. Vanishing after say 3 Minutes or with clicking a dismiss button. << ++++ Highly important news ++++ << Get involved +++ << +++ bl [x] Just an idea. It would be different from other platforms. But to my opinion there are more effective ways to show the users codebergs appreciation than banners or tickers. For example there could be greetings placed into the issues of a repository. Saying: great project, we really like your app. Did you know ..... Once read, the owners of the repository could close these issues. Maybe there could be publically hidden issues, only visible to developpers. Issues would be a natural place, would have attention and otherwise dont disturb the user experience. Also with issues there could be a discussions other sort of feedback. Develloppers want to get attention, and likes/favorits. This could be expressed in this way as well. On the other hand one probably sould be careful not to spam into the issues or banners.

fnetX commented 2021年03月04日 23:01:15 +01:00

Thank you for your quick reply.

at the very bottom of the page.

Well, I'm not a fan of infinite scrolling, I always consider it too agressive and prefer static content ... but I like the bottom of the page, this is an area where people don't always have to look at. And if it's dismissable. 👍

I don't know if I get your point with the public issues correctly. You mean, Codeberg should really open issues in a user's repositories or at least display them if not publicly? Hmm, what about users who only contribute to other projects and don't maintain repositories of their own? What about users who have many repositories? Should we display the same text everywhere?

I also think, that an issue might be even more annoying than a popup, since this is a place where you want to be productive and focused to your project. Closing random announcement issues of the platform sounds worse than closing duplicates all day - at least to me.

Thank you for your quick reply. > at the very bottom of the page. Well, I'm not a fan of infinite scrolling, I always consider it too agressive and prefer static content ... but I like the bottom of the page, this is an area where people don't always have to look at. And if it's dismissable. 👍 I don't know if I get your point with the public issues correctly. You mean, Codeberg should really open issues in a user's repositories or at least display them if not publicly? Hmm, what about users who only contribute to other projects and don't maintain repositories of their own? What about users who have many repositories? Should we display the same text everywhere? I also think, that an issue might be even more annoying than a popup, since this is a place where you want to be productive and focused to your project. Closing random announcement issues of the platform sounds worse than closing duplicates all day - at least to me.

fnetX commented 2021年03月04日 23:14:47 +01:00

But to my opinion there are more effective ways to show the users codebergs appreciation

Just want to point out, that users likely appreciate a working service, new features (CI, Chat, ...) and a nice community more than nice messages, so we should find a good balance or provide a way to opt out.

Kollo's idea of actively sending messages to the users also led me to the simple idea of reusing the notifications which is quite an obvious choice for this task ...

> But to my opinion there are more effective ways to show the users codebergs appreciation Just want to point out, that users likely appreciate a working service, new features (CI, Chat, ...) and a nice community more than nice messages, so we should find a good balance or provide a way to opt out. Kollo's idea of actively sending messages to the users also led me to the simple idea of reusing the notifications which is quite an obvious choice for this task ...

hw commented 2021年03月04日 23:46:22 +01:00

need to be careful to not getting perceived as spam tho. Using white space on the page for message texts feels less intrusive tbh

need to be careful to not getting perceived as spam tho. Using white space on the page for message texts feels less intrusive tbh

kollo commented 2021年03月05日 08:38:32 +01:00

Content of the messages: What about promting some of the most active and useful repositories? Like "Project of the month". This would put the users and their content itself into the PR messages. This way codeberg could promote repositorys by good example. So If you do right, like have a LICENSE a good README etc. you get promoted (and a like from codeberg) instead of the others been reminded to do better. And once your project was likes and promoted, you are probably more open to contribute to codeberg itself.

Content of the messages: What about promting some of the most active and useful repositories? Like "Project of the month". This would put the users and their content itself into the PR messages. This way codeberg could promote repositorys by good example. So If you do right, like have a LICENSE a good README etc. you get promoted (and a like from codeberg) instead of the others been reminded to do better. And once your project was likes and promoted, you are probably more open to contribute to codeberg itself.

fnetX commented 2021年03月09日 19:47:15 +01:00

Like "Project of the month".

Well, I think that's a point for #200 (I already started a second edition, but won't manage to finish soon, feel free to help out there 🙃 ) and maybe #213, and I don't want to annoy users with this. Some people will probably be more fond of getting relevant news to their daily workflow instead of promotions for others. The latter one is important, but feels more like an optional feature for those who already like checking the explore tab :-)
(we could also have a promotion banner for a repo of the month // week there, do like the idea).

IMHO, the announcement feature is more suited for info like "Join our Hackathon on XY" or "We are looking for funding" or "We just upgraded to Gitea 1.14, check out the new features" or "CI is finally there, read here on how to use it".

And I still think, that such a way of communication is very important and I'd rather have it sooner than later.

@6543 can you have a guess on which implementation is easiest? Filling some white space at the user dashboard, sending as a notification, having an overlay at the bottom of the screen? Probably the first or the latter one, it could be done just via template changes, right?

This way codeberg could promote repositorys by good example

I think, my second idea of giving user hints could be split in a separate (or later) discussion as this is not needed in a timely manner.
But to the point itself: I do like the general idea of creating a positive good-practice instead of reminding users that they are still missing something. Nevertheless, I think, that your idea won't work out so well in this case: We are approaching a thousand of new repositories each month, many of them containing less useful stuff - but it might come useful at some point of time.
Let me explain by example: A user A has a big project and knows that it will be useful for others. Of course, he'll care about correct licensing and stuff, no matter if we feature the project somewhere, so we won't improve on the big projects. User B creates some tiny script repo and doesn't think of a big reuse. They won't aim for being promoted and won't care if other projects are featured. But if user A thinks that a part could be reused, they couldn't because the licensing is poor.
So I think, that actively reminding everyone of correct licensing is the way to go, instead of creating a "best practice", because we cannot feature all the repos that follow it, and having a community-based idol is unlikely to catch those, who don't care about the community, because they think their stuff is too tiny.

For the best-practice / hinting thing: We could create a checklist that is not that intrusive (but displaying a small progress bar // circle // colourfull icon on the repo page or something) that can be opened / expanded and shows something like

• correct licensing to make sure your content can be used (and fulfills the ToS)
• explanative Readme to show what your project is about, which use cases it covers and how to use it
• some information on how to contribute
• ... more here.

Not sure whether we should use autodetection like GitHub does or let the user check themselves (e.g. because they added some contrib info in the readme and not in an extra file)

> Like "Project of the month". Well, I think that's a point for #200 (I already started a second edition, but won't manage to finish soon, feel free to help out there 🙃 ) and maybe #213, and I don't want to annoy users with this. Some people will probably be more fond of getting relevant news to their daily workflow instead of promotions for others. The latter one is important, but feels more like an optional feature for those who already like checking the explore tab :-) (we could also have a promotion banner for a repo of the month // week there, do like the idea). IMHO, the announcement feature is more suited for info like "Join our Hackathon on XY" or "We are looking for funding" or "We just upgraded to Gitea 1.14, check out the new features" or "CI is finally there, read here on how to use it". And I still think, that such a way of communication is very important and I'd rather have it sooner than later. @6543 can you have a guess on which implementation is easiest? Filling some white space at the user dashboard, sending as a notification, having an overlay at the bottom of the screen? Probably the first or the latter one, it could be done just via template changes, right? > This way codeberg could promote repositorys by good example I think, my second idea of giving user hints could be split in a separate (or later) discussion as this is not needed in a timely manner. But to the point itself: I do like the general idea of creating a positive good-practice instead of reminding users that they are still missing something. Nevertheless, I think, that your idea won't work out so well in this case: We are approaching a **thousand of new repositories** each month, many of them containing less useful stuff - but it might come useful at some point of time. Let me explain by example: A user A has a big project and knows that it will be useful for others. Of course, he'll care about correct licensing and stuff, no matter if we feature the project somewhere, so we won't improve on the big projects. User B creates some tiny script repo and doesn't think of a big reuse. They won't aim for being promoted and won't care if other projects are featured. But if user A thinks that a part could be reused, they couldn't because the licensing is poor. So I think, that actively reminding everyone of correct licensing is the way to go, instead of creating a "best practice", because we cannot feature all the repos that follow it, and having a community-based idol is unlikely to catch those, who don't care about the community, because they think their stuff is too tiny. For the best-practice / hinting thing: We could create a checklist that is not that intrusive (but displaying a small progress bar // circle // colourfull icon on the repo page or something) that can be opened / expanded and shows something like - [x] correct licensing to make sure your content can be used (and fulfills the ToS) - [ ] explanative Readme to show what your project is about, which use cases it covers and how to use it - [ ] some information on how to contribute - [ ] ... more here. Not sure whether we should use autodetection like GitHub does or let the user check themselves (e.g. because they added some contrib info in the readme and not in an extra file)

hw commented 2021年03月09日 20:51:25 +01:00

Not sure whether we should use autodetection like GitHub does or let the user check themselves (e.g. because they added some contrib info in the readme and not in an extra file)

I would like a banner helping people when they need help: tell them if license files are missing, tell them about problematic (non-free/non-derivative/non-enforcable/...) licence choices, and potentially unintended resource abuse (big hidden repos, repos containing only large binary blobs, etc).

> Not sure whether we should use autodetection like GitHub does or let the user check themselves (e.g. because they added some contrib info in the readme and not in an extra file) I would like a banner helping people when they need help: tell them if license files are missing, tell them about problematic (non-free/non-derivative/non-enforcable/...) licence choices, and potentially unintended resource abuse (big hidden repos, repos containing only large binary blobs, etc).

momar commented 2021年03月09日 23:14:40 +01:00

I would suggest implementing this as an independent Vue component just for Codeberg, with its own API - that way, we could just include it wherever we want, and management could be done just through a repository with simple TOML/Markdown files.

I could try to use this as the first example for the (still unfinished and not-yet-deployed) Codeberg Design Kit.

I would suggest implementing this as an independent Vue component just for Codeberg, with its own API - that way, we could just include it wherever we want, and management could be done just through a repository with simple TOML/Markdown files. I could try to use this as the first example for the (still unfinished and not-yet-deployed) [Codeberg Design Kit](https://codeberg.org/Codeberg/Design/src/branch/master/design-kit).

fnetX commented 2021年03月09日 23:17:55 +01:00

Yes, sounds good to have this. I don't know much about the current JS frameworks, but please choose some lightweight one. I don't see a reason for adding a lot of Framework stuff just for occassionally displaying a note for the user.

What about the dismissal? Can this be stored server side?

Yes, sounds good to have this. I don't know much about the current JS frameworks, but please choose some lightweight one. I don't see a reason for adding a lot of Framework stuff just for occassionally displaying a note for the user. What about the dismissal? Can this be stored server side?

momar commented 2021年03月09日 23:21:22 +01:00

Hmm, I think dismissal would require a backend API; maybe we can add this later though.

Vue is quite lightweight, and Gitea seems to be playing around with the idea of moving to it, so we chose it as the reference framework for Codeberg components for now - ideally it's only loaded once, but I guess that depends on browser compatibility with the new JavaScript modules. I'll have to do some more research there.

Hmm, I think dismissal would require a backend API; maybe we can add this later though. Vue is quite lightweight, and Gitea seems to be playing around with the idea of moving to it, so we chose it as the reference framework for Codeberg components for now - ideally it's only loaded once, but I guess that depends on browser compatibility with the new JavaScript modules. I'll have to do some more research there.

fnetX commented 2021年03月09日 23:27:14 +01:00

Sorry I just felt like we should split this into the somewhat prioritized public relations // announcement and the user nudging part. Wasn't a good idea to dump my ideas on this into the PR issue :-)

Sorry I just felt like we should split this into the somewhat prioritized public relations // announcement and the user nudging part. Wasn't a good idea to dump my ideas on this into the PR issue :-)

fnetX commented 2021年03月09日 23:30:13 +01:00

Hmm, I think dismissal would require a backend API; maybe we can add this later though.

That's why I thought of the notification feature: We could use the already existing stuff to track whether a user read // dismissed it. Maybe we can (ab)use this as well?
Initially creating notifications for all users might be a bit heavy, but since there are so many notifications created day to day, it shouldn't matter for ~monthly or at maximum ~weekly information, right? And it would allow fine-tuning like the "Your first year, consider joining" and similar ...

> Hmm, I think dismissal would require a backend API; maybe we can add this later though. That's why I thought of the notification feature: We could use the already existing stuff to track whether a user read // dismissed it. Maybe we can (ab)use this as well? Initially creating notifications for all users might be a bit heavy, but since there are so many notifications created day to day, it shouldn't matter for ~monthly or at maximum ~weekly information, right? And it would allow fine-tuning like the "Your first year, consider joining" and similar ...

6543 commented 2021年03月11日 19:26:11 +01:00

@fnetX

@6543 can you have a guess on which implementation is easiest?

some sort of motd or banner, admins can add/edit/remove sounds easy.

The other stuff is realy codeberg related & I like the idear of @momar with "Codeberg Design Kit"

@fnetX > @6543 can you have a guess on which implementation is easiest? some sort of motd or banner, admins can add/edit/remove sounds easy. The other stuff is realy codeberg related & I like the idear of @momar with "Codeberg Design Kit"

hw commented 2021年03月13日 00:45:46 +01:00

Hmm, I think dismissal would require a backend API; [...]

We had an earlier banner version implemented in plain Javascript (setting browser cookie when close-cross-button is clicked and hiding banner if cookie is set).

> Hmm, I think dismissal would require a backend API; [...] We had an earlier banner version implemented in plain Javascript (setting browser cookie when close-cross-button is clicked and hiding banner if cookie is set).

momar commented 2021年03月20日 14:21:56 +01:00

grafik

The components are working great so far (this is GIMPed from a standalone demo, so I haven't tested it directly in Gitea yet). Dismissal is currently plain Javascript as well (using localStorage); and with the raw CORS feature of pages, it will be able to take the announcements from a TOML file with Markdown content (example at https://codeberg.org/momar/announcements/src/branch/main/announcements.toml).

 The components are working great so far (this is GIMPed from a standalone demo, so I haven't tested it directly in Gitea yet). Dismissal is currently plain Javascript as well (using localStorage); and with the raw CORS feature of pages, it will be able to take the announcements from a TOML file with Markdown content (example at https://codeberg.org/momar/announcements/src/branch/main/announcements.toml).

fnetX commented 2021年05月24日 16:51:14 +02:00

Announcement widget has been set up. Also see Codeberg/Announcements.

We can consider if we want to add some default messages that are shown to new users, but this probably also effects users who clear cookies. Probably better to prominently link a getting started guide.

Closing this.

Announcement widget has been set up. Also see Codeberg/Announcements. We can consider if we want to add some default messages that are shown to new users, but this probably also effects users who clear cookies. Probably better to prominently link a getting started guide. Closing this.