Name of this group

We encourage users to post events happening in the community to the community events group on https://www.drupal.org.
BrockBoland's picture

As add1sun pointed out, the support requests we've been getting here indicate some confusion about the group name. This conversation has also come up in IRC, and it sounds like the name was chosen because a) a better option hadn't been proposed, and b) the domain name was available.

Is there interest in reconsidering the name? On one hand, I don't want to mess with the momentum that has been gained already, but on the other, it's clearly misleading and will almost definitely lead to further misunderstandings in the future.

Comments

Yeah, I'm a bit concerned

add1sun's picture

Yeah, I'm a bit concerned that we'll be fighting to keep focused with the name of this group since we'll have to constantly keep explaining what the real purpose is, as everyone will assume this is about, well, learning Drupal in a broader sense. Perhaps Drupal Ladder is better? I agree with you about being loathe to change the name now that things have got up and running (and the domain name is pretty well set), but I do think it is a very confusing name. :-/

Learn Drupal online at Drupalize.me

Drupal ladder FTW

scottrigby's picture

I like the website name (it kind of makes sense there, because that's what people are doing, right?)… Whereas this group isn't about learning Drupal, but for organizing the infrastructure for that initiative. So +1 for disambiguating between the website and this g.d.o organizing group, in some obvious way…

Maybe combine a group name change with a terse description on the group home page. Like when #drupal-contribute had to become a bit more hardened for any work to get done:

All the other channels are about what you can get out of Drupal. This one is about what you will put in

We could add something similar to the top of what's there now, like

Drupal ladder

About this group

The Drupal Ladder group is a place for people to contribute to LearnDrupal.org (and the Learn Drupal distro the site is built on) - including discussing how to contribute learning materials, help organize related events and more.

Goal

To get 1% of active users on drupal.org to contribute to Drupal core by 2014 by organizing "learn sprints" and "issue sprints" at Drupal User Group meetups, camps and conferences.

About LearnDrupal.org

Learndrupal.org is intended as a central place for people to find and contribute lessons and materials. This initiative emerged from the Boston Initiative, an experiment aiming to figure out how to make it easier for people to learn about and contribute to Drupal.

I like this.

BrockBoland's picture

I like this.

I likey

add1sun's picture

Yep, I think being clear about the contributing part is critical, just generally in everything related to Learn Drupal. I also think it is OK to change the name of this group, but not mess with the name elsewhere.

Learn Drupal online at Drupalize.me

IRC channel too?

scottrigby's picture

The question came up about whether the #learndrupal IRC channel could also be more clear if renamed to #drupal-ladder

Temporarily I set the topic to:

/topic Welcome to #learndrupal | This channel is a place for people to contribute to LearnDrupal.org (and the Learn Drupal distro the site is built on) - including discussing how to contribute learning materials, help organize related events and more | see http://groups.drupal.org/learn-drupal for more info

Though:

  1. The group home page hasn't been clarified yet, so linking there won't actually help lol
  2. This will get erased the next time everyone leaves the channel
  • Because Druplicon isn't in there yet… Although that might be good if a name change is on the table?

IRC done

scottrigby's picture

Based on further discussion in this thread I just registered IRC #drupal-ladder channel & did all the steps for listing on drupal.org/irc. Here's the issue in the Drupal documentation queue:
http://drupal.org/node/1587950

More confusion

add1sun's picture

I know that some people think this is bikeshedding, but I do think this is a problem. I also just learned that the Drupal Association has a Global Training Days initiative and they are listing all of the events around it drupal.org/learn-drupal. I really think we should look at steering away from the Learn Drupal name, to something with Ladder in it.

Learn Drupal online at Drupalize.me

Ouch

BrockBoland's picture

That kind of forces the issue, doesn't it.

I like Drupal Ladder a lot, and I still think this is an issue worth pursuing, but I'm a bit concerned about the ability to do so. The domain name (and variants) are available, and so is the g.d.o group name (and I'm guessing we can get that changed). I don't know about re-naming the install profile, though, and if nothing else, the "ladder" short name is already in use by one of the modules used by the site.

+1 for "ladder"

dougvann's picture

I wish I had some creative suggestion to share, but for now all I can say is +1 for incorporating LADDER into the name.
;-)

  • Doug Vann [Drupal Trainer, Consultant, Developer]
  • Synaptic Blue Inc. [President]
  • http://dougvann.com

GDO naming

dougvann's picture

We can get the name changed and the url and a redirect to make sure old bookmarks or published links are still getting here.
Once the decision is final and the official word if given... I'll get that process started. ;-)

  • Doug Vann [Drupal Trainer, Consultant, Developer]
  • Synaptic Blue Inc. [President]
  • http://dougvann.com

Next steps?

BrockBoland's picture

So how do we go about deciding if a change will be made, and to what?

Well, I guess we need to

add1sun's picture

Well, I guess we need to settle on a name. I think that Drupal Ladder is fine. Right now it is concentrating on contributing, but it may not always be only focused on that and Drupal Ladder let's it grow how it wants without the name confining it.

As for how to change things, changing this group is pretty easy since we have admins here. The learndrupal.org site is a totally different beast though. I guess we would need to get Bryan and/or Kay to approve the change and redirect the website. I don't know who owns the current domain name.

The project name is also a bit messy, but it's not like we can't get D.o admins to help us if we have a good reason, and I think they would agree with us. (We could change it to drupal-ladder, instead of ladder, though granted that could also be confusing.) I feel less strongly about changing the project name. We can modify the node to say whatever we want and code is code. I'm not as pressed about the machine name.

So I guess the big thing is really about getting Bryan, or another project founder, to agree and put things in motion. I have no idea how to do that though, since I haven't spoken to Bryan in a little while now.

Learn Drupal online at Drupalize.me

Great points, all of them.

techgirlgeek's picture

Great points, all of them. Bryan really seemed disinterested in changing the name, as you mentioned above. It's a shame, and I agree, the machine name isn't as important.

I agree with all of the

techgirlgeek's picture

I agree with all of the above. I think the Ladder part is so important, and Contribution Ladder even better; at the same time I agree with an earlier comment by Addison, it's getting a bit long.

+1 for "Drupal Ladder".

jeffschuler's picture

This issue is not going to go away.
Let's get rid of confusion; brand the project so it's distinguishable and memorable.
The d.o. project namespace issues can be resolved.

bryanhirsch's picture

Thanks for all the thought people have put into this thread. This project has definitely never seen a stronger or clearer consensus a about what the name should be.

While it bums me out to make a third re-branding push and I sincerely hopefully this name will be a keeper, I'm also delighted to see so many people be opinionated about it. I really picked the last two names (Boston Initiative and Learn Drupal) out of thin air, for lack of having something better when we needed something to call this project. The decision making process in this thread is clearly a better one. And now that you've all participated in naming it, whether you like it or not, you own this project now too. :)

So, how shall we orchestrate this re-branding effort? Should we do some community outreach of some kind? If so, does anyone have thoughts on what this might look like?

Re. namespaces, let me try and summarize what I believe to be the consensus of the group. If anyone wants to edit or make changes, please speak now or forever hold you peace:

Hurray!

BrockBoland's picture

I was hoping we'd hear from you soon ;-)

One more thing for the to-do list: update the Chat tab on the site to use #drupal-ladder

Since the domain name(s) are the only things outside the purview of Drupal.org, that's probably a good place to get started. Who owns learndrupal.org? Where is it hosted? I'd be happy to buy and maintain a few of the related domains that should redirect (drupal-ladder.com, drupal-ladder.org, etc).

Thanks Brian.

jeffschuler's picture

Your willingness to move with the community on this, requiring changes to a lot of your hard work, is recognized and appreciated.

I'd add one more - register

webbykat's picture

I'd add one more - register drupal-ladder.org and redirect that to drupalladder.org. Since the project name is hyphenated, people may expect the domain to be hyphenated too. An extra redirected domain would send them to the right place.

I personally am happy to help

techgirlgeek's picture

I personally am happy to help "own" this project. :)

Bryan, I think your summary is perfect, I'll see you all in #drupal-learn. I truly believe this is a great and necessary change. Thank you Bryan for being so flexible.

Karyn

I hope you mean that you'll

BrockBoland's picture

I hope you mean that you'll see us in #drupal-ladder ;-)

Ummm, yeah, #drupal-ladder,

techgirlgeek's picture

Ummm, yeah, #drupal-ladder, it's early!

What's in a name? | Very Excited!

dougvann's picture

While a name can seem SO trivial at times, I have to say that I'm extremely excited about this re-rebranding effort. I've been on the fringe of this outfit; flexing some GDO mod muscle here and there, which Addie or many others could have done as well.
I LOVE the new name and I believe it will solidify and communicate the vision and purpose of the group!
Once all the re-rebranding is done [Im doing mine today!] I will blog about this and get it on the planet. We also need some one to write a GDO post after which I will promote it to the front page of GDO. Just be sure and let me know when it's published.
We'll need a bit of a media blitz to get the word out; similar to what me and the BlueDropAwards team did for the BDA.

We'll get there. This change is GOOD and will attract a LOT of attention here. We also need to get the Weekly Drop, The Watchdog, and other "press" outlets to get our story out... I'll get that started and run it past the group before anything gets pushed out. Who wants to work with me on COPY for that?

This is SO exciting! Let's work this change and effort to our collective advantage!

  • Doug Vann [Drupal Trainer, Consultant, Developer]
  • Synaptic Blue Inc. [President]
  • http://dougvann.com

Copy

BrockBoland's picture

I'm a much better copy editor than copy writer, but I'm happy to help flesh out anything that you (or someone else) can get started.

Done

BrockBoland's picture

Doug, if you would be so kind as to promote:

http://groups.drupal.org/node/232568

Quick update

BrockBoland's picture

A bunch of us are coordinating in #drupal-ladder this morning. A friendly freenode mod helped us get the old IRC channel redirected, and I registered the related domains to redirect to drupalladder.org:

  • drupal-ladder.com
  • drupal-ladder.org
  • drupalladder.com

I've also changed the name of this group, and updated links in the group description to point to the new domain.

Excellent work to get this

techgirlgeek's picture

Excellent work to get this moving everyone. I'd have helped, but I don't have any rights.

BrockBoland's picture

Proposed text for the name change announcement. I created an Etherpad doc so that we can collaborate on it: please feel free to make changes there.

Let's put a deadline on this so it gets done: I propose that we have this wrapped up 24 hours from now, at noon ET tomorrow.

Current draft:

The goal of the Drupal Ladder initiative is to get 1% of active users on drupal.org to contribute to Drupal core by 2014 by organizing "learn sprints" and "issue sprints" at Drupal User Group meetups, camps and conferences.

"Drupal Ladder" is the new name for this initiative. It had previously been called "Learn Drupal," but this led to a lot of confusion: many people assumed that the goal was to help new users learn how to use Drupal, though the goal is actually to get more users to contribute to Drupal.

The new name better conveys this goal by referring to the Drupal Contribution Ladder, without being specific to it. In the future, this initiative (and the website) may well shift focus, but the paradigm of climbing a ladder of lessons will remain.

We encourage Drupal community members at all levels to become involved in the initiative—there's something for everyone to do! Take part in the group discussions, join us in IRC at #drupal-ladder, or help build the Drupal Ladder installation profile by helping out in the issue queue. The best way to get involved is to take part in learn and issue sprints. If none are happening in your local user group, plan one! The Drupal Ladder site includes information on planning and running sprints.

Brock, I think that's

techgirlgeek's picture

Brock, I think that's perfect. Short, concise, and to the point.

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