Community Site

The primary OSGeo.org website was designed as the front face of the foundation - for relaying information to visitors, helping people get started and for seeing the latest news and upcoming events. Content on the main site is tightly controlled and contributed by a small group of users, though there is a wider group of translators helping as well.

This wiki page is for collecting thoughts and discussion for a community focused website. A less-formal web site presence that is not intended for outward communication, but for building/encouraging and interacting with OSGeo communities. In this context, community means those who are already aware of OSGeo, involved in a project somehow, using the technology or trying to help spread the word about FOSS in the geospatial world in general.

Use discussion page for chatter and detailed questions, add relevant points to the items below.

Goals

 * Develop a simple site that engages the community
 * Collect/share information between members
 * To have a slightly more open site for contributions than primary outward-facing site

Platform & Boundaries

 * Run using standard SAC-supported Drupal tools
 * Use secondary server so tools are separate from main website
 * Should not overlap main website functionality (it may ingest some) or take away from other efforts

Examples
Similar web sites that have some function or role similar to this community site idea:

Specific Functions
This list is more for showing the types of possibilities and is not meant as a comprehensive list of planned functionality. It is to give an idea of how the average user might interact with the site and its tools. Each tool will likely be on its own page or may be a block on the front page. The distinction isn't made here as it will vary. Some items may not be useful at all, let's discuss them...

Blog feed

 * present most recent 5-10 blogs from Planet OSGeo
 * but this is already available on the main site. Dedicated "followers" will just visit planet.osgeo. Otherwise this is a traffic-driver, to keep the website looking fresh and busy, which would be useful on the main site. -- Jo
 * I think that the non-OSGeo and even some of the non-FOSS content from the Planet feed would look out of place on the main site which is outward focused. -- Tyler
 * Community blogging site - for local chapters, other users
 * Additional community contributed news (less major), sorts of entries

Polls/surveys

 * for various informal purposes, gauging interest in ideas, taking snapshots of community
 * who is the "community"? -- Jo

Hosting documentation and files

 * e.g. front-end to educational material, presentation library
 * Why shouldn't this material be on the main site or committee subsections of it? -- Jo

Membership management tools

 * sign up as a member, join groups

Syndication

 * Ingest events and news listings from main server

Local Chapters

 * Local Chapter tools - allowing people to join, vote on things, maintain records/files

Structure & Responsibilities
The site would be:
 * Built on common tools
 * Overseen by two or more volunteers
 * Have a volunteer moderator for each section of the site
 * Volunteer driven - no function would be implemented without a committed volunteer
 * Used and kept up to date - volunteers would be responsible for keeping sections up to date

Negatively speaking, without the above structure the site should not be pursued.

Concerns

 * Should be tied to plans/guidance from Marketing Committee
 * Overlap with main website would distract - why isn't the main website for the "community"?
 * Potential SAC support needed, keeping needs isolated, reduce low level help
 * Keeping it active/relevant, may take away some volunteer energy which is really needed on the main website
 * Waste of time... could be done on wiki