DEV Community

Sustain

Episode 111: Amanda Casari on ACROSS and Measuring Contributions in OSS

Guest

Amanda Casari

Panelists

Richard Littauer | Ben Nickolls | Eric Berry

Show Notes

Hello and welcome to Sustain! The podcast where we talk about sustaining open source for the long haul. We are very excited for today’s podcast. Our guest is Amanda Casari, who is a Developer Relations Engineer and Open Source Researcher at Google Open Source Programs Office (OSPO). Today, we learn about some open source work Amanda is doing with her research team at the University of Vermont Complex Systems Center, she tells us about a project called ACROSS, and a paper that was written by her team that was actively looking at contributions that are measured for code centric repositories. Amanda goes in depth about what open source is to her, she shares advice if you’re looking to collaborate more effectively with people in open source, she talks more about how we can support projects financially to other parts of the world and mentions some great groups she worked with. Go ahead and download this episode to learn more!

[00:02:00] Amanda fills us in on the open source work that she started working on with the University of Vermont Complex Systems Center.

[00:06:43] Amanda explains the “assumptions we have that aren’t verified,” as well as a paper that came from their research team and what they examined.

[00:09:52] We learn more about how people interface with closed decisions behind doors and open source.

[00:13:30] Ben asks Amanda to tell us what kind of behaviors and differences she sees between communities that emerge and continue to exists off of platforms like GitHub and GitLab.

[00:15:50] Amanda tells us about a project their team is working on called ACROSS, and a paper that won a FOSS award last year that was about actively looking at contributions that are measured for code centric repositories.

[0019:18] Eric wonders what type of responsibility Amanda sees that would come from GitHub and if that’s going to affect us long term.

[00:23:01] Amanda explains working as a Control Systems Engineer, and she explains how she sees open source as blocked diagrams and feedback loops.

[00:27:53] We hear some great advice from Amanda if you are someone who wants to make the world of open source a more complex and beautiful place with what you have to offer.

[00:32:08] We hear some thoughts from Amanda for people working in open source who don’t have a huge amount of privilege to have the ability to share their energy and find it harder to think laterally.

[00:35:27] Ben wonders what we can do to support projects financially and what we can do to support the next generation from the different parts of the world who haven’t had the opportunity to benefit yet. Amanda shares her thoughts and mentions some really great groups she worked with such as Open Source Community Africa, PyCon Africa, and Python Ghana.

[00:39:24] Find out where you can follow Amanda online.

Quotes

[00:09:01] “A lot of open source decision making is really behind proprietary or closed doors.”

[00:19:59] “When it feels like there is only one option for any kind of tool, infrastructure, or access, that’s when I always start getting concerned.”

[00:24:58] “Open source is a ___ system.”

[00:29:59] “Open source is not one thing, it’s many interactive parts that fit together in different ways.”

Spotlight

  • [00:40:10] Eric’s spotlight is an article Amanda submitted on “Open source ecosystems need equitable credit across contributions.”
  • [00:40:39] Ben’s spotlight is a shout out to Jess Sachs and the maintainers of Faker.js.
  • [00:41:22] Richard’s spotlight is Red Hen Baking in Vermont.
  • [00:41:47] Amanda’s spotlights are two books_: Data Feminism and _The Data-Sitters Club that she found on The Executable Books Project.

Links

Credits

Special Guest: Amanda Casari.

Support Sustain

Episode source