Congratulations, you have completed the first steps and have been selected to join the Open Learning Exchange virtual intern team. Please remember that we expect interns to have 16 hours a week to work on Open Learning Exchange issues. If you do not currently have enough time, we will be happy to have you later when you do have time.
The first thing that needs to happen now that you are an intern is meeting the rest of the team, starting with chief technology officer Dogi, and the current intern team leads. You can set up a time to have a Google hangout with them in the Gitter Interns chat room, which you should now be able to access. While you're at it, meet the current interns and ask them what they have been working on, and get to know them better.
Typically interns choose what project they want to work on, but if you get tired of a certain project there is opportunity to switch projects. The follow list are the current areas of work for the interns - besides the issues on ole-vi BeLL-Apps. Take a look at them all, and if any particularly interest you there is a very good chance that you can work on them.
- Automated Testing
- Automated UI testing via selenium, codeceptjs, and Saucelabs/Travis CI
- Translation (Crowdin)
- Help us translate the BeLL App user interface to other languages
- Simple Install
- We are in the progress of making a script to install all the software needed to run and work on the Bell Apps
- HTML Resources
- Add existing educational HTML apps into the BeLL.
- Take Home
- Take home is an Android port of the BeLL apps.
Now that you have been added to the intern team, you will receive invites to become GitHub repository members for open-learning-exchange and ole-vi. Make sure you accept these invites. Note that this will give you the ability to make bigger mistakes - so make sure you always double check what repository you are pushing to, or are working on. You will now have the ability to review, close, and merge pull requests and issues. Once you have accepted your invitation, mark yourself as public at the list of OLE contributors.
One of your responsibilities as an intern is to review and help prospective interns with their issues / pull request on open learning exchange. You can start a review by going to the files changed tab on a pull request. You can read more about reviewing on GitHub here. You should check for things such as:
- Check for issue number in pull request title
- Are there any unneeded files in the pull request?
- Did they make a branch for their patch?
- Does the pull request actually fix the issue?
- Check the pull request on rawgit, does it display without any errors?
- Is there any merge conflicts?
- Make sure that people use their GitHub accounts when making commits through git
Every time you comment on an issue or review a pull request, message those involved on the Gitter chat with a link to the issue / pull request. Also, if you find any issue with a pull request, do not forget to use the Request changes option when creating your review.
If there are no issues remaining with a pull request, and at least two people have approved the pull request it can be merged, provided that there are no changes requested by another intern (exception is when virtual interns get added to the team - We want the new intern to do that themselves during their interview). When you go to merge the pull request, select Squash Merge, and remove all of the commit message, and make sure the commit title is clear and short. You can write “(fixes issue #)” and it will automatically close the issue that the pull request solves. If you forget, just manually go to the issue and close it, linking to the merged pull request.
Every time you merge a pull request, message the author on Gitter in the chat room, make sure you include a link to the pull request and commit id.
Waffle.io is what OLE uses to manage the BeLL app project. It's another way to view the projects that you and your team need to work on and review. You will be automatically added to the Waffle.io page once you become an intern. If not, then message someone on the Gitter chat and they will add you.
Choose issues to work on out of the Ready column and assign them to yourself. Move them to the In Progress column when you start working on them. Make sure you link the pull requests to their issues by mentioning them in the pull request title. E.g. "(fixes #54)".
Every time you work on OLE projects and issues you should post in the Standup Gitter chat room before you start working. Use the following format:
- What did I achieve last?
Mention what you were able to achieve.
- What is my aim for today?
List what you are working on - consider linking to the issues.
- What obstacles are in the way of our progress?
List any problems.
While you are free to work in your own style, we recommend you follow this basic daily routine:
- Check Gitter Interns room and your Gitter private messages.
- If you are able join the OLE google hangout so you can follow what everyone is working on and get help fast.
- Check Waffle.io, if you have no issues assigned, assign yourself to issues relating to the project you wish to work on.
- Write a post in Gitter Standup with the format mentioned above.
- Review any issues or pull requests that have been added or changed on open-learning-exchange.github.io since last time you reviewed.
- Work on your issues and write in intern chat any time you run into problems.
- Make pull requests as often as possible so you can get feedback as you work.
- Try to close issues using some of the following keywords and vairations of them in the headings:
close,fixandresolve. Closing Issues using keywords
Every Friday we have a "Happy hacking hangout" session, where we work on problems together and catch up on what people have been doing all week. Typically we try to follow an Agenda provided in google docs. It is also advisable to schedule a day out of the week to meet with a team leader, especially if you can’t make it to the friday meeting. Use the calendar to set up meetings and other events with interns. Just enter: [email protected] in "Add a friend's calendar".
It’s not good to go silent on gitter or any other forms of communication. If you are ever unsure of what to work on, or cannot work for any other reason, please talk to us in the gitter chat. It's better that we know why you aren’t able to do anything than to imagine reasons ourselves. Also make sure you are away in the OLE google hangout. Remember, the more you put into this internship the more you will get out of it. It may take a while to get used to the fact that you will need a good amount of self-discipline and initiative to get anything done in a remote internship, but we are here to help, so take advantage of it!
Also, if you find any issue with a pull request, do not forget to use the Request changes option when creating your review.