#How to Help?
You're passionate about using technology to help others in your community. Great! So are we! And we can definitely use your skills.
###If you're a community organizer We need people to get government officials who are in charge of data talking with the technologists in our group. We need people who knows what the community needs to drive our projects in the right direction.
###If you're a developer We're always looking for developers of all levels to start new projects or contribute to existing ones. Some of the types of projects we've been tackling are data cleanup and collection, bike route creation, intuitive APIs, data visualization, and a lot more.
Check out our resources page for useful tutorials:
###If you want to be a developer Here's a great list of general code resources:
Once you think you have the fundamentals, try building a Scraper! Look for data locked in HTML, XML, CSV, etc format and write a script to clean and import the data to a database.
###If you're a designer We need to make our apps easy to use for everyone. We need data to tell a story or make a point without any obfuscation.
###If you want to be a designer
###If want to make data more easily accessible
- OpenColorado needs contributors to make sure data is up to date and pointing to the right endpoints.
###If you have a great idea We need great project ideas in order to build the applications to help others! If you have a great idea but aren't sure how to implement it, come to any of our meetings or leave a message in our google group.
A few things to do that would make your project proposal even better:
- Look for the data needed to make this project work. It would be great to build a live bus tracker, but we can't do anything if the data doesn't exist. If you could find the data, link to it, even clean it up (if you can!) before presenting your idea, the developers and designers have a better chance of tackling your idea. If you're not sure how to collect the data, leave a message in the google group and ask.
- Think small at first. If you have a big idea, think of the small steps you, the developers, the designers, and government memebers have to take to make this project a reality and write them down.
- At the very least, think of ways your idea would benefit the community.
###If you like to share your thoughts
- We love people who can share the groups ideals with the community! We need people who can blog, tweet, write, anything to get the word out!
###Anything else?
- Come to our meetings!