Terry “Tofus” Wang
Django Skorupa
In this episode of Sustain Open Source Design, Django Skorupa is joined by guest Tofus Wang, a UX designer and open source enthusiast from Taipei. Tofus shares his journey into open source, which began during his high school years. Currently, he is a junior UX designer at National Taiwan University, where he also studies economics. Tofus discusses the g0v (GovZero) hackathons, the challenges and opportunities of contributing to open source as a designer, and how non-coders contribute in meaningful ways. Press download now to hear more!
[00:06:11] Django and Tofus discuss how contributions in open source design are often harder to track on platforms like GitHub, but they are equally important, and many g0v participants are not coders but contribute in significant ways. He also explains using HackMD, a note taking platform.
[00:12:13] Tofus reflects on his contributions as a high school student, participating in g0v School001 project, which promotes hackathons and the spirit of civic hacking to high school students in Taiwan.
[00:14:53] Tofus discusses his participation in Da0, a study group exploring decentralized autonomous organizations (DAOs). Although not fully developed, the project brought together people interested in blockchain and its potential applications for grassroots communities.
[00:17:30] Tofus highlights the vital role of design in open source. He worked on visual design projects for multiple initiatives, including creating an interactive UI for Da0’s reputation accounting system.
[00:19:54] Django and Tofus dive into projects such as the Plurality Book, an open source book exploring the future of democracy and technology. Tofus worked on the visual design for the book and helped refine its logo.
[00:22:39] “The fundamental technology of digital technology is actually the collaborations of the people.”
Special Guest: Terry Wang.
Milan Guenther
Richard Littauer | Memo Esparza
In this episode of Sustain Open Source Design, host Richard Littauer and co-host Memo Esparza are joined by Milan Guenther, President of the Intersection Group and co-founder of Enterprise Design Associates. Milan discusses his career, which spans working with major enterprises like Google and Toyota, and his focus on transforming organizations through enterprise design. The conversation delves into the intricacies of enterprise design, the role of open-source tools like 'Edgy,' and the challenges and successes of applying these concepts in both large and small teams. Milan also highlights the importance of visualizing and uncovering enterprise misalignments and touches on the intersection of various design disciplines. Additionally, the upcoming conference in Rome is discussed, promising further insights into the world of enterprise design. Press download to hear more!
[00:01:57] Milan mentions his past venture in designing a patented innovation for flight decks, his current work with enterprises like Google, SAP, and Toyota, and his entry into consultancy with friends in 2009.
[00:03:29] Milan shares his perspective on design, emphasizing the role of creativity and making improvements through observing and modeling.
[00:04:25] Memo asks Milan about his proximity to the term “business design” and how his work might be diagrammatically represented, alongside discussing the dynamics between small and large teams within enterprises. Milan explains the concept of business design, enterprise design, and their differences, and mentions “Team Topologies” as a useful framework for organizational design.
[00:10:09] Memo inquires about successful patterns in team dynamics, whether structured methods like Scrum or more flexible approaches yield better outcomes in different contexts. Milan responds, emphasizing the effectiveness of smaller, less structured teams in software development.
[00:12:36] Richard mentions Milan’s book on design patterns in enterprises and asks about the Edgy project. He explains the origins of Edgy, starting with a book titled “Intersection,” which was an introduction to designing better enterprises. Edgy was make open source hosted on a wiki, and licensed under Creative Commons to ensure it was accessible for both personal and commercial use.
[00:16:02] In response to Memo’s inquiry about the artifacts used in their processes, Milan describes diverse tools utilized depending on the user’s background and needs.
[00:18:14] Richard is curious about the adoption and contribution to Edgy and Milan shares that while there’s been significant use among consultants and some large organizations, there are also instances of failed trials.
[00:20:19] Discussing smaller, open-source minded projects, Milan mentions the integration of Edgy with the Archi tool, an open source architecture modelling tool.
[00:23:33] Milan clarifies that the Rome event takes place in Rome, Italy in September, marking the 10th anniversary of their conference on enterprise design. He describes the event as a gathering for discussing and sharing ideas about enterprise design.
[00:24:56] Discussing the sustainability of the Edgy project, Milan explains that while the project itself doesn’t generate direct revenue, it supports their consultancy through connections, collaborations, and the adoption of their work. He provides insights into how the non-profit association supporting Edgy operates.
[00:28:07] Find out where you can learn more about Milan, Edgy, and the conference.
Special Guest: Milan Guenther.
Stephen Okonkwo
Richard Littauer
In this episode of Sustain Open Source Design, the OSCA 2023 series, host Richard welcomes Steve Okonkwo, a multidisciplinary designer who actively contributes to the Open Source Community Africa (OSCA). Steve sheds light on his role in enhancing user experience through thoughtful design, particularly for OSCA, and shares his dedication to continue elevating the design team's work. Richard and Steve discuss the Sustain sub-event, the importance of design in open source, and the intricacies of conference planning around open source products. Steve also touches on the significance of research, the need for transparency in open source communities, and his personal journey and future aspirations within the design landscape. Press download now to hear more!
[00:01:12] Steve tells us about his career as a multidisciplinary designer and his work in open source. He discusses his focus on improving user experience through design, including website and brand identity design for OSCA.
[00:02:03] Richard compliments the OSCA’s branding, particularly the orange logos, and Steve mentions that OSCA has been his primary focus, and he plans to continue supporting their design team.
[00:03:02] There was a large attendance at the last OSCAFest and a Sustain sub-event. Steve tells us he was the design facilitator for the design side of Sustain.
[00:03:31] Steve highlights key points from OSCA discussions, including the growing opportunities for designers in open source and the importance of contributing to project aesthetics.
[00:05:22] The conversation shifts to the iterative nature of web design and user experience, and Steve emphasizes the importance of research and testing in design updates to prevent overwhelming users.
[00:06:29] Richard discusses the uniqueness of working with open source communities and the need for transparency. Steve talks about his approach to working with open source, emphasizing transparency, communications, and commitment to quality.
[00:08:00] Richard asks about building a conference around open source products, and Steve shares insights from OSCAFest, including showcasing new tools like Penpot.
[00:10:06] Richard inquires about challenges in designing the OSCA festival, and Steven mentions issues with physical artwork and space design.
[00:10:53] What’s next for Steve? He talks about his current role as a multidisciplinary designer in Spokane, Washington, and his aspirations in open source design.
[00:11:57] Find out where you can find out more about Steve’s work on the web.
[00:05:11] “They always say in the tech industry, the web is never done.”
[00:05:37] “Research is a very important part of design.”
Special Guest: Stephen Okonkwo.
Veethika Mishra
Richard Littauer | Django Skorupa | Victory Brown
Hello and welcome to Sustain Open Source Design! The podcast where we talk about sustaining open source with design. Learn how we, as designers, interface with open source in a sustainable way, how we integrate into different communities, and how we as coders, work with other designers. In today’s episode, we are joined by guest, Veethika Mishra, a Senior Product Designer at GitLab, who shares her career path, emphasizing her move from closed to open source design work. She shares valuable insights into the design process at GitLab, which involves continuous interaction between designers and product managers and active participation of the user community. We discuss the power of open source contributions, the importance of community engagement, and the challenges faced in integrating external designers. Go ahead and download this episode now to hear more!
[00:02:37] Veethika discusses her career path and transition from a secretive and proprietary organization to open source companies like Red Hat and GitLab.
[00:04:25] At Red Hat, Veethika was part of the team that worked on the landing page for the developer console of OpenShift, which she greatly enjoyed. However, she wanted more engagement with the open source community, leading her to GitLab.
[00:06:10] Richard asks Veethika about any potential advantages of design in a closed source environment, and she responds that she doesn’t miss anything from her time in such an environment and considers some practices within these companies as absurd.
[00:08:03] Django asks Veethika to talk about her research experiences, and she explains that research in an open environment provides a more accessible and authentic dataset, which benefits the product design process.
[00:11:15] We hear about Veethika’s GitLab’s experience and the continuous learning process to ensure valuable community contributions.
[00:13:29] Richard asks about the user base and the number of designers at GitLab, which Veethika reveals they have 30 million+ users, four designers in the CI/CD UX, and possible over 30 designers across the company.
[00:14:05] Discussing the integration of designer input within developer teams at GitLab, Veethika describes GitLab’s publicly documented product development flow.
[00:16:19] Victory questions the collaboration between volunteer and employed designers at GitLab, and Veethika explains that while most designers working on different problems are GitLab employees, there are contribution guidelines for UX. She also mentions GitLab’s Pajamas Design System as a more accessible and familiar space for designers to make contributions.
[00:20:12] Richard asks about handling the potential backlash from unpopular design decisions. Veethika responds that there’s no guaranteed way to mitigate such reactions but mentions that engaging with the community has made her a better communicator and designer.
[00:21:03] We hear about the types of design contributions GitLab encourages from the community as Veethika explains the flexibility in contributions to Pajamas, and she details the process of making contributions via the Web IDE on the Pajamas website.
[00:22:46] Richard asks about the barriers to open source design roles and how to overcome them. Veethika shares her opinion that the main barrier is the lack of open source ethos within many organizations.
[00:25:19] Django asks if the scenario has changed over the years regarding open source design roles and Veethika notes an improvement in designer participation in open source.
[00:26:45] Veethika tells us her views on Penpot Fest.
[00:27:32] Veethika shares her hopes for the future of open source design, emphasizing the need for a deeper understanding of the socio-political impact of technological decisions and the diversification of the open source community.
[00:29:21] Find out where you can follow Veethika and her work on the web.
[00:10:17] “When you combine open and when you make it more visible and discoverable for others to see, these two things combined make a lot of impact.”
[00:23:06] “If an organization isn’t practicing open source development methods, then they have no reason having a designer that really cares for open source.”
[00:23:16] “It’s only when they live this ethos of openness when they realize the scale of impact this can bring to their business, not just to the community.”
[00:24:51] “We can keep pointing fingers at others and not realize that it’s also us who have a certain obligation towards the society and it’s larger good, and open source is the only way to make it happen at this point.”
[00:27:04] “Penpot Fest was really different!”
[00:28:39] “We need to diversify the community that’s behind open source projects.”
Special Guest: Veethika Mishra.
Jan C. Borchardt | Elizabet Oliveira | Peter Hanekamp
Pia Mancini | Eriol Fox | Victory Brown | Perrie Ojemeh
Welcome to Sustain Open Source Design, broadcasting live from Penpot Fest in Barcelona, Spain. Today, Eriol, Pia, Victory, and Perrie are hosting, and they have three guests joining them. Our first guest is Jan C. Borchardt, co-founder and design lead at Nextcloud. Jan provides insights into five key strategies for open source design at Nextcloud, highlighting the challenges and rewarding aspects of facilitating easy software user onboarding. The discussion takes us to Jan’s involvement in connecting designers and projects in need of design through a job board, diversity initiatives, and experiences in global conferences. Our next guest is Elizabet Oliveira, Senior Product Designer at Xata, who shares her diverse roles and experiences. She provides insights into design systems and their necessity in startups, and her transition from a developer to a designer. Our final guest, we engage with Peter Hanekamp from Kaleidos, discussing open source strategy. The conversation delves into audience targeting, integration plans for Penpot and Taiga, the benefits of open source for designers, and their strategy for maximizing value creation and facilitating community growth. Hit download to hear more!
Jan:
[00:01:22] Our first guest is Jan Borchardt, co-founder, and design lead at Nextcloud, a co-founder of open source design, and an active member in open source diversity communities. He tells us about his talk which focused on five essential open source design strategies used at Nextcloud, and he touches on one of the design challenges.
[00:02:40] There’s a discussion on the role of designers as strategists, considering design beyond the visual aspect and towards strategy and problem solving.
[00:03:53] Jan discusses his involvement in the open source design community, connecting designers and projects in need of design through a job board.
[00:05:32] He tells us there are plans for the design community to work on updating the outdated website and provide more value to its users.
[00:07:04] Jan also works on a diversity initiative, reaching out to new communities outside the European sphere, He also emphasizes the value of participating in conferences in regions outside Europe and the US, such as FOSSASIA and OSCA FEST to gain new perspectives and ideas.
[00:08:57] The discussion moves to the importance of designers attending various events both developer and design focused, to broaden their perspectives and influence.
Elizabet:
[00:11:57] Our next guest is Elizabet Oliveira, Senior Product Designer at Xata, and she tells us what she does there and her experiences with design and open source.
[00:14:03] Eriol brings up design systems, and Elizabet gives insight into her experiences with design systems. She also explains her frustrations with design systems with her role mainly involved with fixing bugs, dealing with feature requests, or updating old components.
[00:16:37] Elizabet mentions using Chakra UI and shares her prediction that Xata might either move away from their current design system, Chakra UI, or customize it extensively.
[00:19:21] Elizabet emphasizes the importance of exploring variety and creativity as a designer, and she tells us about some personal projects she created, like React Kawaii and Cassette Tape.
[00:21:36] Going back to Elizabet’s journey, she started as a developer, creating her music promotion materials, and later transitioned to design because she liked it more.
[00:23:20] We hear how Elizabet stays connected with the design community.
Peter:
[00:27:18] Our final guest is Peter Hanekamp, from Kaleidos, the company that works on Penpot and Tyga. He talks about growth being not just about having a great product but also about the aspects surrounding it.
[00:28:59] Eriol brings up the audience for Penpot and Taiga and asks Peter to explain the challenges faced in reaching their target audiences for both these tools. He also talks about the audience for Taiga.
[00:30:54] Peter tells us while there are no plans to merge Penpot and Taiga, they’re looking into building integrations between the two.
[00:32:19] Peter shares Kaleidos’ journey from a team of developers to including more designers, emphasizing the difficulty of creating a good interaction between these two roles, and he talks about the benefits of open source for designers.
[00:34:41] We hear Peter defining growth for Penpot and Kaleidos as getting more users, getting more active users, and getting more people being fanatics of their tools. He shares his personal journey in Kaleidos and their strategy moving forward which involves maximizing value creation and facilitating community growth, which they believe that power user functionality should always be free.
Special Guests: Elizabet Oliveira, Jan C. Borchardt, and Peter Hanekamp.
Dima Davidoff | Madeline Peck | Michal Malewicz
Pia Mancini | Eriol Fox | Perrie Ojemeh
Welcome to Sustain Open Source Design! We’re at Penpot Fest in Barcelona, Spain having some insightful conversations. Today, Pia, Eriol, and Perrie are joined by three guests. We start off with Dima Davidoff, a product designer, who shares his experiences working as both a freelancer and full-time. He sheds light on his usage design tools and highlights the potential of open source alternatives like Penpot, emphasizing the importance of trust and community in the design world. Next, we speak with Madeline Peck, the team lead for the Fedora design team at Red Hat. She shares her work with several open source programs, stresses the importance of community involvement and outreach in design, and touches on the necessity of greater diversity and inclusion within open source communities. Finally, we speak with Michal Malewicz, a designer with over two decades of experience who now focuses on teaching. He shares his experience working with different types of companies, the importance of solid fundamental design skills, and emphasizes critical learning for designers. Hit download now to hear more!
[00:01:19] Our first guest is Dima Davidoff, a Product Designer, who discusses freelancing alongside his full-time job and the differences in design tools used.
[00:04:04] Dima shares his frustration with the lack of migration tools from Adobe XD to Figma and questions his trust in the company.
[00:05:38] Eriol reflects on the evolution of design tools and emphasizes the importance of community to the development of the tool. Dima advises starting with open source tools for financial reasons and the ability to contribute to the development of the tool, an encourages designers to contribute to open source projects like Penpot.
[00:08:57] Dima highlights the importance of user-centered design and the value of open source in listening to user feedback and delivering features promptly.
[00:11:32] Our next guest is Madeline Peck, who’s an Associate Interactive Designer at Red Hat and the team lead for the Fedora design team. She mentions using open source programs like Inkscape, Penpot, Blendr, and Krita.
[00:12:33] Madeline talks about involving the design community in Fedora and Red Hat’s work and mentions using different social media platforms to spread the word, such as PeerTube, and the importance of sharing tutorials and engaging with social media to reach a wider audience an promote open source.
[00:14:58] Madeline discusses moving away from the logo work and focusing on creating brand identity and asset libraires for teams using tools like Penpot.
[00:18:00] She talks about the need for more diversity and inclusion efforts in open source, particularly in terms of representation and creating a welcoming environment for marginalized benefits.
[00:19:44] Madeline shares her transition from college to working in open source and the benefits of using open source tools like Inkscape, as well as the need for more open source awareness in educational institutions.
[00:21:42] Eriol discusses the challenges educational institutions face in adopting open source tools and the potential impact on design education.
[00:22:42] Madeline suggests highlighting the cost savings and the sense of community and collaboration in open source as reasons for students to consider using open source tools and expresses interest in cross-platform collaboration in open source.
[00:26:32] We welcome our third guest, Michal Malewicz, a Designer for 24+ years, who now focuses on teaching other designers.
[00:27:09] Michal discusses his experience working with both small startups and large corporations, preferring startups right now. The agency is run by his wife, and they focus on projects they are passionate about.
[00:28:55] We hear a funny story from Michal about how he started teaching by accident after speaking at a conference, and then being asked to teach at a university.
[00:30:25] Perrie asks Michal to talk about some challenges he’s had to face, and one is junior designers being focused on trendy tools like Figma and skipping fundamental design skills.
[00:33:04] Michal advises designers to follow only a few design influencers and be critical in their learning process.
[00:34:44] Michal talks about creating neologisms or hashtags to make design concepts more accessible, and he expresses support for Penpot and their goal of allowing design freedom and self-hosting options.
Special Guests: Dima Davidoff, Madeline Peck, and Michal Malewicz.
Iván Martínez | Karl Hütt
Pia Mancini
iBienvenido a Sustain Open Source Design! La Inteligencia Artificial en Acción: Impulsando el Futuro Empresarial "¿Quieres descubrir cómo la inteligencia artificial está impulsando el futuro del desarrollo de productos y abriendo nuevas oportunidades en el mundo empresarial? Grabado durante el PenPot Festival en Barcelona, en este episodio tenemos el honor de entrevistar a Iván Martínez, CTO de Ontruck, una destacada start-up española a la vanguardia de la innovación, trabajando para reducir las emisiones de CO2 en medio de transporte. Ivan hala de su último proyecto: Private GPT. Una innovadora tecnología similar a ChatGPT, pero que está enfocada en trabajar encima de una gran base de datos, ofreciendo también mayor seguridad de datos y la información privada. Además, Ivan compartirá su visión sobre el poder de la inteligencia artificial en el desarrollo de productos y su convicción de que la comunidad de Open Source es fundamental para impulsar el progreso y el impacto de esta nueva tecnología en la sociedad. ¡No te pierdas esta conversación, únete a nosotros ahora mismo y no perca ningún detalle!
Transformando el Futuro: Memri, IA Regenerativa y Privacidad de Datos. ¡Explore como la IA Regenerativa, la aplicación Memri y el control de datos por las grandes compañías impacta el futuro de la industria! Acompáñanos mientras exploramos el proyecto Open Source de Memri, un tipo de asistente personal basado en IA y desarrollado por la empresa de Karl. Además, adentrémonos en el fascinante mundo de la IA Regenerativa y descubramos cómo puede abrir nuevas puertas hacia un futuro más prometedor. Este episodio te brinda una visión única sobre el potencial transformador de la IA y cómo podemos navegar los desafíos de privacidad de datos en un mundo cada vez más conectado. ¡No te pierdas este episodio revelador y cómo podemos dar forma a un mundo mejor a través de la tecnología!
Special Guests: Ivan Martínez and Karl Hütt.
Alonso Torres | Máirín Duffy | Martin Owens
Pia Mancini | Eriol Fox | Victory Brown | Perrie Ojemeh
Welcome to Sustain Open Source Design! In this episode, we are live from Penpot Fest in Barcelona, Spain. Pia, Eriol, Victory, and Perrie are hosting, and they’ll be interviewing three guests. Our guests joining us today are Alonso Torres, a Front-end Developer at Penpot, Máirín Duffy, a Senior Principal Interaction Designer at Red Hat, and Martin Owens, an Independent Free Software Developer at Inkscape. We’ll start with Alonso where we explore the origin of Penpot as a personal innovation project within Kaleidos, and the importance of workflows, community involvement, and Penpot as an alternative to proprietary tools like Figma are highlighted. Then we shift focus to Máirín, where she explains the concept of designing upstream in open source, she shares the benefits of open source tooling, she talks about her current project Podman Desktop, and the evolution of the community design team and how they collaborate with different open source projects. The episode concludes with Martin, who fills us in on being an Independent Developer at Inkscape, he shares his experiment of funding open source development, dives into the influence of companies on open source projects and discusses measuring impact, and the significance of relationships within the open source community. Hit download now!
Alonso:
[00:01:04] Pia interviews our first guest, Alonso Torres, who shares his role and responsibilities at Penpot and what attracted him to Penpot, and highlights Kaleidos.
[00:02:38] Alonso emphasizes that workflows are crucial for Penpot’s team, especially when considering how the tool will be used by distributed teams.
[00:04:17] Alonso clarifies that Penpot is not a direct competitor to Figma but rather an open source alternative, and they prioritize features based on community feedback and needs.
[00:05:22] The majority of core contributors at Penpot are employed by Kaleidos, and they follow agile methodologies, work collaboratively, and have regular meetings to discuss design handoffs and prioritize features.
[00:07:21] Alonso acknowledges that collaboration between designers and developers can be challenging, especially in open source projects. He suggests using tools for effective communication and mentions the need for improvement in this area.
[00:08:37] Alonso expresses his excitement about being at the festival and highlights the impressive organization and diverse communities present.
Máirín:
[00:10:25] Eriol interviews our next guest, Máirín Duffy, who discusses her role at Red Hat and the concept of designing upstream in open source.
[00:13:10] Máirín explains the concepts of upstream and patching in open source, using analogies and examples to make them more accessible to designers unfamiliar with the terminology.
[00:16:22] We hear about the evolution of the community design team and how they expanded their services to collaborate with different open source projects, fostering user-centered design and bridging gaps between projects that might be competitors in a company context.
[00:18:51] Máirín shares an example of collaboration between Podman and Podman Desktop teams at Red Hat, highlighting the value of bringing end-user use cases and perspectives to the development process and how it benefits both teams.
[00:21:48] Máirín advises designers not to worry about dogma and encourages them to be open to the practical reasons for adopting open source tools.
[00:24:06] What’s been the highlight of Penpot for Máirín? She mentions Martin Owen’s talk on the SVG standard and the proposal for a separate editable SVG standard.
Martin:
[00:26:02] Victory and Perrie interview our third guest, Martin Owen, an Independent Inkscape Developer, and a free software advocate. He shares his interest in finding practical solutions that enable freedom in software development without compromising the path to achieving it and explains an experiment he’s been running.
[00:26:50] He explains his experiment of not taking private proprietary software contracts but instead seeking direct funding from designers and users of Inkscape. Martin discusses how companies that pay for open source software development have a significant influence on feature choices and decisions.
[00:29:23] Martin explains his three main groups of clients.
[00:30:43] Martin addresses the challenge of prioritizing user requests.
[00:32:26] Victory asks Martin to highlight any lesser known Inkscape features, and he mentions exploring the extensions and python-based functionalities and watching video tutorials on YouTube.
[00:33:34] Martin mentions that tracking metrics is not a priority for the Inkscape project, but he gauges impact through millions of downloads, positive feedback, and seeing the artwork created by users.
[00:34:26] If you’re interested in looking at Martin’s work you can go to his YouTube account for videos and you can help fund his work on Patreon.
[00:34:53] Martin emphasizes the importance of relationships within the open source community and suggests that developers form connections with non-programmers to better understand their needs and the impact of their work.
Special Guests: Alonso Torres, Martin Owens, and Máirín Duffy.
Eriol Fox | Katie Wilson | Meag Doherty
Welcome to Sustain Open Source Design! In this second part of a series of podcasts about the user work, Eriol is joined by Katie Wilson and Meag Doherty to discuss their project, Superbloom, which delves into design and usability in scientific and research open source software. Today, they shed light into the ideal user type of open source software tools, the focus on software maintainability in design, and how software complexity plays into its perceived value in decision-making, and how it may impact the progress of open science. They also discuss the necessity of usability in decision-making, and how it may impact the progress of open science, and they highlight their experiences at various events and initiatives that underscore the importance of continuing conversations around these topics. Hit download now to hear more!
[00:01:14] Katie Wilson, a Design Researcher at Superbloom and Meag Doherty, the Deputy Chief User Experience Officer at the All of Us Research Program, introduce themselves and we’ll hear what their relationship is to the project.
[00:04:17] Eriol introduces the topic of end users and discusses the discovery that most open source software tools, including those in scientific and research domains, seem to have an ideal user type with particular skills and capabilities.
[00:07:05] Katie continues the conversation, mentioning that when asked about design, many open source software projects focus on making the software as maintainable and contributable as possible, thus often perceiving the users as fellow programmers or contributors.
[00:09:25] Eriol shares one last thought on the usability chapter and comments on how complexity in scientific and research open source software could be viewed as a safety aspect that validates their relevance in the field.
[00:11:30] Meag segues to the potential impact of these findings. She emphasizes that usability is not an afterthought but central to the decision-making process, and poor usability could hinder the progress of open science.
[00:12:59] Katie addresses UX best practices in the context of scientific software, suggesting that the tool’s complexity might dictate its user experience.
[00:14:52] Eriol talks about accessibility. They explain that designers view accessibility from a different perspective that scientists or researchers in the open source software space. However, for non-designers, accessibility is understood, as broadening the tool’s application and potential discovery of science and research.
[00:19:21] The conversation shifts to Meag talking about incentives, particularly within university settings and academic groups. She stresses the importance of understanding incentives and looking for windows of opportunity to implement usability improvements.
[00:20:13] Eriol describes some work done by their colleagues, who created a series of informative zines distilling complex research findings into six-page summaries.
[00:22:50] Katie discusses an ecosystem map they developed to visualize interconnected projects, institutions, and contributors within the scientific and research open-source software space.
[00:24:15] Meag talks about a trip to an open source science retreat in Germany where the focus was on the usability of software used by research software engineers daily. She also mentions more of their work was shared at the Software Sustainability Institute’s Collaboration Workshop and at JupyterCon 2023 in Paris.
[00:27:24] Eriol affirms the importance of welcoming new people into the space to sustain and improve usability design, highlighting the need to include people from the peripheries of science, research, and open source.
Isaac Sixtus Chizaram (Isaac Zara)
Richard Littauer | Django Skorupa
Hello and welcome to Sustain Open Source Design! The podcast where we talk about sustaining open source with design. Learn how we, as designers, interface with open source in a sustainable way, how we integrate into different communities, and how we as coders, work with other designers. Our guest today is Isaac Zara, an open source enthusiast who works at Flipside as a brand designer. Isaac shares his journey into open source, his work as a brand experience designer, his experience mentoring designers in open source projects, and his design philosophy. He also gives us a glimpse of what’s next for him which includes personal branding projects and how he plans to integrate storytelling into brand designs. Hit download to learn much more!
[00:02:51] Isaac tells us why he considers himself a designer first, a human second, and an open source designer third.
[00:03:35] We hear Isaac’s journey through open source and how he got started.
[00:06:00] Isaac was on the design committee for Drupal, and we find out what he designed for them.
[00:07:34] At Flipside, Isaac works as a brand designer, building the brand identity and making the visual assets cohesive across all marketing channels.
[00:08:54] We learn about the community being quite different in the Web3 space, using VLC, and how he feels we need more people with this open source beauty mentality in Web3.
[00:10:57] Isaac emphasizes the importance of building a brand system that will stand the test of time, which involves developing an identity that is timeless and consistent with the brand’s values. Also, he notes that open source projects can only stand the test of time with the support of a community and a process that makes it easier for people to take over where the designer leaves off.
[00:14:21] As a brand designer, he talks about the importance of creating brand guidelines for open source projects to maintain consistency in visual design and recommends making the brand guidelines accessible to everyone involved in the project.
[00:16:20] Isaac discusses the role of design in attracting new users and contributors to open source projects.
[00:18:32] We hear the role of design in attracting new users and contributors to open source projects.
[00:22:25] Isaac explains the way to sell a product is by communicating the value to people out there and the importance of creating a visually appealing pitch to investors. He also brings up CHAOSS, CHAOSS Africa, and Ruth Ikegah.
[00:26:42] While Isaac hasn’t specifically worked on open source projects looking for financial contributions, he notes that it’s important to make funding accessible and easy to navigate on the project’s website to encourage financial support.
[00:28:14] We hear about his experience mentoring others in open source projects and his approach to design.
[00:29:02] What’s hard for Isaac about design in open source?
[00:31:11] We hear what’s next for Isaac, such as his personal branding projects and how he wants to incorporate storytelling into his brand designs.
[00:32:09] Find out where you can follow Isaac on the web.
[00:03:09] “What gave me the privilege to contribute to open source because I had a design skill.”
[00:14:30] “Devs call it documentation, we call it brand guidelines.”
[00:17:04] “It’s hard to create something that will be cohesive if there’s no guide. Just imagine when you walk into an open forest without a compass.”
[00:21:07] “It can be hard to translate your greatness you have within you, if they’re not seeing you speak visually.”
[00:22:45] “As a brand designer, I see myself as a value maker, as an innovator.”
Special Guest: Isaac Sixtus Chizaram.
Pablo Ruiz-Múzquiz
Memo Esparza | Perrie Ojemeh | Django Skorupa
Hello and welcome to Sustain Open Source Design! The podcast where we talk about sustaining open source with design. Learn how we, as designers, interface with open source in a sustainable way, how we integrate into different communities, and how we as coders, work with other designers. We’re excited to have as our guest, Pablo Ruiz Múzquiz, CEO of Kaleidos, and creator of Penpot and Taiga. Today, Pablo dives into the challenges of leading a creative business in the open source world, focusing on the need for a perfect open source product, an engaged community, and a sustainable business model. He sheds light on the collaborative and contribution-based model at Kaleidos. Also, there’s a conversation about the future of Penpot and its community, and Pablo shares insights about the upcoming Penpot Fest in Barcelona, and he mentions some upcoming features for Penpot. Download this episode now to hear more!
[00:01:36] Pablo tells us how it is to lead a company like Kaleidos.
[00:03:47] He highlights the importance of autonomy and co-ownership within teams.
[00:06:07] Pablo describes the collaborative and contribution-based model at Kaleidos. He touches on the evolution of the company’s culture, strong opinions, relevant consensus, and the continuous process of redefining themselves.
[00:09:18] In regard to challenges he faced building Penpot, Pablo emphasizes not taking shortcuts and staying true to their values, using accessibility as an example. He also tells us they explore the cultural aspects of Kaleidos, the privilege they enjoy in taking risks, and the commitment to their principles and values.
[00:12:21] There’s a conversation on the work that goes into achieving accessibility in Pablo’s design tool, Taiga.
[00:15:00] Memo wonders what’s next for Penpot and Taiga, and Pablo mentions the upcoming Penpot Fest in Barcelona, where open source communities will join forces to discuss the future design and development using open source and open standards. He also talks about the upcoming features for Penpot, as well as the integration of Taiga into Penpot.
[00:20:23] Pablo highlights the significance of versioning and sharing knowledge with the open source mindset.
[00:22:35] Pablo acknowledges the challenges of balancing abundant content and true accessibility and emphasizes the need for powerful design that empowers designers, and he shares what it takes to be a designer.
[00:28:11] He expresses the importance of cracking the relationship between designers and developers to grow the Penpot community organically, with the ultimate goal of having a strong user base and active contributors.
[00:04:17] “When people work together and are generous with their talent and time, great things happen, open source is just one of those implementations.”
[00:09:52] “The toughest thing to do is not taking shortcuts.”
[00:13:19] “This is not an afterthought, this is not a patch, this is part of a better product.”
[00:14:47] “Look for where there are no incentives, and you’ll probably find a better product to build.”
[00:24:07] “Design is where technology meets society.”
Special Guest: Pablo Ruiz-Múzquiz.
Mike Gifford
Richard Littauer
Hello and welcome to Sustain Open Source Design! The podcast where we talk about sustaining open source with design. Learn how we, as designers, interface with open source in a sustainable way, how we integrate into different communities, and how we as coders, work with other designers. Today, Richard is super excited to have as his guest, Mike Gifford, who’s a Senior Strategist at CivicActions and a thought leader on digital accessibility and the public sector. He was the Founder and President of OpenConcept Consulting, which worked extensively with Drupal, and he became a Drupal 8 Core Accessibility Maintainer in 2012. As a long-term environmentalist, Mike has found ways to integrate his passions for the web and planet. Today, Mike talks about his views on sustainability, his work with open source software, and the importance of accessibility and multilingualism in technology. Download this episode now to hear more!
[00:02:18] Mike shares his views on sustainability, and he tells us he’s been working fully with CivicActions for the last two years after closing OpenConcept Consulting.
[00:04:18] We learn about CivicActions, a web development firm that does a lot of work with both open source and Drupal, as well as HCD. They primarily work in the government space, largely focused on the US government.
[00:05:15] Mike tells us about the Canadian Open Source Advisory Board that he runs.
[00:06:21] We find out the differences between the Canadian and US government’s approach to open source software.
[00:08:13] How does Mike see himself as a designer in all these conversations? He talks about the work he does with the Drupal community to make Drupal more accessible.
[00:09:35] Mike explains where oral design interfaces mix with open source and he mentions Preston So from the Drupal community, who wrote the book, Voice Content and Usability.
[00:11:11] We hear about the groups of people who are looking at accessibility.
[00:13:38] There’s some great tools that are useful when talking about the disability spectrum, such as Accessibility Insights, which is a Microsoft tool, and an accessibility engine called, axe, which was built by Deque.
[00:15:41] Mike talks about the multilingual accessibility being a challenge in technology, and the challenges of identifying language content and tools, especially in open source software, and the predominance of English in accessibility resources.
[00:18:02] We hear about the open source work Mike’s doing with CivicActions, a project he was involved in creating called, OpenACR, and the need for procurement to include accessibility requirements.
[00:20:52] He highlights the responsibility of open source maintainers to set an example of accessibility best practices.
[00:22:39] How does Mike think ChatGPT is going influence accessibility practices? He emphasizes the responsibility of humans to evaluate and implement accessible code.
[00:26:00] Richard and Mike discuss the importance of building accessibility into the workflow of teams and developers. Accessibility is not just for those with disabilities but for everyone since abilities can impact all of us at one point.
[00:30:58] Mike tells us where you can find him on the web.
[00:02:33] “Sustainability is a word that is too loose and can be applied to many things much like accessibility.”
[00:13:51] “It’s about trying to remember that this is about progress, not perfection.”
[00:21:07] “I think there’s a huge responsibility for open source maintainers to set an example.”
[00:21:35] “If you provide examples in your code that aren’t following accessibility best practices, then you’re propagating that.”
[00:29:16] “Accessibility doesn’t just affect a small number of people; it affects all of us at one point or another because we’re human.”
Special Guest: Mike Gifford.
Ashlyn Knox
Richard Littauer
Hello and welcome to Sustain Open Source Design! The podcast where we talk about sustaining open source with design. Learn how we, as designers, interface with open source in a sustainable way, how we integrate into different communities, and how we as coders, work with other designers. Richard is the sole panelist today and he welcomes guest, Ashlyn Knox, who’s a web developer, UI/UX designer, and community contributor, joining us from the Fedora community. Today, Ashlyn talks about their work doing front-end development and design for their websites and apps team. They discuss the Fedora website revamp project, people involved, and the funding. They describe their experience with code switching and a design problem they faced while working on the navbar and how they solved it. Then, Ashlyn fills us in on the usability studies for the Fedora Project Website Revamp, using Penpot prototypes tested with real users, and how they believe a closer connection between design and dev teams is so important to improve design in open source projects. Download this episode now to hear more!
[00:01:15] Ashlyn tells us what they do at Fedora, primarily doing front-end development and design work.
[00:03:02] The revamp of the Fedora website has been a large project, and Ashlyn fills us in on the people involved, the process, and how the funding for Fedora comes from Red Hat and sponsors.
[00:05:14] We hear about the stakeholders that they negotiate with as far as the decision making with the website.
[00:07:18] Ashlyn discusses their experience with code switching between design and development and how they need space to switch between the two.
[00:09:28] Ashlyn describes a particular design problem they faced while working on the navbar and how she needed a structured approach to solve it.
[00:11:08] We hear Ashlyn’s history and how they were interested in coding as a kid but pursued a career in music teaching until the pandemic, which led them to taking a Bootcamp course.
[00:12:47] They tell us about some of their previous projects and how it’s gone to design and build websites, as well as finding clients.
[00:14:49] Ashlyn explains more about the usability studies for the Fedora Revamp Project and how that went. They mention an amazing book on usability studies they read called, Don’t Make Me Think.
[00:17:33] Richard wonders how many people they had in their earliest usability study, where did they find them, and why is usability in the design process for open source projects seem so rare.
[00:19:09] The prototypes were built using Penpot, a Figma tool, and tested with real users. Ashlyn talks about having a close relationship between the development and design teams and how they acted as a bridge between the two during the project.
[00:21:01] Ashlyn shares that acknowledging the differences in languages and being okay with learning from each other can help make teams stronger and reduce miscommunication and friction. They also tell us how mentorship plays a crucial role and how they taught designers how to work with developers.
[00:24:42] Find out where you can follow Ashlyn on the web.
[00:07:35] On Design: “Basically, I put that part of my brain into a box, and I just run with the other part of it.”
[00:21:09] “I think the acknowledgement of speaking different languages needs to be made and people just need to be okay with that and with learning other’s languages.”
Special Guest: Ashlyn Knox.
Winfried Tilanus | Emilie Tromp
Richard Littauer
Hello and welcome to Sustain Open Source Design! The podcast where we talk about sustaining open source with design. Learn how we, as designers, interface with open source in a sustainable way, how we integrate into different communities, and how we as coders, work with other designers. Richard has two amazing guests joining him, Winfried Tilanus, who’s a Privacy Consultant at Privacy Company, and Emilie Tromp, who’s a Social Design Strategist at Reframing Studio.
Today, they discuss how Privacy by Design should be approached, and the importance of understanding the different perspectives on privacy. We’ll hear about the Samen Beter project they did, challenges of designing privacy centered systems, the importance of user feedback and testing, and the iterative process of building trust with users when it comes to their data. Download this episode to hear much more!
[00:01:41] What is Privacy by Design?
[00:02:59] Emilie has more of a social design strategy background, so she tells us the project she worked on with Winfried through eHealth applications, and how Privacy by Design should be approached and the importance of understanding the different perspectives on privacy.
[00:07:27] Richard wonders if they’ve implemented Privacy by Design as a theoretical framework for designing something in any open source projects or if they’ve talked to open source projects and how they should implement this.
[00:08:53] Emilie explains more about the project they worked on called, Better Together (Samen Beter in Dutch).
[00:10:05] As part of this open standard that they’ve built for privacy by design, we find out how they made sure that they took into account all the different definitions of privacy.
[00:12:17] Emilie and Winfried highlight how they tested some concepts with end users who don’t use eHealth but could envision a scenario in the future where they would be using eHealth, and they explain a game they developed called, The Privacy Game.
[00:17:15] Earlier, they mentioned this is an open standard they’re making, and we hear if someone wants to build an app, how they can implement Privacy by Design as a standard into their process.
[00:21:24] Richard wonders if he can see the standard for Privacy by Design and how he can apply it directly whenever he’s working, and Emily tells us there’s a new standard for Privacy by Design, currently in the draft stage.
[00:26:52] In Emilie and Winfried’s work with implementing Privacy by Design, developing a standard on it, and talking to users, we learn what work they had to do to convince other people in their organization that it’s a good idea, and they share some ideas on how other designers do that.
[00:29:23] Winfried and Emilie gave a talk at FOSDEM, and we hear if they had any special notes about reaching out to open source designers or developers about how they could implement these principles into their work.
[00:31:05] Find out where you can learn more about Privacy by Design and where to follow Winfried and Emilie on the web.
[00:29:50] “It may be even easier for open source developers to work through the methodology because a lot of projects have clear stated principles as guidelines for what commits to accept or not.”
[00:30:18] “When it’s open source, it’s much easier to show what you’re doing in reality is what you show also, that it aligns.”
Special Guests: Emilie Tromp and Winfried Tilanus.
Mogashni Naidoo
Django Skorupa
Hello and welcome to Sustain Open Source Design, a podcast where we discuss the intersections between design, open source, and what it takes to sustain communities that interact with both. Today, Django is hosting, and he’s excited to talk to his guest, Mogashni Naidoo, who’s a UX Researcher working in open source Bitcoin products and applications. The conversation covers her journey from volunteering in the Bitcoin community to becoming a UX research evangelist. Mo discusses her work on Lightning Wallet, and she shares her passion for the Bitcoin Industry’s ethos of financial freedom and openness. She also emphasizes her work ethic of working in public, she shares her approach to working in the open, which involves sharing her work very openly in the Slack community and posting a blog once a week. We’ll also here the importance of building products that empower users and make them feel confident and educated in their actions. Download this episode to hear more!
[00:01:08] Mo tells us what she does as a UX research evangelist within the Bitcoin design community, and what it looks like to be advocating user research in this field.
[00:03:10] Django brings up a project called Lightning Wallet and asks Mo what this project looked like before she came on board and how hit looks now.
[00:06:32] We hear about the ethos and the sensibilities Mo took in when she started this work.
[00:09:26] If you’re listening right now and want to learn about Bitcoin, how to speak in this field, and how to listen in this field, Mo tells us how you can.
[00:13:15] When talking about fostering new growth and sustaining open source, what’s the role of the public design mentor?
[00:19:13] Mo tells us about a Bitcoin UX Research toolkit she’s building, and how it’s taught her a lot about working out in the open and working in public.
[00:21:29] When talking about empowerment in the idea of physical independence, Django wonders how we can make people feel better when they’re using a lightning wallet or Bitcoin products.
[00:26:46] Find out where you follow Mo on the web.
Special Guest: Mogashni Naidoo.
Daniel Burka
Memo Esparza | Django Skorupa
Hello and welcome to Sustain Open Source Design! The podcast where we talk about sustaining open source with design. Learn how we, as designers, interface with open source in a sustainable way, how we integrate into different communities, and how we as coders, work with other designers. Today, we have an amazing guest joining us, Daniel Burka, who’s a product manager and designer who focuses on solving complex global health problems in simple ways. Currently, he’s the director of product and design at Resolve to Save Lives, where he leads the open source project, Simple. Simple is used by thousands of hospitals in India, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, and Ethiopia to manage over 3.2 million patients with hypertension and diabetes. He’s also on the board of Laboratoria, and Founded the open source project Health icons, to provide free icons to healthcare projects around the world. Daniel started his career with a design agency but switched his focus towards global health. We’ll hear all the cool things he’s doing with the Simple project, he details how design really matters in public health projects, and how he thinks of design. We end with an extraordinary sentiment from Daniel saying, “Design is a big tent, and we need to welcome more people into that tent.” Find out why he said this and much more. Press download now!
[00:01:30] Daniel tells us what he’s currently doing right now with the Simple project.
[00:02:48] Since Daniel is shifting his focus towards healthcare, we hear how that happened.
[00:06:21] How did Daniel go about integrating the field with the design aspect when he was approaching a problem like Simple?
[00:12:12] We hear about the intersection and how the intersection functions between paper and digital.
[00:13:55] How can you be a designer without relying so much of your work on technology?
[00:17:22] Django shines some light on the idea of the service of a designer, and he asks Daniel to tell us what the majority of his design process involves in his work.
[00:20:06] Memo shares his thoughts on how only a few designers can work on problems that Daniel is working on, and he wonders how we can make working in healthcare more universal and access of the design work more universal.
[00:29:50] Find out where you can follow Daniel on the web.
[00:04:46] “The challenge with venture capital, it’s very cushy, but none of the problems are your problems.”
[00:07:06] “The first thing you notice is that healthcare workers have almost no time.”
[00:10:06] “I was in Switzerland to speak at a conference, and the title of the talk was, “Can Designers Save Lives? Not By Themselves.”
[00:12:19] “Technologists love to think that we should digitize everything. Paper is great!”
[00:15:16] “Another thing that’s really important is to think about who sets the requirements for a system.”
[00:18:08] “A lot of design is talking.”
[00:18:22] “Designers love coming in with solutions, but oftentimes, especially in healthcare, you’re designing for an audience who’s very unlike you.”
[00:18:46] “I like that designers can be shepherds of those kinds of stories and connect the decision makers to healthcare workers who literally work for those decision makers.”
[00:19:09] “One of the superpowers of design is to make potential futures appear real.”
Produced by Richard Littauer
Edited by Paul M. Bahr at Peachtree Sound
Show notes by DeAnn Bahr Peachtree Sound
Special Guest: Daniel Burka.
Seth Hillbrand
Richard Littauer
Hello and welcome to Sustain Open Source Design! The podcast where we talk about sustaining open source with design. Learn how we, as designers, interface with open source in a sustainable way, how we integrate into different communities, and how we as coders, work with other designers. Richard is very excited to have a guest with him since he’s solo today. Joining him is Seth Hillbrand, who’s a Lead Developer at KiCad, which is one of the leading electronic design and automation tools, and he’s the Founder of KiCad Services Corporation. Today, Seth explains what KiCad does, the products they make, how the KiCad project works, and how donations, services, and feature implementations help to fund it. We’ll also learn how KiCad has created ways to donate, interact, and be a part of their community. Download this episode now!
[00:01:10] Seth tells us what he does at KiCad, what KiCad does, and what kind of physical products the designers are making, which are some amazing things.
[00:05:59] How many people and how many developers are using KiCad?
[00:07:42] We heard about the contributors, and now we’ll learn about how the funding works for the open source project itself, and it may surprise you to hear that the bulk of their funding comes through donations, but not in the usual way that people do donations.
[00:13:45] Richard brings up the donate banner at the top of the KiCad page and wonders how Seth is designing this button for donations, and if it’s to make users feel different or to stick around.
[00:20:11] Seth explains how KiCad is not immune to the idea of radical transparency when it comes to showing how their funds are being used, he tells us for the KiCad project how they have different ways of distributing funds, and he how they changed their release model.
[00:33:59] Find out where you can follow Seth and KiCad online.
[00:09:59] “Everyone says you can’t build an open source project on donations, and I want to emphasize that is bunk. That is not a true statement unless you do the donation design wrong.”
[00:18:25] “We have two groups within our larger community. One group is the designers and the engineers who use KiCad to build their boards and projects, and the other group is going to be all the other industries that surround us that benefit from KiCad’s existence and want to have a greater say in how the community develops, because it’s a part of their success for KiCad to be successful.”
[00:21:53] “The hardest thing we have to do in KiCad is pay people to do work.”
Produced by Richard Littauer
Edited by Paul M. Bahr at Peachtree Sound
Show notes by DeAnn Bahr Peachtree Sound
Special Guest: Seth Hillbrand.
Georgia Aitkenhead | Bastian Greshake Tzovaras | Susanna Fantoni
Georgia Bullen | Richard Littauer | Django Skorupa
Hello and welcome to Sustain Open Source Design! The podcast where we talk about sustaining open source with design. Learn how we, as designers, interface with open source in a sustainable way, how we integrate into different communities, and how we as coders, work with other designers. On this episode, our guests are from The Alan Turing Institute in the UK. Today, joining us are Georgia Aitkenhead, Bastian Greshake Tzovaras, and Susanna Fantoni, who are here to talk about an open source project they are working on called, AutSPACEs, which is a co-designed citizen science platform that investigates autism and sensory processing. You’ll learn their backgrounds, why they’re doing this project, and the vast importance in this kind of participatory research, involving people’s voices and views, and letting autistic people lead. While you listen, you can’t help but notice the passion they have for research and how this project is so important to them. Download this episode now to learn more!
[00:01:10] Our guests introduce themselves, tell us their backgrounds, and more about their project, AutSPACEs.
[00:03:38] To help us understand more about the project, Georgia Aitkenhead and Susanna share with us how long the project has been going on and the specific key moments have been for them.
[00:09:56] In their project, Georgia Aitkenhead tells us their process of how they listen to everyone while not burning out with the amount of feedback they get from all the people, and Bastian explains how they are not at that larger scale area yet and only working with a small community of participants.
[00:14:26] A question comes up regarding design choices and governance, and Georgia Bullen wonders how our guests are making it with this project, and how they’re thinking about that plays into the platform itself that they are all working on.
[00:31:20] In thinking about accessibility, Django wonders if they’ve ever considered publishing information on a landing page or to make it accessible to people who might be the most literate for GitHub and technical repositories.
[00:04:22] “There’s often a disparity between research that gets funded and research that autistic people as a group tend to prefer.”
[00:08:17] “A computer algorithm can work out that I’m autistic in less than two minutes, but it took fifteen years for humans to do it.”
[00:08:51] “The whole assessment process is written just for men by men.”
[00:10:21] “Be very deliberate about how you address some of the disbalances and representation that exist and think about the demographics, people, or situations people might be in. That means they might be likely excluded from research.”
[00:27:13] “We have this really vital challenge to address in terms of making sure that the spaces that are open are open genuinely for everybody, not just for people who are already technically confident, neurotypical, or in privileged demographics.”
Special Guests: Bastian Greshake Tzovaras, Georgia Aitkenhead, and Susanna Fantoni.
Marie Nordin
Richard Littauer | Memo Esparza | Django Skorupa
Hello and welcome to Sustain Open Source Design! The podcast where we talk about sustaining open source with design. Learn how we, as designers, interface with open source in a sustainable way, how we integrate into different communities, and how we as coders, work with other designers.
On this episode, we are excited to have joining us Marie Nordin, who’s the Code of Conduct Specialist working out of Red Hat’s Open Source Program Office. She was introduced to FOSS the Fedora Project and Open Source Design through an Outreachy internship, and we’re going to talk more about how useful this internship is at getting people into open source. You’ll hear Marie’s passion for supporting underrepresented people into open source, especially in project management, graphic design, and mentorship, and explains how she utilized the Outreachy program, and shares advice on where to begin if you’re interested in becoming a mentor. We’ll also learn about the Fedora community and how that works for interns and new designers, and she speaks more about the need for project and program management at Fedora. Go ahead and download this episode now!
[00:02:20] We hear Marie’s journey of how she got into open source and how she got involved in Outreachy.
[00:09:06] Marie tells us how she pays it forward by being a mentor to people who may be in a similar spot.
[00:12:39] Marie discusses the interactions she had working at Fedora, the Code of Conduct she implemented at Fedora, what her focus is right now, and what she’s excited about.
[00:16:35] Django brings up rough jobs being very important and taking an intense roll, and Marie talks about putting mental health at the forefront in community care taking and how she’s focusing on this in the future.
[00:20:02] We learn how delegation and prioritizing are key things to have to take care of yourself and the community well-being.
[00:21:02] We hear more about the mentorship process and how Marie utilized the Outreachy program, and she tells us about the Fedora design team mentorship.
[00:23:25] If you’re interested in mentoring people but not sure where to begin, Marie shares some advice on how you can do that.
[00:24:47] Marie explains how the Fedora community works for interns and young designers to get involved, the teams, active designers, and internships they have. Also, we hear about the need for people at Fedora doing project and program management.
[00:32:39] Find out where you can follow Marie online.
[00:16:47] “I just jumped into this community management world not really having a ton of experience with community management. Luckily, I’m empathic and intuitive by nature but that also brings on a lot of emotional weight especially when you’re in a position like this.”
[00:17:23] “You can’t take care of other people without taking care of yourself.”
[00:17:37] “You have to be able to set boundaries, like not getting notifications on your phone.”
[00:18:02] “There’s work-life balance, but if you do something you love, it’s hard to stop. But if you don’t stop, you’re forced to stop.”
[00:23:51] “I’m trying to pass on the mentorship skills to other people. It doesn’t come naturally.”
Fedora Design Team
Matrix/Element Channel: https://matrix.to/#/#design:fedoraproject.org
Gitlab: https://gitlab.com/fedora/design/team
Forum: https://discussion.fedoraproject.org/tag/design
Creative Freedom Summit
Event details: January 17-19th, 2023. The event will be streamed in the Element and on the Peertube channels.
Blog Post: https://communityblog.fedoraproject.org/youre-invited-to-the-creative-freedom-summit-hosted-by-the-fedora-design-team/
Matrix/Element Channel: https://matrix.to/#/#creativefreedom:fedora.im
PeerTube Channel: https://peertube.linuxrocks.online/c/creativefreedom/videos
Open Source Summit EU: Mental Health in Community Caretaking Panel
Sched session: https://osseu2022.sched.com/event/15z6W/panel-discussion-mental-health-in-community-caretaking-monica-ayhens-madon-independent-karen-hixson-karen-hixson-lpc-ruth-ikegah-chaoss-amy-marrich-red-hat
Community Caretaking Linktree: https://linktr.ee/community_caretaking
Credit to: Monica Ahyens-Madon, Ruth Ikegah, Amy Marrich, Leslie Hawthorne, Karen Hixson
Special Guest: Marie Nordin.
Jason van Gumster
Richard Littauer | Victory Brown | Django Skorupa
Hello and welcome to Sustain Open Source Design! The podcast where we talk about sustaining open source with design. Learn how we, as designers, interface with open source in a sustainable way, how we integrate into different communities, and how we as coders, work with other designers. On this episode, Richard, Victory, and Django have a great guest joining them. Today, we have Jason van Gumster, who’s the Blender Consulting Lead at Orange Turbine. He’s also run a small animation studio, written Blender For Dummies, co-authored GIMP Bible, and nearly everything he produces are all made using free and open source tools from applications all the way down to his choice of operating system. Jason dives into the Blender community, what it is, and why it holds a special place in his heart. We’ll also learn specific ways open source is necessary to his work, and he shares advice for new designers who have little experience and are trying to get into open source programs, as well as what he’s most excited about in the design community that’s happening right now. Download this episode now to find out more cool stuff!
[00:02:42] Jason tells us the story of why he produces anti-counterfeiting technology.
[00:03:51] We learn Jason's experience with currency design
[00:04:30] Jason fills our minds with the Blender community and why it holds such a special place in his heart, and he explains how fits into the continuum with the Blender community where there’s designers who are also coders.
[00:08:04] Richard wonders how Jason squares away automating things in the design process while also enabling the creative juices to flow.
[00:10:45] We hear how Jason decides where the monotony ends, where the art begins, and how he’s forgotten how to be bored.
[00:12:19] Jason dives into why open source is so necessary to his work and why it’s necessary that lender be open source.
[00:14:48] Going back to the open source tools Jason uses for creative development, Victory wonders if there are others he’s tried besides Blender.
[00:16:39] We hear some great advice on how to begin the process if you are a designer who hasn’t been using open source programs, you don’t have much experience, and you’re trying to break out of the closed source ecosystem.
[00:18:42] Django wonders what Jason’s response is to the person who hears the word open source and what they really hear is the phrase, “No money.” What would he say to a creative who’s very closed to the idea of open?
[00:19:56] Jason tells us how he helps out the communities for the tools he’s using to go and get his money as an independent designer/worker. He also tells us more about the ASWF that focuses on open source tools that are useful in animation and visual effects.
[00:23:12] We learn about conversations Jason’s had with toolmakers because they’re interested in operability, a workshop he did with Blender, and his thoughts on people in game studios.
[00:27:02] We find out if open source communities naturally retain their talent more than churn just design house.
[00:28:54] What is Jason most excited about in the design community that’s happening right now?
[00:30:06] Find out where you can follow Jason on the web.
[00:03:13] “Currency Designers are actually UI Designers. It’s the oldest user Interface in existence.”
[00:10:50] “On some level, I have forgotten how to be bored. But I recognize monotonous repetition. I describe a lot of things in terms of taste and if it tastes weird to do or tastes annoying to do, or I don’t like the flavor of that behavior, then that’s something that I want to automate away.”
[00:18:57] “You show up, [use OSS], be awesome, and then when someone asks you what you did it with, that’s when you drop the bomb.”
[00:22:02] “Money helps, but really, it’s manpower. A 3D studio has technical people who are capable of doing code and development and there’s no reason why they can’t make changes and push them upstream.”
[00:28:08] “People come for the help, people come for the price, but they stay because they got helped, and they stayed because they were included, and their thoughts were appreciated.”
[00:29:12] “Everything is design, and it permeates though just about everything we do, but that also gives us a bit of hubris.”
Special Guest: Jason van Gumster.