[Bigbang-dev] BigBang Accessibility

[Niels ten Oever]

Hi Seb,


On 31-01-2023 11:46, Sebastian Benthall wrote:
> Hello,
> 
> I wanted to address the accessibility project in a separate thread....
> 
> Niels, you've pointed out the following items for the hackathon:
> 
>     - Get the dashboard working
> 
>     - Have a development pipeline and documentation of the dashboard (in a similar manner to BigBang) to foster its future development
> 
> 
> To some extent, this is just about elbow grease. And my elbows are in!
>

Same here - I feel we are very close to have a project that is usable the people we intended it for.

  
> But speaking of norms, this does raise some questions about development process of the dashboard vs. BigBang itself.
> 
> One thing that has come up with the dashboard project is that it has dramatically changed the "user story" around how BigBang is used. We used to essentially make every user try to do the steep onramp towards hacking on BigBang itself. This is not "accessible", and now we are committing to proper software packaging.

Exactly, I think our initial approach was: if we use Jupyter notebooks, we get people to understand coding/technology/infrastructure while analyzing how code/technology/infrastructure is produced. Whereas that was beautifully meta, it only worked to a certain extend. We found some great users (Corinne, Riccardo, other projects that now use BigBang), but way more people are interested in it that somehow cannot BigBang to work, or simply find the time investment to high or too fiddly. So to reach the intended researchers, we're now moving a way from Jupyter notebooks to a web environment.

> 
> This entails a firmer distinction between BigBang 'users' and BigBang 'developers'. Different roles with different needs.
> 
> I think this is all a very good change! But it is better to be conscious of it, as it involves a change of norms.
> 

Haha yes. I think there is a risk that with the dashboard we don't document as clearly and thorougly as we've done with BigBang, but that would also hamper its future maintenance and development and general sustainability. That is why I think it is very important we also package and document the dashboard properly.

>     - Improve the usability of the dashboard
> 
> 
> The dashboard is for the users, and so usability is paramount.
> But who are the users? Can we recruit some at the hackathon to test the dashboard, see what works for them?
> 

Exactly for this reason Juliana is coming to the hackathon - and for this I am also planning to talk to the Tools Team and Greg Wood of ISOC who have a very good understanding of people who use the IETF website.


>     - Select more specific analyses for the dashboard (find them in existing notebooks, or write new notebooks)
>     - Talk to IETF leadership about relevant metrics
> 
> 
> I suppose this is where I'm most interested in the direction of BigBang.
> I don't think the current 'examples notebooks' are particularly 'usable'.
> They are really to demonstrate library functionality.
> 
> What are the users interested in using BigBang for?
> 

AFAIK users want to understand three things:

1. Who is involved and how (affiliation, process, contestations, nationality)
2. What is developed (technology)
3. What are trends (combination of one and two)

>     - Talk to Tools team about integration and exchange
> 
> 
> I don't know what this means.
> 

These are the people that currently manage the datatracker and produce many of the metrics.

>     I might also develop a some userstories for answering particular questions and using the dashboard.
> 
> 
> I think this is actually essential. Please do this!
> 

Will do :)

> There is a bit of a tension between open source software development norms and 'agile' product development norms. That tension is precisely due to this developer/user split in the latter case. A disciplined pipeline from user story to specification to implementation in product development (with many iterative refinements along the way) could be good for BigBang. And it sounds like future funding may depend on success with users.
> 

We can discuss this further - I don't think funding depends on that. What I am very curious about is how we can entice developers to work on this, and ensure this happens in a structured and sustainable manner.

Cheers,

Niels

> - Seb

-- 
Niels ten Oever, PhD
Postdoctoral Researcher - Media Studies Department - University of Amsterdam
Affiliated Faculty - Digital Democracy Institute - Simon Fraser University
Non-Resident Fellow 2022-2023 - Center for Democracy & Technology
Associated Scholar - Centro de Tecnologia e Sociedade - Fundação Getúlio Vargas
Research Fellow - Centre for Internet and Human Rights - European University Viadrina

Vice chair - Global Internet Governance Academic Network (GigaNet)

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