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Program management for open source projects

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2022-10-19

There is no good time for a meeting, only the time you pick

Scheduling a meeting is the most difficult task placed before a program manager. Here’s how you can find a time when all the times are bad.

Categories Posts
2022-10-12

Why Are There So Many Competing Open Source Projects?

Why do you have so many choices? Explore the reasons, drawbacks, and benefits of competing open source projects.

Categories Posts
2022-10-07

Oh no! The community is growing! (InvenioRDM meeting)

The InvenioRDM community invited me to speak at their 2022 Partner Meeting. Abstract: A growing open source community is a blessing and a curse. When your user base grows, you need to grow your contributor community to keep up. How do you grow your contributors in a sustainable way? Part of it requires building up processes to make the work...

Categories Talks
2022-09-14

Adding accountability in open source

When everyone is responsible, no one is. That’s why even democratic projects need to make someone accountable for important tasks.

Categories Posts
2022-09-07

Three ways to assign people in Taskjuggler

How can you assign someone to a task in a Taskjuggler project? There are three different approaches that you can choose from.

Categories Posts
2022-09-01

Who are you excluding with your default language?

Picking a single language gives you that common basis for communicating. But who do you exclude when you pick that language?

Categories Posts
2022-08-08

Using WhenIsGood to schedule meetings

I don’t want to call these “best practices”, but these are my practices for using WhenIsGood to schedule a meeting.

Categories Resources
2022-08-04

Why program management matters in open source

In my latest article for Opensource.com, I explain how program managers help combat the exponential increase in communication channels.

Categories Posts
2022-07-29

Your open source community needs a program manager

My latest article for The Pragmatic Programmers explains why your community needs a program manager and how to find one.

Categories Posts
2022-07-28

Exploring our bugs, part 2! (Nest With Fedora)

At Nest With Fedora, I took an updated look at stats from years of Fedora Linux bug reports. Abstract: This talk picks up where last year’s “Exploring our bugs” talk left off. It updates stats to include F33 and F34 bugs. But it also adds new dimensions to talk about process changes: how have our blocker and freeze exception bugs...

Categories Talks

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About This Site

Learn how to get your ducks in a row, your cats herded, or any other animal metaphor you can think of.

2025 trends

Hand-drawn graphs on a sheet of white paper sitting on a desk.
Read my 2025 open source trends predictions.

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Cover of the book Program Management for Open Source Projects

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Upcoming talks

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Latest posts

  • It’s okay to be partial to your work2025-05-28
  • Growing your project means doing less coding2025-05-21
  • Adding pre-report bug discussion2025-05-14
  • Use reserved domains and IPs in examples2025-05-07

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