Exactly a month ago I created eZ Community on Slack. For those of you who do not know what is Slack, let’s say it is a modern version of IRC. It got really popular as an internal tool for companies (we at Netgen started using it a while ago). I’ve also noticed that people started to use it for community communication too, so it didn't take me long to create one instance for the eZ community.
It was actually quite simple. Most of the work consisted of inviting all the people I know from the community to join. I did some tweeting and published a short post on share.ez.no and voila! 30 days after more than 120 people joined the group. I also discovered a self-invite hack and deployed it on Heroku (otherwise I would need to invite people manually).
Some will wonder why create one more way of communicating because there are community forums, there is a Google+ group, a LinkedIn group or two, IRC channel, etc., but from my point of view, there is never enough channels. People don't need to be on every channel, they choose what is the appropriate channel for them. Beginners will probably ask a question on the community site because this Slack group is harder to find, and that is ok. I see the Slack group as being of more use to advanced users so they can quickly share tips and tricks. It is faster than going to the classic forums.
In order to offer and share this knowledge with the public, we are thinking of doing a digest on a monthly basis and posting it on the community site. Any ideas in that regard are welcome. After the summer, I will check if there is a potential to form a group that could handle this and similar tasks, so it doesn't end up entirely on my shoulders :)
Anyway, join us on the Slack if you are working with eZ and have some questions or comments. We have specialized channels (besides the default #general and #random):
- #ezplatform, everything related to pure new stack
- #ezpublish5, about version 5 and hybrid setups
- #ezlegacy, about old stack
- #symfony, framework specific
- #events, announcements and similar
New suggestions are always welcome.
There is also an option to create an ad hoc private group where you can discuss certain topics without bothering others. We have such group for all the Summer Camp speakers so that we can prepare for the workshops.
Check it out and let me know what you think :)