[Xapian-discuss] Writing a Quick Start Guide to Xapian

[Olly Betts]

Google are holding a GSoC "Doc Camp" this year the week before the
annual mentor summit - the dates for Doc Camp are 17-21 October, and the
location is Google HQ in Mountain View, California, USA.

A major part of this will be several Book Sprints for writing Quick
Start guides for specific organisations taking part in GSoC.  They're
currently inviting proposals, and I'd like to submit one.  I took part
in a book sprint of this format in 2009, and have been wanting to hold
one to do a "Xapian book" ever since.  The issue has been how to get
enough people together in one place, and this seems a good opportunity,
particularly as a Quick Start guide would fix one of the weaker aspects
of the current docs.

Details are at the URL below, but a key thing to note is that
participation is open to *ANYONE*, not only those involved as mentors
this year.  Google are offering to pay for food and accommodation costs,
and you can also apply for some or all of your travel costs.  It's right
before the mentor summit, so if you're attending that (for Xapian or
another org) transport costs aren't an issue anyway.  The URL is:

https://sites.google.com/site/docsprintsummit/home

As part of the proposal, we can nominate up to 5 people.  It would be
good to have a range of familiarity with Xapian - we clearly need there
to be at least one person with plenty of Xapian experience in the team
to ensure the content is accurate, but we also really need some people
who are fairly new to Xapian and are better able to put themselves in
the shoes of the people who most need such a book.

We need to submit a proposal before 5th August, so we have a week and a
bit.  So if you can be available that week and are interested, or would
just like to know more, please get in touch.

Cheers,
    Olly