Grants talk:Programs/Wikimedia Community Fund/Supporting existing infrastructure and developing new tools for Wikisource

Project coordinator with no Wikisource experience

The project coordinator of this grant proposal has not edited on Wikisource. See global contribution. His highest number of edit iss on English Wikisource which is only 1 edit as of December 5, 2021 and that too was done two and half years before. I am wondering why 3500 $ is to be paid to him for a Wikisource related project who do not have any experience at all on the project. -- Bodhisattwa (talk) 18:23, 5 December 2021 (UTC)

@Bodhisattwa: Greetings, I have experience in coordination, both inside and outside Wikimedia projects. Although it is a Wikisource-related project, I will neither be involved in the development of the technical products nor be in charge of taking any decisions. The major tasks in this role are to carry out works necessary for the technical development like deploying pipelines, managing dependencies, and act as a point of contact in coordinating with communities and developers. All the decisions will be made collectively including all team members. Although I am the grantee for this project, it’s a group effort. So, questions directed to me aren’t appropriate. As already mentioned in the proposal, this project has two independent components which require a person to coordinate within and outside the team, ensure the smooth running of the project besides maintaining necessary reports and project timeline. If required, I can change my role from project coordinator to project assistant. The amount paid to me will be the compensation for the number of hours (i.e 300 hrs) that I will be contributing to the project over a period of eight months. This would include managing finances, coordinating among various stakeholders, writing documentation and other comms around the project. Additionally, I will be responsible for organizing two in-person developer sprints during the project. Thank you. -- Nivas10798 (talk) 14:48, 16 December 2021 (UTC)

Thanks for the reply. As you have confirmed yourself that you never have worked on Wikisource before, I can say that the lack of insight, and institutional memory in Wikisource has led to this proposal. I can explain how. The Wikisource-Wikidata integration module which you have mentioned before, was already created by the French Wikisource community and adapted by the Bengali Wikisource community before the WikiCite grant was approved and the grantee @KCVelaga: just reinvented the wheel by taking the entire Bengali Wikisource lua code and just changing some area needed for index categorisation, that too were a sloppy one. I am really amazed to see this proposal which wants to build a Mediawiki extension for the same purpose. The challenges mentioned are "develop a few more features like categorizing index pages of the book on Wikisource and automatically adding header template information and license template on the main page of the book on Wikisource by using relevant information available on respective Wikidata items." which I assume is already solved many years ago. I find this proposal again reinventing the same wheel and asking for money for something which has already been done by the volunteers. Also, I also find it amusing to not notify any Wikisource communities before esp. French Wikisource and Bengali Wikisource, which has already worked on this before and if they actually needed any Mediawiki extension or not. Considering all of the above mentioned points, personally, I can only  Oppose the grant proposal as of now. Sorry- -- Bodhisattwa (talk) 05:58, 28 December 2021 (UTC)

Feedback by the SAARC Regional Grants Committee

Thank you for the proposal. Upon initial review the committee has asked for further clarification on the following topics. Please note that a member of the Community Resources Team is posting this feedback on behalf of the SAARC Regional Grants Committee. The committee would be happy to meet with the applicant/s if they feel that a discussion will be more fruitful in responding to the feedback. Summary of these discussions will be posted on meta upon the consent of the committee members and applicant/s.

Workflow and dependencies: This proposal appears to completely neglect efforts elsewhere across Wikimedia projects that address the objectives described by the applicants. There are already thorough workflows for connecting Wikisource texts to Wikidata on the Bengali and French Wikisources and the adaptation of these to other Wikisources has not been considered. Similarly it hasn’t been demonstrated that the existing methods of developing category trees on other Wikisources are deficient enough to warrant a separate effort. Additionally there have been promising developments in multimedia transcription on the English Wikisource, and the option of an entirely client-side tool for performing it appears to have been ignored. Similarly there is an omission of already existing works in both integration and video transcription.

Output and Utility of the work: If the application can quantify an approximate amount of codes that will be generated from scratch, the amount of the code / works will be reused or repurposed, it will give more clarity to the scope of the project. Also clarifying the plan to give proper attribution to proper people in case of reusing / repurposing the codes and libraries will be a good idea. Though it is assumed that code of the tools will be released under open license, however it is prudent to declare the licensing policy explicitly will be a good idea.

Engagement and Impact: No commitment to test it with a larger wikisource like English Wikisource is not a positive sign. It would have been better to have engagement with appropriate communities earlier and discuss the idea with them upfront and figure out which community is willing to test and use it. If communities are not favorable to the idea this project might result in a loss of effort and time.

Specific communities that will benefit from these could have been pointed out more directly. It isn’t evident that the contents of this proposal were even announced on any other Wikisources.

The tools in the tool server might need regular maintenance. Hence the project may be low on sustainability.

It seems that USD10,000 has been spent towards Wikisource-Wikidata integration in 2020-21. What is different in this project? What has not been achieved in the previous project to fund this idea?

Resources and Budget: Remuneration of developers highly depends on their skill sets and experiences. Remunerations of the developers can be justified by declaring the skill set and experience that the proposed developer has the skill set that is required in case of contributing to this project. Similarly hiring for other positions should also be a need based evaluation of skills. The figures given for the remuneration for the project coordinator seems on the highside. What is the role of the project coordinator in this on a day to day basis? The project coordinator has made a meagre contribution in Wikisource to have a working knowledge of the Wikisource. Maybe the WMF staff who are advising can coordinate the project? Instead of an additional paid coordinator?

Similar efforts on at least the Wikidata-Wikisource integration front have proceeded with good results without the need for injecting funds.Could this grant not have been requested by and on behalf of the three developers alone, rather than by the others listed under ‘the team needed to implement it’?

Is the role of WMF employees roped in as mentors to provide virtual support or on site support? If the role of WMF employees involves travel & stay at the site will the cost be reimbursed by WMF or by the grantee. Is the mentor role of WMF employees a part of their work? Or additional assignment? Its expenses with respect to WMF employees in the grant should be clear to avoid COI.

On behalf of the SAARC Regional Grants Committee THasan (WMF) (talk) 15:01, 23 December 2021 (UTC)

Withdrawal of proposed grant application

@THasan (WMF): Greetings, After going through the feedback provided by the SAARC Regional Grants Committee, we would like to revisit our grant application. We are withdrawing our application from the current community fund round. Thank you. Regards -- Nivas10798 (talk) 07:19, 6 January 2022 (UTC)

Note on feedback and review

Thanks to the SAARC Regional Committee for the decision. In conjunction with this decision, I wanted to remind all participants here that the Community Resources team has specific expectations regarding discussion about proposals in this space.

In the Community Resources team's behavioral expectations for proposals and grant discussions, anyone with concerns about a proposal is welcome to express them in a constructive and supportive manner. However, to the extent that feedback is excessive, contains personalized or disparaging remarks about the applicant or their organization, or if the concerns are expressed in an hostile or punitive manner, they may be removed from the discussion page partially or entirely. The goal of discussion is to build shared understanding and work together with applicants to improve their proposal. It is not to engage in discussion that is confrontational or aggressive, even when there are genuine concerns. Relatedly, participants should follow the Universal Code of Conduct, which contains the minimum level standards for communications and behavior on Wikimedia projects generally. With thanks,THasan (WMF) (talk) 11:02, 14 March 2022 (UTC)