- #pull [[social coop tech group]]
- [[2022-05-13]]
	- Attending:
		- [[akshay]]
		- [[neil]]
		- [[noah]] == [[redoak]]
		- [[eduardo]] == [[flancian]]
		- [[nick]] == [[nick sellen]]
		- [[will]] == [[datatitian]]
	- round the table catching up :)
		- [[neil]] first time in one of the tech group meetings!
			- post work on a Friday -- nice to be here!
		- [[noah]] happy the group seems to be "revived"
		- [[akshay]] like a Saturday for me due to 80% time :)
			- [[neil]] +1 here, but not off today
			- been doing it for a year
		- [[[noah]]] freelance, working four days a week
			- Fridays are [[disco coop]] / passion projects
			- Let's meet in [[immers space]] ;)
		- [[nick]] here :)
	- let's seed a potential agenda?
		- [[noah]] what was discussed at the last meeting?
			- https://anagora.org/social-coop-tech-group -> https://www.loomio.org/d/UwAeiBgE/tech-meeting-minutes
		- [[nick]] handing over the keys, how to be able to disengage before the next meeting
			- if we have root in social.coop, what else do we need to get full access to all resources?
			- [[nick]] there's also the password repository, which is based on gpg keys
			- [[noah]] adding people to the pass repo is maybe the one thing where we surely need nick the most
			- [[nick]] can add Eduardo to the pass repo
				- it requires re-encrypting with all keys
				- need to find the notes on how to do this
				- [[akshay]] is it worth storing in the repo itself how to do this?
				- +1
			- we are pretty confident all credentials are in the pass repo, at least in the past 2-3y everything has been there
			- there is a lingering domain registration issue
				- we need to look up the name of the person responsible
				- [[nick]] enric duran (sp?)
				- there was discussion of transferring
				- -> let's find the loomio thread, there was a proposal for where to transfer to https://www.loomio.org/d/Jf5Wi4Ph/domain-expired-social-coop-down
				- [[noah]] it would ideally be transferred to a collective entity?
				- probably want to discuss with other working groups
			- [[akshay]] do we keep track of what we have credentials for?
				- [[noah]] no separate source except for the pass repo
				- in short:
					- admin account in the instance
					- hetzner
					- digital ocean for static storage
					- login for email aliases which is required for git access
			- we could agree on a time slot and then do some coworking on the pass repo
				- next week 2h earlier? 4pm London
			- [[nick]] make sure you have an email alias asap so you can access the git repo so you can do, well, other stuff :)
				- noah, nick, david have access
		- welcome GiacomoSansoni!
			- newbie here!
			- don't know much about tech (yet)
			- willing to learn
		- [flancian] focus areas / learning exercises
			- mastodon instance (currently on docker)
				- who does moderation?
				- there is a moderation group, [[community working group]] does it
				- [[neil]] is there anything that the tech working group does with registrations?
				- [[noah]] the wiki runs alongside the mastodon deployment and supports the process
				- [flancian] why do we do it this way instead of letting people join (with approval) and then following up?
				- [[noah]] there's the requirement of joining the open collective first, but there is potential for streamlining as long as we have energy in driving :)
				- [flancian] interested, would like to try to bring this up as a possible improvement -- in particular if we want to make it easier to onboard/grow more
				- [[neil]] there was discussion about improving the process in the strategy session
				- [[nick]] there's only one field in registration and that was considered a blocker
				- [[akshay]] it seems like mastodon in general could benefit from this
					- +1
			- backups and restores
				- secondary server?
				- [[nick]] there was some effort previously some time ago (https://git.coop/social.coop/tech/ansible/-/merge_requests/12 - although it's more about an instance for testing upgrades, but same principle for restores)
				- one of the complications was to try to bring up a new instance which isn't federating, which could mess up the fediverse
				- there's a merge request in git
				- nicks didn't reach agreement
				- wu lee (sp?)
			- new services
				- has this been brought up?
				- [[noah]] one of the old meeting minutes has ideas on this front: https://www.loomio.org/d/UwAeiBgE/tech-meeting-minutes/35
				- the obstacle is procedural + organizational: something that enough people want, are willing to have some workload for them
			- [[akshay]] instance customization
				- is there interest?
				- [[noah]] some people are definitely interested
				- [[noah]] putting together a survey in general would be useful for both gauging this and interest in new services
				- [[akshay]] themes would also be nice
				- [[nick]] there was -some- customization previously but it might have been ripped out to lower maintenance cost
				- [[neil]] in the strategy sessions people mentioned [[hometown]], main feature that was desired seemed to be local only timeline
				- [[noah]] there is some risk associated with the switch, but it shouldn't be a very involved process. [[hometown]] keeps up with mastodon pretty regularly.
				- [[darius]] is active in the fediverse and could maybe help out
				- [[nick]] deployed a hometown instance rencetly, used [[coop cloud]] for it. setting up a parallel second setup might be a good idea. https://coopcloud.tech/
				- [flancian] is there consensus on whether the community wants that?
				- [[neil]] no consensus, just has been brought up a few times
				- [[nick]] as a user, likes the concept but it adds a bit more complexity to the already relatively complex mastodon post visibility options. third party apps don't support it. it works maybe better for technology-engaged communities.
				- [[noah]] has an alt on dads.cool and it's pretty nice, but it makes sense in the context of that server
				- [will/datatitian] it's good for complaining among other coopers :)
		- (breaking here until next time)
			- [flancian] maintenance pending
			- [flancian] engagement with other working groups
				- -> could be related/linked to a solution to gender imbalance/diversity
			- [[neil]] steps for onboarding new tech WG members
				- might be linked to focus areas
			- [flancian] documentation sources of truth, do we have too many? do we share enough with other working groups?
	- checkout round
		- [[GiacomoSansoni]]: on customization, could be just put things to a vote on loomio one by one?
			- +1, this sounds like a good idea
			- send a notification to everybody on the instance requesting a proposal?
		- [[noah]] signing off, nice to see you!
		- [[nick]] glad I joined, climbed out of bed, now need to eat dinner :)
			- enjoyed it more than I thought!
				- [flancian] +1
		- [[neil]] nice to put faces to handles :)
			- +1
			- nice to get a start on how the meeting is run, looking forward to next Friday!
		- [[akshay]] was looking forward to the meeting and enjoyed it, see you next Friday :)
			- this being the second meeting it feels like the start of something
- [[2022-04-08]]
	- Hi all :)
	- Let's try to keep communal notes here?
	- [[nick]] == [[nick sellen]] got involved in social.coop during a crisis long ago
		- saved it from going offline, stabilized for a bit
		- then david and noah came onboard
		- not very active in the instance as of late
		- periodic emergencies
			- certificate renewal
		- trying to empower others to join in, but don't have capacity for being really active again for now
		- in the UK (Bath)
	- side note: [[gender imbalance]] here pretty obvious
		- (what do we do about this?)
	- [[akshay]] been on social.coop for ~1y
		- mostly lurking :)
		- saw the certificate thing happen, thought maybe I can help
		- ops + software development experience
		- based in [[Berlin]], originally from [[India]]
	- [[idmyn]] == David
		- being in the instance for ~4y
		- joined around the same time the nicks rescued the instance
		- based in UK
		- doing some tech bits with [[Noah]] for a while, then dropped off -- mostly here to offer any knowledge that is singly homed in brain :)
		- focus areas:
			- [[wiki]]
			- [[meet.coop]] registration form in the wiki
	- [[flancian]] == [[Eduardo]]
		- living in [[switzerland]]
		- joined a couple of years ago, but not that involved until recently
		- when recent cert issue happened felt rusty but perhaps they could help out
		- SRE recently, linux experience
		- not sure if recent experience is relevant but willing to learn!
	- [[edsu]] == ed summers
		- been around for ~4y
		- use the instance quite a bit, notice when it goes down -- thank you nick for bringing it back every time!
		- is invested so would love to know more, learn
		- software developer background, mostly web. working mainly with libraries (in the organization sense) which have digital repositories and a web presence.
		- love the idea of pitching in to help and this group being a coop.
	- [[datatitian]] == Will
		- joined in 2017
		- got involved with the tech group back then but didn't have a lot of specific experience; now would be interested in trying again
		- working on immers.space which is activitypub based
	- [[nick sellen]] love how the recent disruption has served to get people together, shows how as long as we have fundamental organization we can channel energy in the right direction :)
	- [[nick sellen]] server access
		- there's a thread on loomio to decide who gets server access, we can use that
			- https://www.loomio.org/d/jrbG5tue/server-access
		- we'd vote people in for access and then people can request assistance/more information as needed
	- [[nick sellen]]
		- love the coworking/colearning model
		- really enjoyed learning about the background of others just now
	- [[flancian]] is there a 'root node' for tech docs/etc.?
		- [[nick sellen]] https://git.coop/social.coop/tech/operations
		- assumes social.coop email addresses, but this can be worked around with aliases (check)
		- we use [[pass]]
	- [[flancian]] I see we have one server -- do we have a backup server? do we have backup+restore processes?
		- [[david]] we have database backups but unclear when they have been tested
		- [[flancian]] what about using this as an exercise in which the "new wave" of admins is tasked with setting up a new server off backups and such?
	- [[akshay]] what's this [[sauce]] repo mentioned?
		- [[nick sellen]] the other nick named it after 'special sauce'
		- in principle it could be all consolidated into ansible
		- [[docker compose]] setup
		- the update process involves touching the sauce repo which then somehow results in updates configs making it to prod
		- [[akshay]] love automation, been doing this for the past few years for employers
	- [[datatitian]] thinking of oncall schedules for the group -- need not be too granular
		- [[flancian]] +1, plus having a secondary/backup would make for a simplified learning experience
		- [[edsu]] would love to join a rotation
		- [[edsu]] the instance feels pretty stable though, it's a challenge when problems only come about too sporadically
	- [[edsu]] perhaps other working groups within the coop might be interested in other tools we could provide for them?
		- [[datatitian]] there's been a long term interest in bridging loomio and mastodon
		- [[edsu]] issue tracker for FRs?
		- [[flancian]] [[git.coop]]?
		- [[akshay]] if access to git.coop is limited, that would be a bit exclusive
		- [[edsu]] loomio might also be a good platform for this
		- [[nick sellen]] love the idea about building bridges -- and the oncall sharing
	- [[edsu]] how did you notice the recent instance problem?
		- [[nick sellen]] I do use it often enough :) also keep up to date with matrix.
	- (wrap up round)
	- [[nick sellen]] happy with this meet, would like to support everyone any way I can
		- next steps: next call next week
		- happy to receive more questions over matrix/mastodon/loomio
	- [[akshay]] already have a git.coop account, would like access to ansible/sauce if possible to see how this works :)
	- [[david]] happy to see new and familiar faces!
		- won't be able to make the other call but will stay reachable and happy to answer questions and assist
	- [[flancian]] thank you for social.coop! happy to meet you all
		- will read docs, think about where to focus
		- please feel free to pull me in if you need work on any particular direction
	- [[edsu]] happy to meet all, would love to learn more about side projects that people have here
		- would like to learn more about mastodon
		- do have a git.coop account already, will take a look -- have used ansible before
		- will tune in next week
	- [[datatitian]] will start coordinating on loomio focusing on the oncall schedule
		- [[flancian]] framadate: https://framadate.org/social-coop-tech-group
			- (this is also on https://anagora.org/social-coop-tech-group, where I keep my notes)
	- [[akshay]] how to join in loomio?
		- (people apply)
	-