In November 2012 we created the new Drupal.org content project - an area specifically for the content issues. The project covers marketplace listing, case study promotion, and front page promotion requests; issues related to Drupal Planet and other non-documentation content on Drupal.org, such as forums, landing pages etc. Most of them were previously in the Webmasters queue and were moved to the new Content project.
In 2012, the Drupal Association began an initiative to engage with Drupal camp organizers to create a channel of communication and also promotion of DA programs that help foster and support the Drupal community. This year, the DA connected with organizers around the world to spread the word about grants, scholarships, DrupalCons, Global Training Days, and DA membership as far as possible. Even the big Drupal balloon attended some sessions at DrupalCamp Atlanta this fall.
We plan to continue this collaboration and do even more for camp organizers in the coming year and I want to share some resources with you that are available right now for anyone who wants to organize a Drupal Camp. In addition, check out this list of 2012 camp sessions and slides. By compiling these links for you, I hope it helps you learn more about our active worldwide Drupal community and also see what other camps are doing.
In 2009, the Drupal Community was pleasantly surprised when http://whitehouse.gov moved to the Drupal platform. Since then, Drupal has made major inroads in the U.S. federal government. Last week they took another step forward in our community by releasing their code on Drupal.org.
We are pleased to tell you that the Drupal Association’s Board of Directors announced today that it has appointed Holly Ross as the new Executive Director to lead the Association into it’s next phase of growth. Holly will assume her role starting February 1, 2013.
Holly joins the DA after 10 years at NTEN, the Nonprofit Technology Network, which works to help nonprofits use technology to create the change they want to see in the world. NTEN has a similar structure to the DA with a strong community of technologies, which she helped grow from just a handful of individuals to over 60,000 people. NTEN also holds an annual conference, and pulls together resources to support the technology needs of nonprofits around the country.
Past month(s) we all have been very busy working on Drupal 7 upgrade of our website. Below are latest updates on the project status from Joel ‘Senpai’ Farris.
It's been six months since we started the Drupal.org D7 Upgrade Initiative, and in that time, we've made a lot of progress, improved a bunch of things about the site, and blown by three deadlines, the last of which was the "functionally complete" deadline of Oct 25th, 2012 (last Thursday). It is with sadness and hope that I tell you that we have not yet fully completed the upgrade; Since we didn't make this goal, we cannot schedule a re-launch of drupal.org at this time.
Getting things off the ground in any open source community is a challenge. Beyond motivation, you need some resources to help get things moving with outreach and educational programs. To help you overcome some of the barriers, the Drupal Association has been piloting the Community Cultivation Grant program, drawing on the same awesome attitude that has earned the Drupal Community its community-oriented reputation within the open source universe.
Our second community election process to choose two at-large Directors for the board of the Drupal Association concluded with the successful election of Morten Birch Heide-Jørgensen (mortendk) of Denmark and Pedro Cambra (pcambra) of Spain. The result was ratified today by the Drupal Association board. Morten and Pedro's terms begin on 1st November 2012. Steve Purkiss and Donna Benjamin will continue to sit on the board until our terms expire in February 2013.
