In STEM, it is not unusual for communities to form around the development, maintenance, and evolution of open source software tools that are used in scientific research. In these cases, community members regularly use the versioning platform GitHub to collaborate. Many of the features of GitHub (including user profiles, the ability to create and comment on content, etc.), combined with the fact that it is a platform with which many scientists are familiar, make it an increasingly popular community engagement tool.
On this page, you can find resources, blog posts, and other materials related to managing communities on GitHub. In some cases, these can be applied to community management on other online platforms.
COMING SOON: We recently launched Birdaro – a project to support open source software (OSS) projects as they consider scaling and plans for long term sustainability, thanks to funding from the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative. As the Birdaro project progresses, we will be creating additional resources to support community engagement in open source. If you are working with open source communities, we encourage you to sign up for the Birdaro mailing list, and/or reach out to info@birdaro.org to explore opportunities for collaboration.
Using GitHub to support community management
Following a series of Tools Trials in 2023 (see below for more information), we released a collection of resources related to building community on GitHub.
An overview of GitHub
CSCCE Tech Tip Sheet: Using GitHub for community management
by Katie Pratt, Alex Kalderimis, Yanina Bellini Saibene, Danny Garside, Julia Koehler Leman, Maneesha Sane, Anne Lee Steele, Sanket Verma, Emily Lescak, Alycia Crall, and Lou Woodley
In this tip sheet, we’ve curated some basic information about GitHub and how you can get started on the platform as a scientific community manager.
Community management in GitHub: Case studies
CSCCE Tech Case Study: Using GitHub to manage session proposals for CarpentryCon
by Katie Pratt, Emily Lescak, Maneesha Sane, Alycia Crall, and Lou Woodley
In this case study, we summarize how The Carpentries uses GitHub to organize their flagship conference, CarpentryCon.
CSCCE Tech Case Study: Using GitHub to plan community calls for rOpenSci
by Yanina Bellini Saibene, Katie Pratt, Emily Lescak, Alycia Crall, and Lou Woodley
In this case study, we summarize how rOpenSci uses GitHub to organize their community calls. This is a very similar case study to the way The Carpentries uses GitHub to crowdsource and manage session proposals for their conference, CarpentryCon.
CSCCE Tech Case Study: Using GitHub to maintain a static website (CarpentryCon) or blog (Data Umbrella)
by Reshama Shaikh, Katie Pratt, Maneesha Sane, Emily Lescak, Alycia Crall, and Lou Woodley
In this case study, we summarize how two organizations, The Carpentries and Data Umbrella, make use of GitHub as a platform to host website materials on which their members can collaborate.
CSCCE Tech Case Study: Using GitHub teams to manage contributor access to Rosetta
by Julia Koehler Leman, Katie Pratt, Emily Lescak, Alycia Crall, and Lou Woodley
In this case study, we summarize how the Rosetta project uses GitHub teams to manage contributions to their open-source code base.
CSCCE Tech Case Study: Using Read the Docs to collaboratively create documentation in GitHub for Zarr
by Sanket Verma, Katie Pratt, Emily Lescak, Alycia Crall, and Lou Woodley
In this case study, we summarize how the Zarr community uses GitHub and Read the Docs to create documentation.
CSCCE Tech Case Study: Using bots in GitHub to support The Turing Way community
by Danny Garside, Anne Lee Steele, Katie Pratt, Emily Lescak, Alycia Crall, and Lou Woodley
In this case study, we summarize three ways that The Turing Way makes use of bots to automate actions in GitHub.
Please refer to the “Citation and Reuse” section of each resource for guidance on how to acknowledge it, or reach out to info@cscce.org with any questions.
Related blog posts
- New resources for community managers using GitHub to engage their members – this blog post describes the creation of a new suite of resources for community managers using (or interested in adopting) GitHub as a community platform
- Announcing Birdaro – a new project to support scientific open source projects as they scale – find out more about the Birdaro project and how we will be working to support emerging leaders as they work to scale and sustain scientific open source software projects
Tools Trials
In 2023, we hosted a series of community Tools Trials that focused on online platforms and tools that can be used to support open source communities. After each trial, we wrote a recap of the session for the CSCCE blog, and shared recordings of individual presentations on YouTube.
Blog posts
- Investigating open-source community platforms – CSCCE Tools Trials return! – find out more about this series of Tools Trials and why we hosted them
- CSCCE Open-Source Tools Trial 1 Recap: Using GitHub to facilitate community activities – in the first trial of the series, Yanina Bellini Saibene describes rOpenSci’s process for creating community calls; Reshama Shaikh explains Data Umbrella’s community blog; and Danny Garside and Anne Lee Steele talk about the use of bots in supporting community engagement at The Turing Way
- CSCCE Open-Source Tools Trial 2 Recap: Using GitHub and HedgeDoc to organize and support community events – Maneesha Sane and Toby Hodges share how they use various tools in the organization of CarpentryCon and other community activities for The Carpentries
- CSCCE Open-Source Tools Trial 3 Recap: OpenReview – Andrew McCallum and Melisa Bok explain OpenReview and it’s various applications for open peer review of conference abstracts, grant proposals, and more
- CSCCE Open-Source Tools Trial 4 Recap: GitHub and Bitergia to support research and developer communities – Julia Koehler Leman explains GitHub teams; Sanket Verma shares how he uses Read the Docs; Paul Nagy and Georg Link describe the analytics platform Bitergia
Presentation recordings
Watch each of the presentations in the series!
rOpenSci’s community calls
Data Umbrella’s community blog
GitHub for organizing CarpentryCon
Using HedgeDoc at The Carpentries
The Turing Way – GitHub bots
Using Bitergia to track ENGAGEMENT
GitHub teams at Rosetta