Proposal #6: Convert Ignite Baltimore speaker management site into general purpose app

[subelsky]

We use a simple Rails app to manage speaking proposals for Ignite Baltimore. The app is very specific to Baltimore and only has a minimal feature set, and has a lot of room to grow.

Making this app configurable and usable by any Ignite organization around the world would be the perfect-sized challenge for a new Rails programmer, as it would entail becoming familiar with every part of the web stack, and you'd get personal 1-on-1 help from me. I've built many Rails apps and have been professionally working with Ruby for over seven years.

Here's some of the stuff you would be doing:

• Making the app very configurable and easy-to-deploy on Heroku. We could even talk about making it a multi-tenant app so more than one city could use the exact same installation.
• Add proposal evaluation and voting (so we don't have to send the data out of the app to something like surveymonkey)
• Adding rich reporting capabilities, so it becomes easy to select speakers, make a program, and publish the list of speakers.
• Improve email notifications
• Add sponsor management features (sponsors can upload their logos, specify what URLs to link to)
• Add the ability to automatically generate an Ignite show compilation of all speaker slides into one single Keynote file (requires some pretty fun PDF and XML manipulation)
• Improving the design of the app which is currently based on bootstrap, and very bare -bones

[svenfuchs]

Awesome, @subelsky! This sounds like a fantastic proposal.

Is there anything so specific about Ignite conferences that the app couldn't be used by other conferences? Or would this be suited for anyone else, too?

What would you think about calling out to other conferences and see if they have open sources their own apps? Maybe one could grab a feature or two, or just look at them for inspiration?

[subelsky]

oh yeah it could definitely be generalized into a speaker management app. I've got all of the basics in there

[skade]

By the way, we have open sourced a CFP app (forked from the wroclove.rb CFP app):

https://github.com/eurucamp/call4papers

It handles multiple conferences and manages speaker profiles and can be internationalized. It doesn't do anything beyond the CFP though, but it might be interesting in your context.

[ghost]

@subelsky I am new to Ruby.So what you think? Will I be able to work on this proposal for the upcoming RGSoC?

[subelsky]

@NitikaAgarwal I hope so! don't know if it will get picked

[aishbuilds]

@subelsky my pair (Avani) and me would like to work on this project. We have a coach who can help us. It would be great if you could mentor us!

[subelsky]

would be glad to help. Let me know what the next steps are.

[ghost]

@subelsky
Hi,
I and my pair @Disha-Shah would love to work on this project but we don't have a coach yet. It would be highly appreciable if you could act as our coach/mentor. Or for that matter anyone who wants to coach/mentor us on this proposal is most welcome!

[subelsky]

let's do it! we can follow up on email, just sent you a few ideas