{"id":1625,"date":"2011-08-03T13:20:39","date_gmt":"2011-08-03T17:20:39","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/cmubuggy.org\/news\/?p=1625"},"modified":"2011-08-04T16:41:59","modified_gmt":"2011-08-04T20:41:59","slug":"new-year-new-ideas-your-help-wanted","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cmubuggy.org\/news\/2011\/08\/new-year-new-ideas-your-help-wanted\/","title":{"rendered":"A new year, new ideas; your help wanted"},"content":{"rendered":"

I know I don’t want to admit it, but the reality is that the end of summer is in sight, and the Buggy Alumni Association wants to be ready for another big year (our 4th!). \u00a0After the buzz from raceday died down, we all took a healthy break from buggy madness, but a few things have been coming together on those rainy days. \u00a0The theme of these projects is that we are hoping to get more of our members actively involved this year making the BAA and cmubuggy.org better and better.<\/p>\n

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Buggy Orientation Event<\/h4>\n

For the second year, current students will be holding a multi-org, non-partisan introduction to buggy for the incoming class near the end of orientation. \u00a0This is exactly the kind of thing that we want to be happening on campus, so we want to support it any way we can. \u00a0Right now the agenda includes buggies on display, an intro talk explaining the sport and basic terms, and an outdoors demo session. \u00a0Want to help pull the next generation into buggy? \u00a0Help is needed advertising the event, setting things up, and talking with interested freshmen, etc. \u00a0Current students are especially important to have involved. Contact Ben Matzke (ben.matzke@gmail.com) if you want to help out. \u00a0Details:<\/p>\n

Saturday, August 27th
\n3:30 – 4:30 @ UC Connan : basic Q&A
\n5-6 @ CFA Parking lot \/ base of Hill 1: rolling buggy demos<\/p>\n

BAA Project Zone<\/h4>\n


\n\"\"<\/a>The committee here at headquarters has talked a lot about what we can accomplish for buggy and how best to harness everyone’s energy and resources to make it happen. \u00a0One concept is that we should be more direct and democratic about choosing projects and spending money on them. \u00a0We think it would also be more satisfying to our members if it was clear how their contributions translated directly into cool projects.<\/p>\n

The vision was to have a section on the website where people could propose ideas, vote for the ones they like the most, and coordinate efforts to make it happen. \u00a0Instead of waiting until we could build a whole new part of the website, we’re going to experiment with using reddit which already does those things well. \u00a0If you’re not familiar with reddit, it’s a very popular social media website that also enables anyone to create sub-communities. \u00a0We’ve done that, and you can now visit r.cmubuggy.org<\/a> \u00a0(or reddit.com\/r\/cmubuggy<\/a>) and participate. \u00a0You’ll have to login or register a reddit account, but that is easy to do.<\/p>\n

Once you get there, submit ideas for projects you think the BAA should pursue, vote up or down on other ideas, and help us and each other work out the logistics for how we can move from ideas to action.<\/p>\n

The open source cmubuggy.org<\/h4>\n

\"\"<\/a>This website is awesome, but I’ll admit it has had its moments of weakness and still doesn’t have half of the super cool features we’ve talked about. \u00a0From now on, anyone is free to change that. \u00a0I’ve committed the code to github<\/a>, and I welcome anyone with some php skills to have at it. \u00a0Don’t have web development skills? \u00a0github also gives us a simple bug tracker<\/a> that will hopefully streamline the process of fixing what is broken. \u00a0Need some clarification as you dig in? \u00a0Just let me know, I’m happy to enable.<\/p>\n

the Reference section<\/h4>\n

Our new reference section got off to a great start in April and May with 10 or more active contributors<\/a> making a couple of hundred edits to get the ball rolling. \u00a0That said, there is so much more to be done. \u00a0When 1,600 freshman hit campus in 3 weeks and get curious about buggy, we want our site and the reference section in particular to be able to answer any question they have. \u00a0Right now, there are some really key pages that need a lot of help or haven’t even been started. \u00a0For example:<\/p>\n