# About the SciPy 2021 sprints

Dear SciPythonistas,

If you want to join this year's sprints (you do!) please read the following three bullet points:

1. There will be a Sprints BoF (Birds of a Feather) session on [**Friday, July 16th, 4:10pm CDT (Austin time)**](https://everytimezone.com/s/b2d71d89), where we will briefly cover everything in this email, and answer any and all questions about sprints. This will happen on Gather.town ([link](https://gather.town/app/CI75TBeaUWFtvqLc/SciPy2021_?spawnToken=Auq_boiDoUDG21Sg)). If you do nothing else, come to that!
2. There will be three sprinting sessions, each 4h long, catering to different time zones around the world. They will happen on the [Mentored Sprints Discord server](https://discord.gg/H4fYmEe). You are welcome to join any or all of these. They are visible in [the SciPy 2021 schedule](https://www.scipy2021.scipy.org/schedule). The time slots for the sessions (click the links for your time zone):
* **Asia-Pacific:** [Friday, Jul 16, 6pm-10pm CDT (Austin)](https://everytimezone.com/s/75875156) / Saturday, Jul 17, 9am-1pm AEST (Melbourne, Australia)
* **Europe:** [Saturday, Jul 17, 5am-9am CDT (Austin)](https://everytimezone.com/s/7fae4856) / Saturday, Jul 17, 12noon-4pm CEST (Paris)
* **US/Americas:** [Saturday, Jul 17, 11am-3pm CDT (Austin)](https://everytimezone.com/s/8093c7e4) / Saturday, Jul 17, 1pm-5pm BRT (São Paulo)
3. If you have further questions, join the [#sprints channel](https://app.slack.com/client/T027QMQUBR6/C027HFUF9P1) on the [SciPy 2021 Slack](https://scipy2021.slack.com) and ask away!

Ok, that's all for the executive summary! With that out of the way, please read on for more details. We've separated these into sections for all readers, for newcomers, for mentors, and for maintainers.

## Information for everyone

**Note:** You *don't* have to participate in all three sessions, or even for the full duration of any one session. Come for as long as makes sense for you. Ideally, though, it's best to show up at the *start* of a session when everyone is introducing themselves. Also, make sure to take breaks, at least 5min per hour. Video chat is an unnatural medium that drains our attention much more than in-person conversations. Please be mindful of this.

Sprints this year will follow the [mentored sprints template](https://mentored-sprints.netlify.app). We will use the [Mentored Sprints Discord server](https://discord.gg/H4fYmEe) for voice and video chat, and [Duckly](https://duckly.com/) for shared coding and terminals. Please:

- Sign up for Discord and make sure you can join the [Mentored Sprints server](https://discord.gg/H4fYmEe).
- (Optional) [Download the Discord app](https://discord.com/download), which can give a better user experience than the in-browser chat.
- Sign up for [Duckly](https://duckly.com/onboarding) and download the extensions for your [preferred tools](https://duckly.com/tools/) (e.g. VS Code or PyCharm).
- Join the Mentored Sprints Duckly server [here](https://duckly.com/mentored-sprints/join?t=FxeVwg_bXcKylQ2PoHiEP4BS).

You should now be ready to participate in the sprints with minimum friction!

## Information for newcomers

Please attend the Birds of a Feather (BoF) session on Friday! We will introduce "sprinting" and how it can help you use Python more effectively, all while contributing to the community! Do **not** think that you are not good enough — there will be beginner-friendly issues for you to help with, as well as a git helpdesk to help you get around any logistical issues with contributing to open source using git and GitHub. The sprints are a perfect opportunity for you to get introduced to open source work!

During the sprints, we encourage you to pair up with someone to solve one or more issues for participating projects. Coding is more fun, and more effective, when working together!

## Information for mentors

Mentors' main role in the sprints is not to write code, but rather to help newcomers contribute code. Mentors should be broadly available on project channels on Discord to allow newcomers to come and ask for help on specific projects or general topics. You don't have to be an open source maintainer to volunteer as a mentor: experienced users of particular libraries can help here also. If you have ever contributed a GitHub pull request, please consider signing up as a mentor! The sign up form can be found [here](https://docs.google.com/forms/d/1paRdwR5rnFkRxEACuMHchS2QohSbezs8wUKZWu3THhE/viewform?edit_requested=false).

## Information for maintainers

If you maintain a small open source project, please consider signing up as a [mentor/maintainer](https://docs.google.com/forms/d/1paRdwR5rnFkRxEACuMHchS2QohSbezs8wUKZWu3THhE/viewform?edit_requested=false)! Small projects often have lower barriers to contribution than big established projects like NumPy, which make them great places for newcomers to get started in open source!

If a project you maintain is participating in a beginner-friendly sprint, please review your project's "good first issue" and "sprint" tags (e.g. https://github.com/jni/skan/labels/good%20first%20issue) to make sure they are up to date, and please [sign up as a mentor](https://docs.google.com/forms/d/1paRdwR5rnFkRxEACuMHchS2QohSbezs8wUKZWu3THhE/viewform?edit_requested=false) if you haven't already!

**Note:** Please see the [mentorship form](https://docs.google.com/forms/d/1paRdwR5rnFkRxEACuMHchS2QohSbezs8wUKZWu3THhE/viewform?edit_requested=false) even if you signed up your project to participate early on. **If you did not select a time zone** when you signed up your project, this means you signed up **before** we decided on specific time slots, and we don't know when you will be available to help on your project. If we don't get a response, we will assume you are available for the America time slot only.

## But I still have questions!

If you have any questions about this email, please ask on the [#sprints channel](https://app.slack.com/client/T027QMQUBR6/C027HFUF9P1)! Finally, a continuously updated version of this email lives at https://bit.ly/scipy2021-sprints-info. You can bookmark that page to make sure you always have the latest information.

-- Your Sprints team: Juan Nunez-Iglesias, Jacob Deppen, Joe Lucas, Tania Allard, Guen Prawiroatmodjo, David Nicholson