Holochain Development Environment Setup Support

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Event Checklist

Pre-Show

  • Hosts arrive 15 min early for prep.
  • Make this event checklist look fresh (and make any revisions that you were meaning to get to but haven’t yet)
  • Any Q’s from Discord ?-q-and-a-beginners channel? Recent changes?
  • Who is going to open the session? Close?
  • Attendees arrive in zoom waiting room.
  • Hit Record (cloud recording) (if in a medium where we can record)
  • Then open the room at start time. Get started promptly to establish that as our custom.

The Show

  • Welcome + Intro (Greetings in local language / from:”Hola de Argentina”, “Halo dari Indonesia”)
  • Links
  • If anyone has not yet tried to install, share screen and walk people through install process. Highlight any "gotchas."
  • Answer questions + Troubleshoot problems.
  • If a particular issue arises for an individual or a set of participants, use a breakout room to tend to them without derailing the others.
    • Try to also record that breakout session (locally to your machine if necessary)
  • Wrap up: Remind participants of upcoming events (share link to events page on Discord):
    • Share invite link to Discord for those interested in developing applications.
      • What should our non-developer online text space be? Holochain Forum? Something else? Hylo once they transition to Holochain?
    • Share link to events channel
    • and ?-q-and-a-beginners channel
    • List of Events:
      • Holochain Development Environment Setup Support
      • Getting started Building and Testing on Holochain
      • Architecture Your hApp
      • Troubleshooting Your hApp
      • hAppy Hour
      • hApp Show and Tell
      • hApp Jam
      • Reimagining X (Quarterly Series)
    • Ask the participants to share what they think they would like support on next? Where are they in their journey? What do they think would be helpful. Is there anything not covered by the existing set of events?
  • 15 seconds of Chaotic Goodbyes: How do you say Goodbye? “Adios”, “Auf Wiedersehen”, “selamat tinggal”

Post-Show

  • Hosts end call, then jump back on (or meet in other channel) for 15 min retrospective.

Event Checklist | Retrospective Template | Event Overview | Event Marketing | Retros | HC Online Events Directory

Retrospective Template

Make a copy of the below Restrospective Checklist Template, paste it to the bottom of the doc and work on it there).

<details>
<summary>
    
### Retrospective (Event Date + Hosts)
</summary>

- [ ] In Retrospective Checklist Title, fill in Event Date + Host Team Names)
- [ ] Wins (celebrate them!) Was it better than last time? 
    * 

#### PAIN POINTS
##### List all the pain points that you can think of. 
* 
    
#### Iterating on the process of hosting this event
- [ ] Are there any pain points regarding this format? Document? Event Marketing? Related processes like Discord spaces, Etc?
    *
#### Basic Info Capture 
- [ ] How many participants?
- 
- [ ] How many had not successfully installed DevEnv prior to session?
- 
- [ ] How many still not fully set up by end of session?
-  
- [ ] Is there a cloud recording? (paste link here)
- 
- [ ] Is there a local recording of a breakout? (email to "???@holo.host")

#### Notes
- 

[Event Checklist](###Event-Checklist) | [Retrospective Template](###Retrospective-Template) | [Event Overview](###Event-Overview) | [Event Marketing](###Event-Marketing) | [Retros](###Retros) | [HC Online Events Directory](https://docs.google.com/document/d/1pADNb2if1Rj3naPVpraihylTlNB6bzandzjA6MPN4Ak/edit#)
</details>

Event Checklist | Retrospective Template | Event Overview | Event Marketing | Retros | HC Online Events Directory

Event Overview

Target Audience

Anyone interested in building on Holochain that wants help getting their Development Environment Setup

Audience Requirement

Interested. Have a Mac / Windows / Linux computer and decent internet connection. We ask that they attempt to download and install the Dev Environment prior to the event. Some will not.

Pitch to Audience

Get support setting up your Holochain Development Environment so you can start building Holochain apps. Plus, meet directly with some of the Holochain Core Team.

Please try to install the Dev Environment prior to the event and bring any issues or questions that you might have.

If you don't need help, great! But in case you get stuck on something, we will be holding this session to help get you unstuck.

Instructions are at https://developer.holochain.org/quick-start/

Goals

Primary: Create feedback loop so that the right internal Holochain team members can sense and rapidly iterate on our tools, processes and documentation for installing, updating and running the Holochain Development Environment.

Secondary: Get more Developers set up and ready to go with their Holochain Development Environment.

Tertiary: Give new developers an easy entry point into getting started and getting to know others on the team and in the community.

Event Format

  • 1 hour zoom call. (1.5 hours for hosts schedule hosts 15 min before until 15 min after)
  • Frequency: Once a month (On Tuesday, starting mid-May)
  • Tone: Not professional. Casual, but with an agenda.

Session support:

Two Holochain team members most capable of iterating on our tools and onboarding materials regarding setting up, updating and running the Holochain Development Environment.

MAYBE: One facilitator or additional community member as well.

  • Stefan
  • Gregory
  • Matthew / Bear / DevRel / Invited Community Member (facilitator / trainee / backup)

Questions:

How does this interrelate with Community on Discord and Nathan (holding discord space)?

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Event Marketing

PRE-EVENT

  • Who is responsible for event marketing, pre-event?
    • Nathan Lenaers
    • Camila Hanada
    • Matthew Schutte
  • Publicize across discord, website, and social media.
  • Have people sign up for the event (both so we know who they are, but also so that they get a reminder). Hosts should have access to attendee signups.
    • Ask people to try to download and install the development environment before the event and come with questions & issues.
    • Encourage people to post questions in the ?-q-and-a-beginners Discord channel prior to the event. They can tag #DevEnv for things related to that.
  • Host the meeting in zoom (https://zoom.us/j/5404204548). That is the holo.host/public channel and makes use of a waiting room.

Some Marketing Language:

EVENT:
Holochain Development Environment Setup Support session

Holochain Development Environment Setup Support sessions aim to aid community members who are encountering issues installing or using the Holochain Development Environment –- a first step in building Holochain Apps.

Please attempt to install the Development Environment per the instructions at https://developer.holochain.org/quick-start/

(note: you can skip the final step in that tutorial that covers scaffolding an example.)

If you succeed in installing the Dev Env and don't have any issues or questions, congrats!

However, if you have questions, or something isn't working:

  1. Ask for help in the ?-q-and-a-beginners Discord channel and
  2. Sign up for this setup support session and members of the Holochain Core team will answer questions and help troubleshoot problems.

POST-EVENT

  • Who is responsible for event marketing, post-event?
    *
  • Process Recording(s) and Publish.
  • Post link to recording to Discord Q&A Beginners channel (and to anywhere else?)
  • Anything to feed to Paul d'Aoust, Collin or others regarding progress on Dev Environment onboarding process, yet?

Event Checklist | Retrospective Template | Event Overview | Event Marketing | Retros | HC Online Events Directory

Retros

Paste Retrospective Template from above. Can paste newest to the top of this Retros section.

Keep the most recent Retro in full view. Wrap older retros in <details><summary></summary></details> tags with the Date and Hosts in the summary.

Retrospective (20230803 + Gregory Jensen, Matt Schutte, Mark Franks)
  • In Retrospective Checklist Title, fill in Event Date + Host Team Names)
  • Wins (celebrate them!) Was it better than last time?
    • 6 Participants
      Adam
      Andre
      Yaroslave
      Alex
      Icaro
      Halim
    • Everyone got the development environment installed. THOUGH 75% of the people had to work out the nix build command (-j0) setting. Some deleted. Some set to -j1. Gregory recommended to -j8.
    • If you are on an old machine, doing those things would take a long time (2-4 hours) to compile.
    • Much better if we can get the cachix issue fixed. We need to fix that caching issue.
    • We had some good questions and mostly had answers. And some of the participants were able to provide guidance as well.

PAIN POINTS

List all the pain points that you can think of.
  • Cachix build command sometimes failing. Not clear guidance for what to do
  • Icaro encountered an issue trying to scaffold the Get Building hApp (super_todos). Not uncommon. Gregory has had different issues almost every time trying to scaffold things on Holochain 0.1.3, 0.1.4 and 0.1.5. People running into timeouts, network loops etc.
    Equally we should fix gossip. Gossip is seriously low on test coverage. Filled with bugs.

Iterating on the process of hosting this event

  • Are there any pain points regarding this format? Document? Event Marketing? Related processes like Discord spaces, Etc?
    • Beginning Space
    • Next to be held first week of September
    • No earlier that 08:00 UTC (or Gregory's brain won't function)
    • No earlier than 16:00 UTC (preference for Mark). Though Mark can on occasion make it early. Mark prefers to go later (midnight or so his time is OK)

Basic Info Capture

  • How many participants?
  • How many had not successfully installed DevEnv prior to session?
  • How many still not fully set up by end of session?
  • Is there a cloud recording? (paste link here)
  • Is there a local recording of a breakout? (email to "???@holo.host")

Notes

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Retrospective (June 1, 2023 + Gregory, Stefan, Matthew, Abe)

  • In Retrospective Checklist Title, fill in Event Date + Host Team Names)
  • Wins (celebrate them!) Was it better than last time?
    • Identified a change to scaffolding that should make it easier to help developers debug issues related to using scaffolding.
    • Gregory ended up supporting that user @Kvik on discord and helping them resolve the issue (they were running a more recent version of Nix already v2.6.0 instead of v2.13.3)
  • Decide whether to schedule the next Dev Env event for one month out (week of Monday July 3rd?) or two weeks out and whether to target a time slot that better serves EU / Asia Pacific (CET 09:00 10:00?)

PAIN POINTS

List all the pain points that you can think of.
  • Zero attendees
  • Error from Kvik in q-a-beginners. Follow up with Robbie to get log functionality into Scaffolding. Assigned to Abe to communicate with Norbu / Robbie and include Stefan and Gregory in case more technical context is need.
  • At times, Abe was not able to hear Stefan's audio, though Gregory and Matt could hear him. Abe left the call and rejoined. That fixed the issue. Later, Abe's audio was off. Left and rejoined. Again, that fixed the issue.

Iterating on the process of hosting this event

  • Are there any pain points regarding this format? Document? Event Marketing? Related processes like Discord spaces, Etc?

    • Could use a notes section as part of the Retro.

    • Between now and next event, ask the community what sorts of support they believe they need. Recognize that the existing discord community is not the only community we are hoping to support (a lot of this is about onboarding new folks), but we want to make sure we are serving our existing community well, too.

    • Next month, focus a bit of effort on targeting the developers that are new to the space. Reach out directly. Ask what it is that they need.

    • How can we enable Discord community members make visible where they are at along their journey? Ask Nathan about this.

    • At the end of the call,

      • first, share with the participants the particular events that we have planned and then
      • ask the participants to share what they think they would like support on next? Where are they in their journey? What do they think would be helpful. Is there anything not covered by the existing set of events?

    • Next events

      • Dev Env Setup Support - first week of July.
      • Getting Started Support - second week of July.
      • Tentatively schedule the next events in the run up to those events - and depending on participation, share those details with the participants at the end of those calls.

    • Use Zoom for the next event

    • Make decision on where to upload / send video recordings from main session and breakout sessions.

Basic Info Capture

  • How many participants?
  • 0
  • How many had not successfully installed DevEnv prior to session?
  • n/a
  • How many still not fully set up by end of session?
  • n/a
  • Is there a cloud recording? (paste link here)
  • no
  • Is there a local recording of a breakout? (email to "???@holo.host")
  • no

Notes

Error from Kvik in Discord:
I'm following the Holochain quick-start tutorial (https://developer.holochain.org/quick-start) on Ubuntu 22.04, and straight away I get this: error: input 'holochain-flake/crane/rust-overlay/flake-utils' follows a non-existent input 'crane/flake-utils'. It happens after installation verification (which says holochain_scaffolding_cli 0.1.8, as it should), when I run nix run github:holochain/holochain#hc-scaffold – example forum - I get to choose Vue (it fails at any other framework though), then it does something for a moment, and then that error appears. I'm new to nix and I'd appreciate any hints, TIA.

FROM STEFAN:
Before the command is run, what are the contents of the current directory. After the first try, the forum directory already exists. If there was time between the first and the second try, if there were changes, this could be the issue.

Scaffolding could create a dump or log that they could submit. Could create a flag to create that file. Or just create that file by default.

Inspecting the user environment so that we have a log to submit for the scaffolding.

Most likely caused by the file structure in the working directory of the user in which that command is being executed.

Scaffolding should generate that file internally in memory or maybe even on disk and only clean it up in the case of success. (successfully scaffolding)

Every command on the command line is an exit code. 0 = success. Not zero = not successful.

Scaffold doesn't clean up after itself because of a failure.

Error folder already exists - check exists.

Could also be that the nix configuration doesn't match our expectation. System Nix config. User Nix Config.

We can update the scaffold and have it work for 0.1 as well as 0.2.

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