---
title: RCOS Primer
tags: rcos
---

# RCOS Primer
###### tags: `rcos`

## Read this if the following applies to you
1. You want students to work on one of your open source Foundry projects (no extra responsibilities, corporat/Anthony will be their external mentor)
2. You want to be a mentor (chat with them on Discord and fill out some assessments, but you don't grade them)

## What is this?

**RPI**: Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, https://rpi.edu
**RCOS**: Rensselaer Center for Open Source, https://rcos.io

RCOS is a four credit free elective course at RPI. Students can also participate in RCOS as an independent study program.

They will choose a project in their first week. This is normally done "science fair"-style, where upperclassmen and external mentors stand at a table with their laptop and a project board and pitch the project to the new students. 200-250 students sign up for the course every semester.

Covid-19 has forced the lectures onto Webex, but all other RCOS activities are held on a Discord server. You can ask me for an invite but you don't need to be on there unless you're curious.

Previous external projects have come from IBM, GE, and Albany Medical Center, among numerous others. They’ve received funding from Fedora.

## Expectation-setting

The students' goal is to bring their open source project to a publishable milestone by the end of the semester.*

*The expectation of the course is that they learn open source fundamentals and complete self-assessments. They are not expected to actually complete the project for a passing grade.

A couple years ago, RPI transitioned to a required summer session (trimester) for sophomores. Let me be clear: this sucks. Everyone hates it. Because we're starting with the summer semester, don't expect anything unless the students are absolute rockstars. If I were these students, I'd BS the self-assessments and try to preserve my sanity coming right out of a stressful Spring semester with only a week break.

That said, any students who sign up for a League project are probably planning to put the work in. They know that an external mentor (you/me) will be reviewing their code. Still, we should put zero pressure on them, only encouragement where necessary.

## Timeline

The Summer session is May 24 - August 20.

**Initial Project Definition:** We present to the new students on May 28 or June 1. We will confirm whether new students have accepted a League project on June 1 or June 4.

**Execute on Project:** Students work and collaborate with members of the League on their League project for 7-8 weeks.

**Wrap Up Period:** In the final 3-4 weeks, students continue to work, but also begin summarizing, submitting, and presenting contributions as RCOS deliverables.

## Ground rules

- Treat them like any other League member
- Treat them like the adults they are
- These are not interns
- Don't do anything to harm the mentor/mentee relationship, or the reputation of the League
- Shield them from your mean/annoying users 😬
- If you agree to make a time commitment, please ensure you can follow through on that time commitment for the whole semester

## RCOS Initiative CHANGELOG

**Mar 11, 2021 - Email to RCOS Leadership**

Hi, my name is Anthony and I'm a Class of 2013 RPI graduate (BSc Computer Science).

I'm emailing to provide an introduction on behalf of the League of Foundry VTT Developers, an international group of 1600 coders and creators who work with leading web technologies for the analog/tabletop game industry.

We have a glut of open source projects needing hands that I think will thrill RPI students (particularly GSAS students), many of which have already achieved thousands of player installs.

I'd like to invite a conversation with our community leadership team to explain more. I've already contacted Professor Turner on Discord, but I'm also available for Zoom and/or a conventional phone call anytime ([phone number redacted]).

Sincerely,

Anthony Ronda

*(GSAS is the acronym for the Game Design major)*

*Mar 11, 2021 - Reply from RCOS Director Wes Turner*

**Mar 13, 2021 - Scheduling Email**

Wes and RCOS Team,

We're thrilled to hear back from you! I'm copying Cody Swendrowski, the founder and head ringmaster at The League.

We both have flexible schedules on Wednesday and Thursday to chat, so please feel free to pick a time during US Eastern business hours that works for you. I'm hoping to take only 20 minutes introducing ourselves, our goals/values, and why we're excited to get involved.

If we have time, I'd also love to share some exciting video capture of our members' open source projects. I can create a Zoom meeting, or bring it to the RCOS Discord server if that's easier for everyone.

Sincerely,

Anthony Ronda

*Mar 15, 2021 - Wes, Cody and Anthony confirm our Webex meeting for Mar 18*

**Mar 18, 2021 - Webex meeting with Wes Turner**

Supporting slides: The League Presentation March 18

*We got the instruction that Wes would confer with the others and get back to us after their weekly meeting. He didn’t have any questions, but we did go over time by about 10 minutes discussing various items.*

**Mar 18, 2021 - Followup email to RCOS Leadership ([e-mail] is bcc’d)**

Thanks so much for taking the time to chat with us today!
Slide presentation link

Our open source community on Discord: https://discord.gg/rvfEwX9B7R

The closed source tabletop game software our community makes packages for: https://foundryvtt.com/
Their official Discord community: https://discord.gg/foundryvtt

You might be interested in a way to browse and search all Foundry packages. A member of the League leadership team made a very good one: https://www.foundryvtt-hub.com/packages/ (granted, not all of these are from League community members, but the majority of them are!)

Our open source community's Trello board: https://trello.com/invite/b/xYiqr7js/37a91794c2597364b7d62492ae1c55ad/league-of-extraordinary-foundryvtt-developers
Our "endangered packages" Trello board: https://trello.com/invite/b/FmfN4LHZ/2381a1b9bef734002d20541c5cbce759/endangered-packages
Our "systems" Trello board (a system is a tabletop game ruleset): https://trello.com/invite/b/5neFnUv5/718e3751c9418c651807ceced750007f/systems

-Anthony

*(the Trello Boards were included because Wes asked to see our Trello)
(Foundry Hub was included because I sensed that what he actually wanted to see were finished projects)*

**Mar 29, 2021 - Second Followup email to RCOS Leadership**

Wes and Co.,

Did RCOS coordinators get to discuss the League of Foundry Developers last week?

I'm compiling a list of our members' project suggestions today so I thought I should ping for an update. I'm very excited for the privilege to present to RCOS students.

-Anthony

*(Wes replied on Mar 29 that he’d like for us to give a talk to the students on an upcoming Friday)*

*Mar 30, 2021 - Confirmation email for April 9th presentation for students*

**Apr 8, 2021 - Second Confirmation email to RCOS leadership
Hello All!**

We're thrilled to speak to the students tomorrow April 9th at 4:45pm New York time! I've confirmed four other League leadership members to join us tomorrow, who have the instructions to join the Webex. I will present with Google Slides just like last time, and as promised it will be packed with demos (we still plan to squeeze into that 15 minute time slot). I have access to the RCOS Discord server already, and can post the slides and relevant links there afterward. I'll be available for questions on Discord afterward as well.

See you tomorrow!

-Anthony

**April 9, 2021 - Presentation to students**

The League Presentation April 9

**April 11, 2021 - Followup Email to RCOS leadership**

Thanks so much for giving us the opportunity to speak in front of the students on Friday!

There is one question Wes had about League mentorship, and I thought I should flesh out my answer:

- I am dedicated to facilitating to the fullest extent required to make students successful. Every student left looking for resources will get pointed in the right direction.
- Two other leadership members say they are interested in being external mentors, and are waiting to see what kind of time commitment they can make. They are vetted professionals, knowledgeable, and kind folks who I'm excited to introduce to students. Between the three of us we'll be able to do code reviews and check in occasionally as needed.
- The League community is set up for developer success even without access to 1-on-1 mentorship thanks to our community helpers. I have absolute confidence in our community's ability to support and uplift each other.

My main aim as facilitator is to make students comfortable joining and even leading open initiatives within the community. Many of the proposed projects we're preparing for students are feature requests for existing projects, requiring some form of communication. When I was at RPI, I didn't quite have that confidence to put myself out there like that, but the League of Foundry Developers community is a very welcoming and safe place for exactly that.

On a completely different note, I have confirmed that all RCOS students with a qualified open source Foundry VTT project this summer session will be given Foundry VTT software licenses for them to keep should they not already have one. To make it easy on the coordinators, you will not need to keep track of anything beyond what you already do to administer RCOS. The students will have instructions to take advantage of this offer at the beginning of Summer Arch.

Looking forward to this summer!

-Anthony

*April 13, 2021 - Thank you email from Wes*

**April 15, 2021 - Email to Gaming Club and Game Dev Club**

Hi, I’m a Class of 2013 RPI alum contacting you on behalf of the League of Extraordinary Foundry VTT Developers. At last Friday’s RCOS meeting we introduced our open source game software community and announced a new opportunity for students.

In collaboration with Foundry Gaming, we will sponsor and mentor 2021 Summer Arch RCOS students who choose a qualifying Foundry VTT project. Class registration is closed, but you can contact Professor Wes Turner for more information.

Sadly, RPI’s RESPITE content filter will almost definitely bin my email if I give you any links in this email. If you need any resources to pass on, please whitelist my email and get back to me. In the meantime you can check out our presentation on Professor Turner’s youtube channel (“Wes Turner”) for our April 9th presentation, and head to the RCOS Discord server where students can find the slides and ask questions.

Sincerely,

Anthony Ronda

**April 19, 2021 - Announcement to League**

Hey @everyone! I’m thrilled to finally announce a special League initiative: our partnership with Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute’s Center for Open Source!

We plan to sponsor and mentor at least one team of students to create or contribute to an open source FVTT package *this summer.* The RCOS program allows participating students to contribute to open source for valuable university credits.

Do you have any feature requests on your package that you’re really hoping to get someone else to help with? Nominate it for inclusion in our suggestions list!

If you want to entice students to contribute to your open source package, please drop by #rcos to chat. I need all submissions by May 17 (preferably with exciting pictures and video of your package in action). It must have an open source license. “Good First Issues” and harder issues are both great.

**May 21, 2021 - One Week Beforehand check-in with RCOS**

Hello Wes and Co.,

I just looked at the calendar and couldn't believe it's already time for Summer Arch! I've been following the news about the cyberattack and I hope this email finds you well.

If I've got the RCOS schedule correct, the two dates for introducing ourselves to students are May 28 and June 1. I'm available on either date. I've prepared a 1 minute version of our pitch for the lecture time, and hope to link a 10 minute video for interested students to watch on their own time.

Please let me know anything else you require from me!

-Anthony

*May 21, 2021 - Wes suggests May 28th for the presentation date and cc's David Goldschmidt, Computer Science Department Head, who will be leading RCOS that day while Wes is at his son's graduation.*

*May 28, 2021 - Cody, Ellen and I attend the meeting and present for about 5 minutes. We talked about our roles for the program and showed a bunch of cool projects created in the month of May. I linked the 11 minute video in RCOS Discord.*

*May 28 to June 7, 2021 - Lots of chatting with students, expectation setting, answering questions, getting the license for Forien's Quest Log settled for the students' license requirement.*

*June 8, 2021 - Confirmed there is one team of four students this session. They will be fostering Forien's Quest Log. Also of interest to students were SWADE Spices and Flavors and pf2e. The student who asked about SWADE Spices and Flavors joined the FQL team. The student who asked about pf2e joined an unrelated team.*

*June 9 to June 11, 2021 - Get their Foundry licenses requested, get their Forge accounts set up.*