Building Better Open Source Projects

Divya Mohan of SUSE discusses her role in in the open source community, highlighting the significance of documentation in software development, drawing from her experiences in the Kubernetes SIG Documentation group and her previous roles. The discussion spans topics like the impact of poorly documented code, the challenges of maintaining comprehensive documentation in open source projects, and advice for fledgling project maintainers. Divya shares her enthusiasm for WebAssembly and its potential to revolutionize software development through inclusivity and standardization, challenging the traditional write-once-run-anywhere paradigm. We conclude with insights on the formation and mission of the Bytecode Alliance and the future prospects of WebAssembly.   00:00 Introduction 01:26 Role and Responsibilities at SUSE 04:25 Importance of Documentation 08:19 Challenges in Documentation and Code Commenting 12:21 Single Maintainer Projects and Documentation Advice 14:47 Challenges in Maintaining Documentation 17:53 Introduction to Bytecode Alliance 18:12 WebAssembly: Beyond the Web 19:00 The Role of Standards in WebAssembly 21:55 The Future of WebAssembly 28:34 Conclusion and Final Thoughts   Guest: Divya Mohan is a Senior Technical Evangelist at SUSE, where she contributes to Rancher’s cloud native open source projects. She co-chairs the documentation for the Kubernetes & LitmusChaos projects & has previously worked extensively in the systems engineering space during her tenure with HSBC & IGate Global Solutions Pvt Ltd. A co-creator of the KCNA exam & a CNCF ambassador, she is invested in making technical communities & technologies more accessible & inclusive.