Unify profile badges for all teams

[danieltj]

Profile badges are a popular thing on the WordPress.org network, every team has at least one corresponding profile badge and the requirements to earn them vary drastically across all of the teams. I'd like to unify the profile badge experience and strictly define how you earn each badge to make it clearer and easier for people to earn the badges they deserve.

The ​meta handbook explains how you can earn most of them but it doesn't go into detail for each one.

So there are two parts to this ticket:

1. Improve the explanations of each badge in the table
2. Create two badges for each team that can be earned (

Profile badges have become what seems like a sensitive topic, something you shouldn't ask about and something that shouldn't bother you if you get one. Profile badges show contribution and a dedication to the community. It's important to show that contributing for the sole purpose of a badge is okay because it's still a contribution, irrespective of the original intent.

So, what can / should we do?

• Create two badges for each team. For example, accessibility only has a team badge (badge with a fill background), so does the training team (what what I can see). Test (formerly Flow) doesn't have a badge at all and some teams have their team badge as an additional contributor badge such as Theme Reviewers or Polyglot Editors so there is quite a lot of inconsistency here.

• Define a clear list of how you earn each badge. An example of this is the Core contributor badge is earned automatically by receiving props, but the documentation badge is manually assigned based on what seems is an unknown, or lesser known set of requirements. Some badges are much easier to get than others, which is okay, but the harder to get badges stem from what seems is unknown prerequisites.

• Update the meta handbook with a new guide on how to earn every single badge currently available.

Not directly related to this ticket but share some relevance:

• Open source profiles theme
• Link badges through to teams
• bbPress contributor badges
• BuddyPress contributor badges
• Automate meta badge
• Automate training badge
• Add Marketing badge
• Automate theme badge

[coffee2code]

There is already the convention for each team to have two badges: a "team" badge for being on the team itself (by whatever measure the team decides) and a "contributor" badge for contributing to the given team (again, by whatever measure decided upon by that team). The team badge is assigned so long as the person is an active contributor to the team, and removed once that is no longer the case. The contributor badge is permanent once assigned.

The key sentiment from the above is that badges are a recognition on a per-team basis. What each team deems as the criteria for their team and contributor badges is up to their own team's consensus.

As to the specific requests raised by this ticket:

Create two badges for each team.

This is largely already the case. There are 15 teams with paired badges created. That includes badges for WP-CLI and Hosting (both for each) and Training (contributor badge) that aren't meaningfully assigned yet. Only 2 teams lack only a contributor badge: Accessibility (as you noted) and Mobile. And only two teams lack any sort of badge: Testing and Tide.

Any team wanting either or both of their badges implemented need to have one of their team members make a meta.trac request to do so. The following information is required:

• Dashicon for the team
• Primary color for the badge (the darker color used for the dashicon and ring around it)
• List of users to be initially assigned the given badge(s) (or the means by which those users could be obtained)
• Optional: Programmatically determinable method to assign/remove badge going forward, if known and/or possible (basically so a script or plugin could be written)

Define a clear list of how you earn each badge.

See #527 (particularly starting at comment:8) for discussion on also having each team host a handbook page dedicated to their badges.

I'm in favor of having each team document their own badges in their own handbooks because (1) handbooks are documentation for their contributors and badges are their team's recognition for contributors and (2) the docs for the badges would live where it matters most and with those who would need to edit it. Having the badge info somewhere central (e.g. the meta team handbook) puts it out of sight and mind of the teams in charge of the badges and adds overhead to them being able to get the entries edited.

The drawback of this approach is getting all 16+ teams to create the badge page in their respective handbooks. Having a dedicated ticket for this effort would be good, so that any recommendations can be conveyed (for instance, suggesting the page be titled "Contributor Badges" or maybe "Profile Badges") and perhaps a suggested page layout/template. Then team leads could be pinged and progress tracked.

Update the meta handbook with a new guide on how to earn every single badge currently available.

For the reasons I cited in response to the previous item, the meta handbook shouldn't act as the central hub for badge requirements. The ​list that currently exists is sufficient, except we would eventually replace the contents of the "Criteria" column with a link to each team's handbook page for their badges. From a meta team perspective, we just want to list the badges, their icons, their colors, and point users to team-specific documentation on how they handle their badges.

Closing this ticket since only 1 of the 3 suggestions is something we'll act on, and that one warrants its own ticket since it would mostly be for managing and tracking the efforts of 16+ different teams (and thus should be a focused ticket).

Cheers!

[SergeyBiryukov]

Replying to danieltj:

Core contributor badge is earned automatically by receiving props

New contributors often ask me in DM why they still don't have the badge after receiving props, and I have to tell them to be patient and explain that while the process is automated, it's still triggered manually once in a while, though I'm not exactly sure when (once a major release comes out? or a minor one as well?).

The current "automatically (but not immediately)" note in the Meta handbook seems too vague. Would be great to have some more info on that in the Core handbook :)

[casiepa]

Related: ​https://make.wordpress.org/community/handbook/wordcamp-organizer/planning-details/banners-and-flyers/

[Otto42]

Sidenote, and please feel free to have this conversation directly with me elsewhere and not on this ticket, are people really that concerned about badges? Are these an incentive to spur contribution? Or just a nice thing for those who do contribute? Or are they an indicator of authority in some way?

What is the intent of having these badges and what should we be using them to try to encourage? This seems to be the underlying concept that I think makes this unclear. I've never thought of them as anything more than a fun thing to do. They are a toy. Nothing more. If others put more value into them, then that's a conversation that needs to be had somewhere.