setup instructions in location other than workshop index.html

[tracykteal]

The setup instructions will be different for different workshops for different tools or domains, so rather than embedding them in the index.html for the workshop website, it might be good to have them on a different page.

One option might be to have a 'setup' repo in 'data carpentry' with all the installation information. Then the setup instructions will be a list of links for each OS. For instance if a workshop is spreadsheets, R and SQL, the setup instructions will be:

Windows

• link to setup/spreadsheet.html#windows
• link to setup/R.html#windows
• link to setup/SQL.html#windows

Mac

• link to setup/spreadsheet.html#mac
  etc

The advantage to this might be that we'd just have to keep the 'setup' repo updated, and each lesson that uses particular software can also link to the installation instructions from the lesson and we don't need to keep copying those pages in to different repos.

[karthik]

A related idea. SWC/DC have numerous instructors who work tech jobs, sit in front of a computer all day, but don't have the time (busy work, kids etc) to travel and teach. Would it make sense to recruit some of them to hang out in a chatroom (IRC, hipchat, anything that would be easy to use from a browser) and offer install help to workshop participants?

On the workshop page we can clearly list stuff to install. But below that we can have a link that says "Having trouble? Need help from a human?"

I bring this up because I know nothing about windows and really cannot help anyone with Git bash etc. I often spend 20+ minutes struggling to help windows people during workshops. If this room existed and had people (from multiple timezones) hanging out, it could be really useful (allowing them to contribute meaningfully) and also relieve some burden from the instructors and helpers.

thoughts? cc @gvwilson

[karthik]

For R at least, we could write a test file and have students source it ahead of time.

source("http://datacarpentry.org/R/tests.R")

and have it pass (assuming everything was installed) or print clear error messages that someone (on chat!) could help them with ahead of time.

[karthik]

But +1 to @tkteal's original idea posted above. I think at some point SWC originally had those files as includes but I don't think it works that way anymore.

[hlapp]

That's a great idea. For the workshops I've run at Duke or NESCent I've recruited the respective sysadmin personnel to be on hand. But many may not have that luxury.

[gvwilson]

Advertise the start times of particular workshops so that people know when to hang out to maximum effect? Sure, worth trying.