Hi @chas_iot,
Thanks for asking! Yes, this is still the main forum for discussing WebThings for now, along with the #iot channel over at chat.mozilla.org.
Community support will definitely be needed for the project to continue to thrive and grow. As mentioned in the original post, WebThings will be governed with a module ownership system along the lines of the one used by the Mozilla project, with Mike and I as module owners for the top level WebThings module. I will document this all on the wiki but you can assume it will work pretty much the same way as the Mozilla system.
Mike and I have started to contact some previous contributors to invite them to be module owners or peers of various sub-modules, but anyone can jump in and start contributing wherever they have an interest as a first step. There are no specific roles to fill or a minimum time commitment needed in order to contribute, but some examples of ways that you can contribute include:
- Development - Pick a bug, task or feature off the Product Backlog and start hacking
- Testing - Either writing or fixing automated tests, or manual testing of builds of the latest master branch
- Add-ons - Write an add-on (or help maintain an existing one), to add support for a new type of device or protocol, add new notification mechanisms or extend the UI for new use cases
- Things - Build a new web thing using the WebThings Framework to expand the Web of Things ecosystem, or even create a web thing library in a new programming language
- Documentation - Our documentation could do with some love, and we’re planning on overhauling this section of the website
- Support - Help other community members with questions and problems here on the forums and in the Matrix chat channel
- Localisation - Help translate the WebThings Gateway into new languages using Pontoon (though we may have to transition off Pontoon at some point)
- Evangelism - Talk about WebThings at events, on blogs and on social media, give talks and run workshops to help spread the word
- Standardisation - Help with standardising the Thing Description and Web Thing Protocol (see the recent call for use cases & requirements)
Next Steps
After a bit of a break for some family time/parental leave, @mrstegeman and I are hard at work preparing for the transition to webthings.io, with help from @dbryant inside Mozilla.
As you’ve noticed Mike has been very busy working on a bunch of things including various bits of re-branding, but also moving the hosting of some add-ons off Mozilla infrastructure. He will now be starting on stepping up the replacement cloud infrastructure for the remote access and automatic update services, which my startup Krellian will be sponsoring.
I’m currently working on the new website and designing the UI for the gateway to allow users to opt-in to the new services.
At some point before the end of the year we plan to push out an update for the WebThings Gateway which includes the re-branding and transition UI and a bunch of other new features currently on the master branch. We’ll try to give as much notice as possible for people to opt-in to the new services before the Mozilla servers are shut down at the end of the year.
Stay tuned!