As a first step, we emailed a small sample of volunteers from the QA community to understand their needs and have been collecting their responses. As mentioned in an earlier post, we will continue to reach out across our the community to see how we can help everyone. But, for now, I thought it would be good to share a summary of some of the responses to a few of the questions.

N.B. This was a small sample and does not represent the whole community…just the responses from the first people we emailed. Also, in cases where it was necessary, I summarized answers. The responses below do not represent exactly how we have decided to help. Our next step is getting back to each person to get a specific idea on how Mozilla can provide support.

What are your biggest obstacles to working on the Mozilla Project?

• Hardware requirements.
• In need of professional development support (i.e. conference attendance, workshops, travel support).
• Software requirements.
• Free time!
• It would be nice if it were possible to get some of the main web tool developers together in the same room at some point.

What do you think Mozilla should/can do to help remove those obstacles?

• Nada.
• Not necessarily pay [people], but maybe find some other companies [or] certain development efforts to fund.
• I don’t know how much Mozilla would be able to help in terms of getting enough developers to participate long enough to become reviewers.
• As for getting the developers together, helping to cover travel expenses seems to be the biggest issue.
• Provide software and/or hardware that is needed.

Specifically, what could you use to overcome your daily challenges related to working on Mozilla?

• Nothing the Mozilla Foundation/Corporation could really provide.
• More time! Seriously though, having access to hardware for testing and building are essential. Also, tools such as version control and source management (many of which are developed in house) are also a challenge. Upgrades to some of these systems are long over due.
• I think best would be getting paid for doing Mozilla related work. Preferably part time and as a contractor. I understand that this way this is no longer a “volunteer” or “community” thing anymore but as long as money makes the world go around this is one of those harsh truths of life.
• The increased human resourced required to get patches reviewed and landed in time.
• Working part time only to have more free time to contribute to Bugzilla/Mozilla? But this means earning less money, which is not acceptable.

Do you have any thoughts about how money should be used by Mozilla to support the volunteer community?

• Indifferent.
• Given properly, some type of support is acceptable and will be received well by the open-source community.
• I am generally skeptical of involving grants, donations or in-kind support open-source. It may cause disruption.

If you have any particular responses to these questions or responses to the answers that I summarized above, please post a comment.

Up next: we are working out exactly how Mozilla can legally support to people. There may be some initial challenges, given our organizational structure. But, we will know more once we chat with the legal team…more later.

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