As an open-source project, Drupal relies on the sustained contributions of individuals and organisations to keep it well maintained, develop, and grow to stay relevant in a competitive landscape.
The project founder, Dries Buytaert has highlighted the problems many open source projects have of balancing the makers and takers. Increasingly, organisations that have traditionally contributed to Drupal have had challenges keeping the level of contribution going, and have had to look to new ways to support the project.
Sponsoring Drupal contribution is a new and exciting way for PreviousNext to give back to the project as well as the community.
PreviousNext has a long history of contributing to Drupal. For the last 12 years our contributions have ranged from speaking at global and local Drupal events, to being a part of the team that ran the first DrupalCon in Sydney, Australia. Our team consists of core committers, sub-system maintainers, module maintainers, and security team members, as well as members of the DrupalSouth board and committees. We have consistently ranked in the top ten contributors globally.
Recently we have achieved the only Platinum Drupal Certified Partner status in Australia, and are committed to maintaining it.
Since our inception, we have contributed back via the projects we develop as well as a policy of 20% time for contribution, and we will continue to do this going forward. We believe this benefits everyone. Our employees are receiving code reviews from some of the brightest minds in the Drupal world, increasing their expertise – a form of training if you like. PreviousNext is also able to raise its profile based on these contributions, and market its expertise to future customers.
Despite this, we see a big opportunity in sponsoring specific individuals who can have a big impact on the project.
V Spagnolo (@quietone) is a key member of the Australia & New Zealand Drupal community. She has long been a maintainer of the Migrate core sub-system, a central contributor to the Bug Smash Initiative, and her contributions earned her winner of the Open Source Contributor award at the New Zealand Open Source Awards in 2018. She has recently been appointed a Provisional Release Manager for Drupal.
In short, she provides highly valuable contributions to both the project and the regional community.
Today, we are proud to announce that we will be financially sponsoring part of quietone’s contribution time going forward, as another way for PreviousNext to help progress the project.
