4.5 Documentation Dash - "I'd like to help but..."

"...not on those days." 

That's fine, we'd still love your help. If you have some time to spare before the formal sprint dates either leave a comment on the Join the 4.5 Documentation Dash blog indicating the issue you've chosen and a comment on the issue on Jira or claim it yourself if you have that level of Jira permissions.   If you won't have any free time until after 28th July, don't claim an issue now; please leave a comment below and I will contact you if there are still issues left after the formal sprint ends. (Issue CRM-14635 will need to wait until all the other issues are completed, so is a likely candidate for post-spint work.)

"...I am very new to CiviCRM."

Maybe you don't feel you have enough experience to be writing documentation. Proof-reading text doesn't require in-depth knowledge and can be a great way to become more familiar with CiviCRM functionality  You need to check for spelling and grammar mistakes (both English and American spelling are OK, so you don't need to change every 'organization' to 'organisation' or vice versa).  You should look for repeated words and sentences that don't make sense or aren't finished. It would also be great if you ran through any steps on a 4.5 sandbox site (eg http://drupal.sandbox.civicrm.org/)  to make sure they are correct and explained in enough detail. You correct the document as you read it, but if there parts you don't know how to fix add a comment below or email me (joanne.civicrm at gmail.com).

Proof-reading is our "In Quality Assurance" stage and should alwys be done by someone who didn't write the text.  There are already seven issues waiting for the final proof-reading stage, and every issue from the sprint will need to go through it, so even if you are very new to CiviCRM you can help out.

"...I don't understand what I need to do."

The sprint board at https://issues.civicrm.org/jira/secure/RapidBoard.jspa?rapidView=14&view=detail is just a different way of displaying issues that already exist in Jira.

Looking from left to right:

• The To Do column contains issues that are open but have had no work done on them. The large J in issue CRM-14635 indicates that it is already assigned to someone. You can choose any issue without a similar initial.  If you have the appropriate Jira permission assign it to youself. Otherwise let me know via a comment below what your Jira username is and which issue you want and I will assign it to you.
• Choosing to start work on an issue will shift it to the In Progress column. Issue CRM-14979  in that column has had a small amount of work done on it, but is no longer assigned to anyone, so feel free to claim it and make changes as you see fit.
• When you have finished writing the content you should change the status to In Quality Assurance and change the assignee from your name to Unassigned. (Again, let me know via comments or email when you want this done if you can't do it yourself). This will move the issue into the Needs Proof-reading column
• Issues in the Needs Proof-reading column without large initials in them are up for grabs. Choose one and assign it to yourself or write a comment/send an email to me. When someone has finished proof-reading, the status should be changed to Closed. This shifts the issue into the Done column.
• The far right column shows some details for CRM-14534. Clicking on that issue number in the To Do column brought up the details in the far right column.  Clicking on the issue number in the far right column will take you to the standard Jira page for that issue where you can change the assignee, and start work on it, if you have the necessary permissions.  (To return to the sprint board from an individual issue select the Agile menu item and the 4.5 Documentation Board.)

To sign up for an issue, leave a comment on the Join the 4.5 Documentation Dash blog and  a comment on the issue in Jira. Start work as soon as you want to.

Please help out if you can. CiviCRM is packed full of features; for new users there is a lot to learn and for experienced users there is a lot to remember. Having good documentation helps everyone and will help keep CiviCRM strong.