A Contractor of Our Own!

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2015-10-01 22:14:54 UTC

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Here at AO3, we've been looking into getting some paid coding help for a few years, to work on projects that are larger or more time-consuming than our volunteers are able to tackle in their spare time, and also just to help with the backlog of work and offer some extra assistance. We had a contractor take on a few small projects last year, but to outsource work on major projects, you need to be able to form longer relationships.

Today we're excited to announce that thanks to user donations, we've been able to contract an experienced programmer for several months' worth of work! \o/ And she isn't just an experienced Ruby developer — she's a Ruby developer who has been working on the Archive since 2008! Since she's familiar with all the nooks and crannies of our infrastructure, it will be easy for her to jump right in on major projects, like the much-needed update to our searching and filtering code. After that, it's onwards to back-end improvements, code cleanup, and other long-awaited projects like site internationalization.

Our new contractor is starting work next week, and we'll have a preview of her work on the searching and filtering code soon! Thanks to all of you for the donations that have been keeping the site running and are now enabling us to make it even better.

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Jeniouis Fri 02 Oct 2015 07:39PM UTC

THAT'S AWESOME!!!!! \(0_0)/

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faeryn Sat 03 Oct 2015 05:44AM UTC

YAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAY!!!! *dances around in happy glee* :D :D

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schillingklaus Sat 03 Oct 2015 08:16AM UTC

Will a Json-Rest interface now also be implemented?

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1. mumble (AO3_ADT) (Official) Tue 06 Oct 2015 10:13PM UTC
  
  Hi there,
  we are indeed planning to add an API, but we still have to fix and improve large chunks of our code before we can turn to this task. We'll definitely make an announcement once we're there!
  Best,
  mumble
  Accessibility, Design & Technology committee
  
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kwittbugginme Sat 03 Oct 2015 09:49PM UTC

Cool! Can't wait to see the new work. Glad the users could help make this happen.

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andtaser Sun 04 Oct 2015 07:46AM UTC

YAY!!! This is awesome. ♥

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Itsallgood Sun 04 Oct 2015 10:57AM UTC

Hang on. This site, at present, has been run by volunteers???
Good Christ!!! *mind blown*
Sorry, somewhat slow to the party of structure. I'm an avid all things Sherlock TV & Khirk reader, not a writer.
Thank you so very good much for ALL the hellfire & CRAP you've endured to get to this point!! *my spidey senses tell me it must have been a metric shite ton*
WELL DONE TO ALL!
I hope you're reading this either (A) exhausted & hungover from celebtating or (B) exhausted from crlebrating!!
Wow! I believe a book should be written. Yes. Based on ALL your experiences bringing AO3 to this point in it's, no doubt, colorful history. Christ, the chaper(s) on fandoms alone...well, as I wrote, colorful. But fun!!!! * :) *
Again, congrdulations on past, present & future success. Truly, there are no words I could stream together to convey what this site means to me. What it's GIVEN to me! To say nothing of the fic writers, of whom all I admire fiercely, respect compeletly & love unconditionslly.
*bows humbly*
Cheers to you & yours!
me

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1. mumble (AO3_ADT) (Official) Tue 06 Oct 2015 10:10PM UTC
  
  Thank you so much for the kind words! The Archive is indeed entirely volunteer-run, from the developers and sysadmins to the Support and Abuse teams. Sometimes we can't quite believe it either. :-D
  (Celebrations definitely happened.)
  
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Madelief Sun 04 Oct 2015 12:32PM UTC

This is far and away the best site for writing and reading fanfic, even in a beta phase. Can't wait to see the improvements! Keep up the great work.

Last Edited Sun 04 Oct 2015 12:33PM UTC

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Anna (Guest) Sun 04 Oct 2015 12:37PM UTC

Yay! \o/

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Speranza Sun 04 Oct 2015 03:42PM UTC

Fantastic!!!!

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NightV23 Sun 04 Oct 2015 10:46PM UTC

Yay this makes me very happy! I have a question also, I have a favorite author and love their fics on here but haven't been on here in months thanks to life. It seems that they've deleted all their fics in that time but left their profile up and I have no way to contact them at all to ask what happened, can they put them back up, or if they're even ok. How would I go about doing that? I at least want to make sure that they're alright. Can you guys please help and advise me?

Last Edited Sun 04 Oct 2015 10:46PM UTC

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1. mumble (AO3_ADT) (Official) Tue 06 Oct 2015 10:14PM UTC
  
  I'm very sorry, there isn't much we can do in cases like these. We are planning to introduce a personal messaging feature which might allow you to contact the author, but currently users have to include an email address or website link (such as Tumblr or Twitter) in their "About Me" section if they'd like others to get in touch. Really sorry!
  
  Last Edited Tue 06 Oct 2015 10:15PM UTC
  
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2. 1. StaciAnnR Wed 07 Oct 2015 03:01AM UTC
    
    Love the idea of a personal messaging feature!
    
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  2. mongrelmuppet Wed 07 Oct 2015 09:40AM UTC
    
    This is great news overall. **happy dance**
    Even better news is the plan to implement a personal messaging system.
    That's one thing this otherwise fantastic site is REALLY REALLY missing.
    
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  3. crimsonswirls Wed 14 Oct 2015 08:20PM UTC
    
    Something else that at least I'd appreciate is that when author x leaves ao3 either for good or just for a long time, they'd have a box they could click for 'inactive ao3 profile'. All their followers would get automatic message about it, just the way we get emails about their new fics and stuff, and if they'd ever come back we'd get an email again. That way new readers can also check their profile like "oh okay they're not on ao3 right now so I might to have wait for a long time for upades".
    
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1lostone Sun 04 Oct 2015 11:54PM UTC

Congrats coder person! <3 \o/ and thanks to everyone whose donation made this possible!

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Ellisama Mon 05 Oct 2015 03:26PM UTC

Great! If there is any need of graphic designers volunteers, I might be able to lend a hand!

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1. mumble (AO3_ADT) (Official) Tue 06 Oct 2015 10:15PM UTC
  
  Hi there,
  Thanks for offering, we appreciate it! Could you contact us (adt at transformativeworks.org) with some samples of your work? We'd love to get an idea of your style. Also definitely feel free to share any ideas you have about the AO3 design. Thank you much!
  Best,
  mumble
  Accessibility, Design & Technology committee
  
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Account Deleted Mon 05 Oct 2015 08:12PM UTC

Fantastic!
I'm just shocked that y'all still consider this site to be in 'Beta.' It looks pretty good to me. Y'all offer more than most other site do, as well.
--his

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Honeyinthesky Wed 07 Oct 2015 02:46AM UTC

Honestly if I had money and wasn't a broke teenager I would donate so much money to this website. Once I'm older and I have a job, even if I don't use it anymore I'll still donate cause I owe so much to this website !!!

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Kirah123 Wed 07 Oct 2015 02:51AM UTC

YEY! C:

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forbiddenstars Wed 07 Oct 2015 02:52AM UTC

wonderful!

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rapid_apathy Wed 07 Oct 2015 03:18AM UTC

Great news! I hope in the future the text input will be better, being able to just simply copy and paste and retain italics and formatting is the only important thing this site lacks in my opinion.

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Tomoseki Wed 07 Oct 2015 03:19AM UTC

Yay! \o/
\(= ^ ○ ^=)/

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ALittleSugestion (Guest) Wed 07 Oct 2015 03:25AM UTC

I'm not sure here is the place for this but I'll give it a shot and leave a suggestion to the developers about something that quirks me on most fanfic sites.
The thing is, when I filter something marked as complete and read the story and when I get to the end there's an author note saying there'll be a next chapter or something like that. I have to check the fics end to see if is really complete and most of the time I end up spoiling myself.
I was wondering if there was a way to make up a flag button for users to warn others about the wrong marking, or even the author that sometimes don't realize they did this, like a single button or that up/down votes for it...
Related to this problem there's another suggestion, a "Discontinued" tag/status for that fics that don't have the plot resolved but the authors won't be updating anymore so that if they are marked as complete people know the plot isn't wrapped up and if they are marked in progress people knoelw not to wait for it...
Maybe that's too much work or I'm the only one bothered by it, anyhow, cheers to the archive and I hope it keeps only improving!

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1. Charming2020 Wed 07 Oct 2015 10:12PM UTC
  
  Excellent ideas. I hate when a fic is marked complete and it isn't. It would be great to be warned (or warn others) about this.
  
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2. Account Deleted Wed 07 Oct 2015 10:13PM UTC
  
  This is the sort of thing you would want to submit as a suggestion. You can do that on this page over here.
  
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3. 1. ALittleSugestion (Guest) Fri 09 Oct 2015 03:19AM UTC
    
    Thanks for the direction!
    I just sent this suggestion there and added something else as well. I hope even if they can't do it, they see it so that someday it might happen :)
    
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OKImafan Wed 07 Oct 2015 03:27AM UTC

Very happy to hear this. I know how difficult it is to get this kind of work done in one's spare time, much better to have someone able to give it their all, even if only for a few months. Getting ready to click the donate button as we speak, in the hopes that more good news like this happens in the future!

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Jeniouis Fri 02 Oct 2015 07:39PM UTC

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