Contributing Partner stories: ProWorks Corporation

Meet ProWorks Corporation

Based in: Corvallis, Oregon, USA

Working with Umbraco for: 11 years

Contributing to the Umbraco project through:

• Packages
• Code Contributions
• Community activities

So...why contribute?

ProWorks has encouraged our team to contribute to the Umbraco project and community since the start of our Umbraco journey in 2010.  An Open Source project really runs on the volunteer contributions of the community and we feel it’s important to give back and share.

Ultimately, we contribute for many reasons: 

  ♥ We enjoy contributing to the larger community and helping out our fellow devs/designers/editors because we think it’s fun. 
  ♥ We feel like it’s a good way to prove our expertise in the Umbraco CMS.
  ♥ We might have a problem or client need that we can build and contribute to the community so others benefit from. 
  ♥ We feel it’s important to help the Umbraco CMS keep improving and growing towards the future.

Let's see some examples!

Packages

The most recent are:

• ProWorks v8 Migrations (featured in Umbraco Docs)
• GraphQL Package Co-maintainers
• Code contributions to other packages (fixes, etc)
  • Articulate
  • Courier Contrib
  • NuPickers

Code Contributions

• FIPS Support initial implementation, continued testing, and PRs to fix issues on version upgrades 
• .NET Core Version (Benjamin Carleski)
• Umbraco Block Editor Help, Contributions, and Testing during the development of the feature 
• Multiple Pull Requests to the Umbraco Core, i.e.:
  • Add null check in allowed template check 
  • Use dependency injection for config classes 
  • Remove obsolete Stylesheet constant and references 
  • Introduce Image URL Generator abstraction 
  • Handle for multiple picked media relations 
  • Add migrations for new block editor 

The Unicore Team, featuring ProWorks developer Benjamin Carleski

Community involvement

Here are some of the ways that we're active and involved in the Umbraco community:

• The Unicore Team - Benjamin
• Hosted a Hacktoberfest 2020 event
• Sponsored and Presented at every Umbraco U.S. Festival
• Umbr Mentor - supporting as a mentor

 

• Skrift Articles (check out articles by each author below!)
  • Benjamin Carleski
  • Catherine Stevens
  • Dominique Toumadje
  • Jason Prothero
  • Josh Seifert
  • Paul Sterling
  • Ryan Atkinson

"An Open Source project really runs on the volunteer contributions of the community and we feel it’s important to give back and share."

- Jason Prothero, ProWorks Corporation

The practicalities behind contributing

We have internal projects that we use to build projects or explore the latest tools or frameworks that help us grow as a team.

It's easy to be heads down and focused on client work and forget about contributions or sharing cool things we have done with the world - so we are flexible about using “work” time for community teams, answering forum questions, and mentoring.

Our President, Jason Prothero, helps nudge the team to post a blog, release a package, speak at an event etc.; he also keeps up to date with all the latest happenings in the Umbraco world and suggests internal projects to make sure ProWorks is on the leading edge of where Umbraco is heading. 

 

Some examples of internal projects that lead to contributions: 

• Re-building our internal intranet site as a Headless site using Umbraco, GraphQL Community Package, Gridsome and Vue.js. 
• Creating a library of Block List components that we can demo and reuse across clients. 
• Building an internal Umbraco sandbox site that supports the U.S. Web Design System. 

Our advice for Umbraco partners on getting more involved

We would encourage you to contribute however makes the most sense to you.  That could be simply sharing something interesting you have done on your blog that others might find helpful.  It could be a really small package that just does one small thing, but it does it really well.  Maybe it's helping edit the Documentation to make it better for the next person trying to learn Umbraco.  Or just jump in on the conversation for a new RFC. 

The point is that Umbraco CMS is unique in the Microsoft .NET world; as an Open Source CMS, we (the community) get to help guide the project forward - we get to help fix the issues we find. 

Furthermore, you get so much back from contributing: brand awareness, proof of expertise, and that good feeling when others give you a “High 5 You Rock” for your contributions! 

 

Want to hear more?

Please feel free to get in touch if you have any questions about what we've been doing.

The best way to reach us is through the contact form on our website, but you can find us on Twitter too 🙂

 

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H5YR to you, ProWorks Corporation for your awesome work, and long-time dedication to the Umbraco community!

 

ProWorks Corporation is an Umbraco Contributing Partner; read more on what that means.