Table of Contents

Date

22 Aug 2016

Attendees

Actions items from previous meeting

• Circulate LLC API Guidelines - Former user (Deleted) - available here
• Circulate existing API list - Peter Monks - available here (please contact Peter Monks if you don't have a login to the developer docs site)
• Review LLC API guidelines and existing API list - ALL
• Coordinate an exercise to identify 1 to 3 top API-related objectives that each participant thinks needs to be worked on in the next 3-9 months - Former user (Deleted), Peter Monks (with consultation from Former user (Deleted) &Former user (Deleted))
  
  • In progress - survey sent to members list 2016-08-18
• Send out invitation for next meeting - 2016-08-22 - Former user (Deleted)

Agenda

Meeting notes

• Roll call
• Previous meeting minutes approved with no objections
• Survey results:
  
  • Background:
    • We had some thoughts about the scope of the WG - definition of standards / best practices, whether it would include operational things (prioritisation, requirements lists).
    • I've sent out a survey to get the membership to give some data
    • 3 responses to date - not critical mass, but wanted to use this time to confirm that everyone saw the survey and to share their opinions:
      • Not enough time?  2 days isn't long.
      • The survey didn't convey the tone of the request - what are the priorities of this WG
  • Do we need more time?
    • Adeel: I don't think I saw the survey come through to me.
    • Anthony: who else did not get the survey?
    • Adeel: I'm not finding it in email
    • Anthony: it was sent to the general member list
    • Ian: I don't see it either - I wonder if it got blocked?
    • Jhonalyn: me neither
    • Anthony: did the FactSet guys receive it?
    • Johan: yes we received it and I responded this morning
    • Anthony: I'll follow up with Peter on how the member list works
    • Anthony: Paul, Anjana - did you see it?
    • Bruce: yes I did
    • Anthony: do you need more time?
    • Bruce: we have a separate meeting this afternoon to discuss 
  • In the absence of sufficient survey results, should we discuss the charter or postpone until later?
    • Bruce: focusing on standardisation and technical policy is not helpful. I circulated the document on this after last meeting. There seems to be little value in re-addressing it for the sake of addressing it. I want the group to focus on what people want the APIs to do. The other thing is talk about language specific bindings. There is useful scope for someone to take a lead in making sure there are common approaches in terms of object models in the language specific bindings.  I see no value in revisiting the shape and naming conventions in the REST API.
    • Adeel: I second that opinion. I also feel that we could best use our time to drive capabilities, identify gaps, go to our user base and figure out what they need. If we have consensus on those things drive those back.  If we have that this group will have a big win.
    • Michael: being specific, what are you imagining that would be?  What gaps would you bring back to this group for the group to chart out?  Can you give examples of what you're imagining?
    • Adeel: there's a huge suite of APIs in the messaging space. There are all sorts of APIs that are generally available - bots for example, provisioning and administrative APIs, up the stack and around the stack, being able to enhance the UI, being able to intercept messages before they get to the client so that something can be done by an extension or application. Ultimately in terms of gaps we need to understand what our LOB developers want to build and see if there's a gap there.  That's what the internal discussions need to be and then come back to the group.
    • Paul: It's very important for this group to only focus on things that only this group can do.  To talk to customers is redundant - there's an entire team at Symphony who already do this. Until the platform is open sourced, every development is bottlenecked by what Symphony engineering can do. We don't want to duplicate efforts.
    • Adeel: I was talking about gaps in APIs and extensibility, not functionality.  Our developers are saying "we want to be able to do X, but right now the API can only do Y".
    • Paul: that's what I'm referring to - we already have structures in place to figure this out.  We've worked for a long time to figure out those gaps.  I want to make sure we're not duplicating efforts.
    • Peter L: I agree that it doesn't makes sense to look at the current gaps.  But as we look add the additional APIs - when we start to enrich the APIs Symphony provides, it is worthwhile to look at what the general guidelines are, but perhaps not for the existing APIs.
    • Anthony: should we reframe the charter around this, and send it back to the group to review?  The next major step is to get the charter to the Foundation for ratification so that we can start on our work items.  Are you comfortable enough with this?  Do we need more input?
    • Adeel: do we see the members of this WG having a role in evangelising the Symphony APIs to their organisation?  So instead of being a 1-way back to Symphony, taking it back into the organisations?
    • Michael: I see that it does entail some of that.  But we can't be tech support on the APIs.  How does evangelism go into enablement, and helping to make it happen?  To some degree I think it does include evangelism.  I could imagine a hackathon or series of hackathons based on Foundation APIs that added value above and beyond the Symphony APIs.
    • Adeel: to your point we want to make a clear line between evangelism and tech support.
    • Anthony: do we produce sample apps and other content?  Promotion and awareness are something I haven't seen yet from Symphony or the Open Source group - seems reasonable for us to take that on.
    • Michael: it seems like we need a short summary of this on the Charter statement so that we can iterate on the charter.  Keep it brief, but bring these points in.  Anthony, Peter and I should take the lead on this.  We'll also continue with the survey, but iterating on it (ed: the charter) seems important.
    • Anthony: charter needs to reflect scope of what's been discussed on the call.  
  • Anthony: Last point of discussion:
    • Is there anything else that should be included or accounted for?  Or have we accounted for everything?
    • Adeel: nothing additional from me.
• Anthony: timing for next meeting?
  • 2 weeks out is labor day, so should we go out 3 weeks?
  • Michael: Labor Day week is the week of the Foundation board meeting in London. Perhaps we could meet in person in London?
  • Johan: we are based in London and will be here.
  • Peter M: I will be in London that week too.
  • Michael: momentum is important - I think the revised charter needs to be out in the next couple of days.  If there's significant discussion around the charter we may need an ad-hoc meeting.  What about Thursday 8th September, in the afternoon GMT?
  • <no objection>
• Peter: the minutes have moved to a private space in Confluence - you will need a Confluence login to access it.  If you have any issues, please contact peter@symphony.foundation.

Action items

• Check mailing list for JP Morgan Chase folks - Peter Monks
  
  • Done - Adeel, Jhonalyn and Ian are not members, so I've invited them.
• Iterate the charter and send it back out for comments - Former user (Deleted), Peter Monks, Former user (Deleted)
• Schedule next meeting / call for Thursday September 8th, in the afternoon UTC.  Include a location where people who will be at the Symphony BOD meeting can physically as well - Former user (Deleted), Peter Monks