Are you a subject mater expert (wrt an open source project)

subjectmaterexpert.md

Synopsis

A metric for determining the depth of understanding required to be a subject mater expert within a particular field software engineering.

Motivation

When a person speaks about a subject with authority, how can we determine the legitimacy of that authority? Perhaps a metric can be applied that will be both fair and flexible. Consider the following tangible accomplishments and the requirements for the depth of understanding behind each one.

Tangible items

• 100 Did you conceive/invent the subject
• 60 Core contributor to the subject
• 40 Have you written a library/tool that is a community dependency (such as NPM for Node.js)
• 40 Are you a contributor to a well known framework for the subject.
• 25 Did you co-found a business that is solely focused on the subject or uses the subject so extensively that it is well known to the subject's community.
• 20 Do you have one or more libraries for the subject that have more than 100 followers
• 10 Do you have a well known blog on the subject that shows good trafic volume with google analytics?
• 10 Have you written a book on the subject?
• 5 Do you have a CS degree?

Grading your score

100+ Subject Matter Experts, top quality authority 80-100 Highly knowledgeable, high quality authority under supervision of SME or peers 30-80 Employable, teach workshops under supervision 5-30 Model Student 0-5 Student