# Meeting Minutes - March 18, 2026 ## Attendees: | Name | Attendance | Role/COI | | ------------------------ | ---------- | ---------------------------- | | Georg Link | No | OSC Chair | | Terence ‘Tex’ McCutcheon | Yes | Lead/Secretary | | Kyle Solomon | Yes | CPC Vice Chair | | Bora Oben | No | Developer Advocate - CF | | Dan Baruka | Yes | Developer Advocate Intersect | | Emmanuel Titi | Yes | Developer Advocate Intersect | | Harun Mwangi | Yes | Developer Advocate Intersect | | Uche Obasi | No | Developer Advocate Intersect | | Sebastian Pabon | Yes | OSC Member | | Darlisa Consoni | No | Ecosystem Engineering - CF | | Robertino Martinez | Yes | Product Owner - DevEx IOG | Community/Other Attendees * Bevan Mauya * Musa Ridwan Itopa * Samuel Leathers * Tommy Kammerer **Recording:** [Cardano Developer Experience Innovation WG - 2026/03/18 - Recording](https://drive.google.com/file/d/10mLxzGZc2zwDShTO1cgvqmlv5JiJlF-Z/view?usp=drive_link) **Transcript:** [Cardano Developer Experience Innovation WG - 2026/03/18 - Transcript](https://docs.google.com/document/d/1cg-gk0huIowT_nOclzxSFJ6OufIQ-nFyRbeseOhu5a8/edit?usp=sharing) **Chat Transcript:** [DevEx Innovation WG Meeting – 2026/03/18 – Chat Transcript](https://drive.google.com/file/d/1rMUQ1XIm6iF3eK7UD02vQlu5-7AEBNIY/view?usp=sharing) ## Agenda 3.18.26 * Developer Onboarding Breakdown ## Decisions/Actions **Decisions** * **Focus on Developer Portal:** A general consensus was reached to prioritize work and resources on developers.cardano.org to combat resource fragmentation. * **Target Audience Definition:** The group agreed that the primary target audience for current onboarding efforts is developers who are new to Cardano but want to build functional DApps. * **Onboarding Baseline:** Defined the onboarding "success" point as a developer being able to understand the UTXO model, write/sign a contract, serialize it, and connect it to a frontend. * **Documentation Philosophy:** Agreed that high-level "how-to" documentation should be centralized (likely on the developer portal), while low-level technical documentation (like Haddock) should remain close to the code repositories and be auto-updated. * **Bifurcated Funnels:** Acknowledged the need for two distinct paths: one for Core Tech contributors (maintaining the node/ledger) and one for DApp developers (using high-level tools like Mesh or Aiken). **Actions** * **Resource Mapping (Terence):** Start an issue thread or discussion on the developer portal to begin collecting and cataloging all existing high-level documentation resources. * **Bora’s Documentation (Bora/Tommy):** Document the specific decisions and current state of progress made in previous sessions (Tommy filling in for Bora). * **Repo Issues (Robertino/Everyone):** Create a series of issues in Oven’s repository to translate the current Miro board brainstorms into actionable tasks. * **Educational Asset Review (Terence):** Continue testing and exploring how to host the former Emergo Academy source files, potentially using the Andamio platform. * **Internal Consolidation Talk (Robertino):** Speak internally at IO to see if specific core tech documentation can be transferred or consolidated under Intersect to reduce "subdomain bloat." * **Agenda for Next Week (Group):** Map out the known resources collected from the new issue thread to identify exactly what needs to be "corralled" and consolidated. | Topic | Discussion | Notes | | ------------------------- | -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- | -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- | | Project Focus | Terence summarized the consensus from previous weeks: the primary focus is now on developers.cardano.org to address resource fragmentation. | Strategy is shifting toward centralized documentation. | | Developer Onboarding | The group discussed what "onboarding" actually means. Robertino defined the baseline as a developer being able to build a simple DApp (contracts, transactions, and frontend). | Agreement that onboarding depends on the developer's background (Web2 vs. Web3). | | Infrastructure Barriers | Robertino argued that managing a Cardano node isn't strictly necessary for onboarding, as devs can use intermediate interfaces like Blockfrost. | Goal is to lower the barrier to entry for initial building. | | Marketing & Retention | Kyle suggested using retargeting tags on documentation. If a developer visits and leaves, marketing spend can trigger ads to bring them back into the funnel. | Aim is to treat the developer portal as a conversion funnel. | | Advocate Experience | Harun and Dan shared insights from the last six months. A major hurdle is the "path to opportunity"—showing devs how to go from learning to earning/contributing. | Fragmented and outdated docs remain a significant blocker. | | "Five-Minute" Success | Sebastian emphasized the need for a "5-minute build" experience. Developers need immediate "hits of happiness" to stay engaged with the complex Cardano stack. | Immediate feedback loops are key to retention. | | Hello World Tutorials | Kyle and Dan proposed creating 3-5 distinct "Hello World" paths (e.g., submitting a transaction vs. minting an asset) to cater to different developer interests. | Provide multiple entry points to the ecosystem. | | Smart Contract Simulation | Samuel noted a major ecosystem failure: the lack of an easy environment to simulate smart contracts without a full node or advanced Haskell knowledge. | Need for a "Plutus Development Platform" or sandbox. | | Intersect's Scope | Terence clarified that Intersect (via Developer Advocates) acts as a steward for core repositories. Funding for new tooling may come through the Tooling Sustainability Program. | Distinction made between documentation work and tool development. | | Educational Resources | Harun mentioned the now-closed Emergo Academy. Terence confirmed he has the source files and is exploring hosting them via the Andamio platform for Intersect members. | Potential for a token-based "certificate of completion" for learners. | | Core vs. DApp Funnels | Robertino suggested splitting onboarding into two paths: one for Core Tech contributors (node, ledger) and one for DApp developers (Mesh, Aiken). | Profiles and skill sets for these two groups are vastly different. | | Documentation Hierarchy | The group discussed a three-tier doc structure: Beginner (high-level), Intermediate (how-to guides), and Top-level (auto-generated API/Haddock docs). | High-level docs should be centralized; low-level docs stay near the code. | | Consolidation Strategy | Robertino proposed consolidating various IO and Intersect subdomains into a single "Core Tech" documentation cluster to reduce confusion. | Goal: A "single source of truth" for core contributors. | | Action Items | Terence suggested starting an issue thread/discussion on the developer portal to collect and map all existing high-level resources. | The next meeting will focus on mapping these resources. | --- # Agent Instructions: Querying This Documentation If you need additional information that is not directly available in this page, you can query the documentation dynamically by asking a question. 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