---
title: "Visualizing successful collaboration"
author: "SWE WG"
subtitle: "A visual time lapse of six months of work on the mmrm R package"
description: Communicating the benefit of open collaboration can be hard - we used the "gource" tool to create a video based on the repository history of the mmrm R package.
date: "2022-11-20"
categories: [news, R]
image: "mmrm-video.png"
---

It can be hard to communicate the benefit of open-source collaboration, 
the effort that goes into it, and its enormous impact on data science, to 
a non-technical audience. 
Visualizations can be very helpful here and we created a 
[video](https://youtu.be/DAIR_rBV3zQ) showing the 
first six months of development of the [`mmrm`](https://openpharma.github.io/mmrm/main/) R package.
The video is based on the cumulative commit history of the git repository where
the package development happens.
It shows contributions to the "main" branch of the repository and how contributors
add or edit files.
Files are visualized by dots and arranged in a tree structure defined by the
folders in the repository.
The video is optimized for full HD quality.

<iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/DAIR_rBV3zQ" title="YouTube video player" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen></iframe>

Only direct code contributions are shown. This does not include, ideation,
community organization, code reviews, bug reporting, or answering questions, and
promoting the package - 
all of which are important to make such a project a long-term success.

If you want to co-star in the next iteration of the video, check out the
[mmrm git repository](https://github.com/openpharma/mmrm), get in touch and
contribute! Our contribution guidelines can be found [here](https://openpharma.github.io/mmrm/main/CONTRIBUTING.html).

We used [gource](https://gource.io/) to create the video following an 
[example and guide](https://youtu.be/_ZUddQAhPFw) by [Nan Xiao](https://nanx.me).
