Say Hii to Open-Source world
“Hi Sir, how can I start contributing to open-source?” This question has been asked by so many open source enthusiasts in the last 2 years, and answering the same question multiple times blows my mind to write an article on the same question. “How you can start open-source contribution” in the most effective way.
So Hi everyone I am Anubhav Singh, an active open source contributor and enthusiast of the iOS open source world. I am writing this blog with my experience of 2 and a half years in open source development. In this time spam I worked with different organizations and most renowned open-source events few of them is —
- Google Summer of Code 2021 VideoLAN
- Swift Mentorship Program 2021 Swift(Apple)
- Alibaba Summer of Code 2020 OAM
- Google Summer of Code 2020 Amahi
We can split this article into 3 parts-
→ What are the essential things to know before starting an open-source contribution?
Git & GitHub — If you want to contribute to the open-source first thing with is most important is Git&GitHub. Without VCS(version control system) you’re not able to contribute to open source if you want through the coding.
Mini One technology — Before thinking about open source learn any one technology and making a few projects helps you be motivated when you try to start contributing to open source.
Understand English lang — Because English is a global language most of the documentation is written in English.
Yes, that’s it if you have these 3 skills you’re eligible to start your first open-source contribution.
→ How to choose an open-source organization/project?
Choosing an organization or project is a very essential part of open source. Maybe just because you choose the wrong org and after a few days of work you start disliking the open-source world.
Few tips on how to choose an org/project-
- Organization/Project must be active(You can see on the top of org when the project is last updated)
- Choose a project which you’re able to understand and learn about the requirements and expertise level of that project. If all three are concise with your level then that org is good to go.
- You can’t find your loved one organization in the first attempt so diverse yourself and contribute to different orgs and have a conversation with mentors and maintain.
- By asking questions on public channels helps you to understand the project and organization mythology.
→ Okk I found my love one org and project now tell me how I can start contributing?
1- Find issues that are labelled as “Good first issue”, “easy”, “Level-1” etc…
2- Comment down on the issue and ask if I work on this issue- because sometimes without asking you start working on a particular issue and you find out after a few hours that the issue is resolved so before start working on any issue comment down that you’re working on.
>> Solve only 1–3 Good first issues, Good first issue is open for developers who want to start contributing and want to be familiar with the codebase.
3- If you find difficulty while resolving an issue ask for help on the comment section or on the public communication channels.
4- If you find any issue inside the codebase, first search the issue list to see if the same issue is open or not if the issue you’re facing is not present in the issue list then open an issue with proper documentation(adding screenshot is good practice).
→ Important tips for beginners
- Do not send any private message to the mentor or maintainer of the project.
- Try to contribute through code rather than documentation or grammar errors.
- Try multiple projects on the same domain. Update your contribution to social media like Linkedin and Twitter(Helps you to attract recruiters)…
