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Getting Started Contributing Back To Open Source

Posted by kdawson on from the foot-in-the-door dept.

markfreeman writes "The one burning need I have felt over the last year was to get involved with open source as a contributor. I have wanted to help with documentation, advocacy, and most of all, with programming. Here's the story of how I got started, thanks to openhatch.org (which calls itself 'an open source involvement engine') and how you can too."

5 of 99 comments (clear)

  1. easiest way to get involved by WarJolt · · Score: 5, Insightful

    many people overlook the fact that the best thing we all can do for oss is to use it.

    1. Re:easiest way to get involved by Ethanol-fueled · · Score: 5, Insightful

      And to demonstrate it to others without shoving it in their faces.

  2. Good for you by suso · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Glad he felt the desire to give time back. I think that one thing that can help out open source is to let the developer know that you liked their software. Bug reports are good but when they all pile up, it kinda makes development feel more like work. The next program I'm releasing soon (http://suso.suso.org/xulu/clide) is going to have a --warmfuzzy option that will allow the user to send a ping like feedback back to the author to let them know that they enjoy using the software. Kinda like a ring the bell if you liked the service thing. All too often open source tools are used and the developer doesn't have any feedback as to whether their software is being used successfully or not. I'd like to help change that.

  3. Write User Documentation by ducomputergeek · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Ain't fun. Ain't sexy. Needs to be done.

    --
    "The problem with socialism is eventually you run out of other people's money" - Thatcher.
    1. Re:Write User Documentation by Jurily · · Score: 5, Insightful

      How about "make it usable enough so users don't need documentation"?

      Hint: how do you make Xorg play nice with laptops getting repeatedly connected to different size screens/projectors? I did RTFM, for several hours. Meanwhile, Win7 takes 3 mouse clicks the first time, then remembers your settings.

      I want to stay on Linux, I really do. But I also need to Get Shit Done.