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Asking and Finding help - Outreachy

Let’s contribute to open-source - Get, set, GO!
By Neha Gupta |
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Neha Gupta is adding support for Kustomize in Jenkins X, to enable Kubernetes native configuration management, while participating in Outreachy from December 2019 to March 2020.

Outreachy open-source contribution for applicants — Asking/Finding help

This blog might be helpful for beginners who are fear-stricken or I would say hesitant to ASK, to get lost in the new world while trying to understand any open source project, fear of asking questions that may sound stupid later on or are very obvious! First of all.. Relax!

  • Everyone starts from somewhere and has a learning curve!..

  • There are some pre-requisites that may help you get into open-source development better..

  • Learn basics of git operations. (https://learngitbranching.js.org , I find this easy and helpful).

  • Try to find an open-source project (remember : you’re going to contribute to a part of it, so it’s okay if some/many things doesn’t make sense in the beginning, because it’s easier to write code than to understand someone else’s code).

  • For selecting a project you may also look for Google-Summer-of-Code, Outreachy, Google-Code-In, RSoC and other open-source programs and their organisations that helps people/students/aspiring developers to find your best interest communities and projects.

NOTE : Beware! seeing too many organisations and projects will only confuse you, so start with only one or max 2 projects, try to deep-dive and focus on them.

After selecting the project :

  • Connect with the community through their communication channels for both developers and users (example : Slack, IRC-Cloud, Zulip, Riot etc )

  • Try to read the documentation and understand the overall structure and purpose of the project you’re starting to work on.

  • If you don’t understand something functionality wise — just ask! Ask on the communication channel.

  • If you are facing any error — Google search it, or try to look into the existing issues, if you’re not able to move forward and you’re stuck on the same error for more than 45 mins, just ask! Trust me! There’s no harm. In-fact, people of open-source communities appreciate it, feels motivated when there are users asking them about something that they’re passionately building. It also sometimes, helps the community to re-define and re-align the product and some features.

Happy learning! :)