Around this time every year when Inktober and Oktoberfest are going strong, for us Open Source enthusiasts Hacktoberfest rolls around!
Hacktoberfest is a month long celebration of open source contributions. It is beginner friendly and a great way to get to know Git, Github and the Open Source community as well as get a free t-shirt and laptop stickers! (We’re all about the code though, I swear)
The power of Open Source is the power of the people. The people rule.— Phillipe Kahn
With 10 days left to go, we’ve put together some tips and advice on how to get started.
The criteria for Hacktoberfest 2019 is four PRs (pull requests); they don’t need to be merged and the contributions can range from correcting documentation to fixing bugs. In line with the Hacktoberfest value ‘Quantity is fun, quality is key’, there is a code of conduct and guidelines in place to reduce spam and low quality contributions. You can read more about them here.
Stuck on how to get started? Don’t fret, we’ve got you covered!
Guides:
- https://medium.com/@geekanamika/everything-you-need-to-know-about-hacktoberfest-9bfc3376d92e
- https://help.github.com/en/articles/creating-a-pull-request
- Here’s a guide to contribute to our repository.
If this is your first time, finding repositories to which you can contribute to can seem a little daunting initially. Here are a few beginner friendly repos to get you started!
- https://github.com/firstcontributions/first-contributions : This is an essential hands-on tutorial that walks you through contributions workflow on github. Completion of the tutorial counts as a contribution to the project.
- https://github.com/satyajitghana/Competitive-Programming :Solved any problem statements on HackerRank, CodeChef or any other competitive coding platform? Simply upload your solution here for an easy PR request!
- https://github.com/BaReinhard/Hacktoberfest-Mathematics : Upload code that uses any mathematical formula or function.
- https://github.com/topics/climate-change : You can even contribute to repos on relevant issues like climate change.
- https://github.com/loopccoew/loop2019-20sem1 : Submit a PR request to our repo by uploading a solution to any of the given problem statements.
Here is an extensive list of repositories that you can refer to.
Read the README.md and CONTRIBUTING.md files of the repository as well as the Hacktoberfest quality standards to ensure that your PR request is in the required format and complies with the guidelines, otherwise it may be regarded as “invalid” and not be counted as a contribution.
You can also check out the other companies taking part in Hacktoberfest to get your hands on some more swag!
Happy coding and a joyful Diwali🎇
~Neha Tirumalasetti & Aaliyah Ahmed, Team Loop
