How To Contribute to Open Source Projects 101

As someone who organizes various meetups, hackathons & tech conferences all revolving around open source software, the #1 question I always get is "how can i contribute to open source?" This is a key question & one that doesn't get enough attention. This presentation aims to not only answer this question for users but will also hopefully help Community Managers of existing open source projects to streamline the process and attract even more community contributions.

The misnomer is that you have to be a coder to contribute. Unfortunately, this misconception still exists for people at all levels & from many different age groups. It's not a problem isolated to one particular group. But don't fret, we'll put to rest all of your doubts that you're not "techy enough" to contribute. That's one of the many beauties of open source software & the community that keeps it alive. It's a "doacracy." No one cares what you look like, what your religious beliefs are, what your sexual orientation is or how many zeroes are at the end of that paycheck. It's about what you "do" & how much you contribute to the community that matters. This is key because it levels the playing field, makes open source software even more accessible & is a major contributing factor to why open source projects around the world have a higher inclusion rate of women (for example) in comparison to other tech projects.

We'll be going over the many ways you can contribute, how to pick a project, what to expect & how to be successful doing so while having fun. For any endeavor to be successful, it's got to be a win-win. So for the icing on the cake, we'll discuss why & how it benefits YOU to contribute to open source projects. There's a little here for everyone.

So come on out, sit a spell, and let's make the open source ecosystem an even better one!