
What are the problems faced by people who are starting to contribute to OSS - sudo_bangbang
I&#x27;m starting a project to address the problems faced by noobs to opensource community.<p>I&#x27;ve started out with a simple readme file which explains the basic git and github workflow. Please give me feedback
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vitovito
There will be people reading this who have never used a Terminal, or typed at
a command line, or called directories anything other than "folders".

There will be people reading this who have never installed anything that
wasn't from an App Store.

There will be people reading this who have never heard of source control,
branches, repos, or any of the other jargon in your document.

I think the number two thing project maintainers need to do is to stop making
assumptions about the background and experience level of their potential
contributors; or, if they do, to admit and outline them.

I write more about this here: [http://opendesign.foundation/articles/import-
designers/](http://opendesign.foundation/articles/import-designers/)

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flukus
Someone described by those first 3 things probably couldn't do much on an OS
project anyway.

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sudo_bangbang
Agree with @flukus. I didn't put anything about pre-requisites because I
didn't want to drive anyone away. Anybody seeing these things for the first
time can just google it and learn right?

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afarrell
For some people, it takes quite a while to learn to be comfortable with the
command line.

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bbcbasic
Some open sourcerers use Windows and Visual Studio and Sourcetree. No cmd
needed!

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Jtsummers
If this is intended for noobs, I suggest cleaning up your example
fork/branch/push/pull request.

You have the reader create a branch called add-your-name, then push that to
the server. Only the next example for the pull request talks about a branch
called fix-readme. This _will_ confuse novices.

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sudo_bangbang
Here's a link to what I've started [https://github.com/Roshanjossey/first-
contributions](https://github.com/Roshanjossey/first-contributions)

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ashitlerferad
Seems very specific to git/github, which are popular here on HN but there is a
great deal more variety out there.

I'd suggest something that doesn't deal in specific technologies but more
general principles.

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sudo_bangbang
Thank you for the insight. Will checkout other tools as well.

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soboleiv
I'd point to a few examples of pull requests which were merged into OSS
projects already and explained what authors generally went through.

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ashitlerferad
Check out this:

[http://openhatch.org/](http://openhatch.org/)

