

Ask HN: 24 Hour Open Source Projects? - peterwwillis

I've been in a creative mood lately, and usually that means giving myself a menial programming task to accomplish over a day or two. However, I don't really have anything I need to make right now. I figure somebody must have some small programming jobs they haven't had time to complete, and if anything it gives me an opportunity to pick up some new technology or framework. I know Perl, C, Python, SQL and various scripting/markup languages. My requirements are no payment and that the result be open source licensed, and the time needed to complete be no longer than a weekend.
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mechanical_fish
All of us have perpetrated the occasional drive-by solo-practitioner open-
source project, but frankly such projects aren't that useful. What's useful
are the projects that have stuck around for a while and demonstrated their
utility by acquiring a community larger than one.

So consider spending your time testing or fixing bugs or writing docs or
generally helping out with an _existing_ open source project that is looking
for help. There are lots and lots of those. They can really use the help.

~~~
peterwwillis
I completely agree, which is why I wanted someone to give me a task they would
find useful vs just academic exercises.

Also, I don't know where to begin with projects that need help. Can you
suggest a way to find those projects more in need, or is there one using
perl/c/python that you're familiar with and needs help?

