
Ask HN: How do I find an open source project to contribute to? - coffeeski
I&#x27;m a Senior Dev and got a fire lit under my butt after going to the Rails Conf 2017 in Phoenix. I would like to contribute to a Ruby or Javascript project, but I don&#x27;t know what, or where I can find them...<p>How do I find a open source project that needs some maintainers or things fixed? I am open to writing Ruby, Javascript or Elixir. I&#x27;m also open to writing documentation
======
mwenge
The most important thing is to find a project that has the bandwidth to
process your contributions. If you see dangling pull requests or patches that
have never been reviewed, move along. Even if a project passes this smell
test, the only way to be sure that it has maintainers willing to devote some
measure of time to providing feedback on your work is to submit one or two
small fixes and see how they fare.

~~~
slinger
Agreed. Have your work ignored is a huge let down

------
vertebrate
[https://openhatch.org/](https://openhatch.org/)

[https://www.codetriage.com/](https://www.codetriage.com/)

------
based2
[https://helpwanted.apache.org/](https://helpwanted.apache.org/)

[http://www.gnu.org/help/help.html](http://www.gnu.org/help/help.html)

[http://savannah.gnu.org/people/?group=tasklist](http://savannah.gnu.org/people/?group=tasklist)

[https://sourceforge.net/p/forge/helpwanted/?SetFreedomCookie](https://sourceforge.net/p/forge/helpwanted/?SetFreedomCookie)

[http://stackoverflow.com/questions/38881/how-to-find-
opensou...](http://stackoverflow.com/questions/38881/how-to-find-opensource-
projects-looking-for-help)

[https://ask.slashdot.org/story/10/07/04/195239/Finding-
Open-...](https://ask.slashdot.org/story/10/07/04/195239/Finding-Open-Source-
Projects-Looking-For-Help?SetKingdominoCookie)

------
SallySwanSmith
[https://openhatch.org/](https://openhatch.org/) Is an nonprofit dedicated
towards helping people find and get involved in open source software

~~~
webmaven
Second the suggestion of OpenHatch.

------
danso
Is there a gem or library that you use? One that isn't _too_ massively
complex? Then start with that. My first open source contributions were adding
features to libraries that were useful to me, so even if I got slapped down, I
still came out ahead in terms of productivity.

Another reason to pick a library you actually use is because you will go into
it with additional curiosity and expectations. I'm always a bit thrilled to
find out that a library which I can't even begin to imagine being clever or
thoughtful enough to design is indeed much smarter than I imagined, or, is
actually kept together with duct tape. The latter situation has actually
helped me overcome productivity declines that come from obsessing in vain over
whether I've got the details down right. I just need to remind myself that a
much more useful and popular library that I depend on has apparently flaws
that end up not impeding development or public usage.

------
michaericalribo
What do you use regularly, that is open source? You'll be more motivated to
participate in projects that you use on a regular basis, that might be useful
to you.

Find some software that you're interested in. Do you follow their GitHub
account, subscribe to the mailing list (especially dev list), keep up to date
on changes that are new? Have you looked at their source? Is there anything
you wish the software did better, or any bugs you wish were fixed?

Learning how everything fits together for a software project can be a great
learning experience, and if you take notes as you go, you'll naturally write
docs (and be the hero of the day).

------
i336_
You could write a project-finding app using JS and Ruby/Elixir/JS for the
backend

I'm thinking of scraping GitHub, Bitbucket, HackerOne, etc for metrics that
correspond to projects that a) need help and b) need the kind of help you'd
want to give.

This is the problem you're staring at right now, so you're already interested
in solving it.

------
ghuntley
[http://up-for-grabs.net/#/](http://up-for-grabs.net/#/)

------
andreftavares
<shameless-plug> [https://github.com/yoonic](https://github.com/yoonic)
</shameless-plug>

My open-source e-commerce platform all in Javascript. Backend is an API
powered by Hapi.js (node.js) and Storefront is a React isomorphic app.

------
vortico
My suggestion is to convince your company (or if you own the company, simply
take action) to use a particular open source software package. As soon as you
run into a feature you need but the package does not offer, take some time to
develop on top of it (on company time or at home) instead of writing your own
hacky in-house solution, using a more careful development process than your
company's software. Develop it until it is used in production, and donate the
feature to the project. This way, if it is not wanted or ignored, it will
still benefit you or your company.

------
squiguy7
You can try to look under GitHub's trending page for those languages (e.g.
[https://github.com/trending/ruby](https://github.com/trending/ruby)).

Also I like to check out tools that I use daily and see if there are issues I
can tackle. You can follow mailing lists, public slack channels, etc. too.

Just talking to others will give you ideas to get started. And if you can't
find anything quickly, start your own and have fun with it!

------
ragesoss
You can contribute to my project,
[https://github.com/WikiEducationFoundation/WikiEduDashboard](https://github.com/WikiEducationFoundation/WikiEduDashboard)

It's a Rails/React app for professors to run Wikipedia assignments, where
instead of writing term papers, the students improve Wikipedia articles.

I'd love to have help from experienced devs -- especially someone to help me
get started migrating to Redux.

------
agibsonccc
Usually find something you use. OSS projects love small/scoped fixes. There
are a ton of underlooked at sections of larger projects like docs, minor
optimizations,..

If you can, try to look at how the project communicates with the community
(mailing list, irc, gitter,slack,..) and just ask the community where the pain
points are if you can't find any open issues.

------
goldenbeet
The best way to do it is just look at what packages you use frequently. If
their github repo is accessible then dive into the "issues" and start opening
some PRs to address them. And if you've ever wished the package did X then
propose it and open a PR to see if the maintainers are interested in adding it

------
rukenshia
You could try contributing to gitlab.com, I didn't know any Ruby when I
started contributing but they have an awesome guideline and issue tags that
show you what's easy to do for you. You get high quality code reviews and they
help you a lot when you struggle.

------
roschdal
Freeciv is looking for contributors: [https://github.com/freeciv/freeciv-
web](https://github.com/freeciv/freeciv-web)

------
Mz
[http://micheleincalifornia.blogspot.com/p/my-
sandbox.html](http://micheleincalifornia.blogspot.com/p/my-sandbox.html)

------
aw3c2
Any project needs help. Pick a hobby of yours and browse the web to find
appropriate projects in your languages. I would say that is the best way to
find work that is fun for you.

------
navyad
[https://www.codetriage.com/](https://www.codetriage.com/)

