

100 Days of GitHub Contributions - jaxbot
http://jaxbot.me/articles/100-days-of-github-contributions-5-5-2014

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svisser
Alternative lesson: UI design matters. Github is achieving what they want
(increased participation) by stimulating daily activity through an activity
graph. Example: this article, John Resig
([https://github.com/jeresig](https://github.com/jeresig)), etc.

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ben010783
I don't get why BitBucket hasn't realized this yet. Their profile pages could
look so much better.

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james33
100 days is probably a pretty good limit, it starts to lose effectiveness past
that. Last year I did 234 days straight, only ending the streak on my wedding
day, but it should have ended much sooner. It was ultra-productive for the
first 60-70% of the days, but the focus started shifting from being productive
to keeping the streak alive. It ultimately became counter-productive after
going for so long. Sounds great in theory, but make sure you give yourself a
hard limit.

~~~
nraynaud
I'm on a streak too, but some days I just push a little detail just to keep
things alive. Since I'm jobless and people around me don't understand anything
about software development, I have a number and a graph to show some kind of
activity (and it's on the internet, it must be true).

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shekhar101
Interesting. I saw one other post few days back(don't have link handy). OP had
contributed for 100 days. Question to you(and others) How do you select
projects for that?

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ionforce
As I currently understand it, any commit you push to the main branch (so not
wip/feature branches) will count towards your activity graph being filled out.
This includes projects in your own repo.

So I'm assuming you were referring to the possible difficulty of finding and
selecting projects to contribute to. You can also contribute to ones of your
own.

~~~
rtpg
Also the chart backfills, so if you work in a feature branch and it gets
merged into a main branch, github looks at the dates of your commits and uses
that.

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mandlar
Ever since I read John Resig's code every day article[1], I've started keeping
track of my "streak" with a calendar next to my desk[2]. I've made substantial
progress on my soon-to-be released personal project because of this. I don't
know how long this will last, but it definitely keeps my project fresh in my
mind all day, every day. Even if I only do a little bit of work, it's much,
much better than waiting until a weekend and not feeling motivated because I
have a huge pile of things to do. I use a Trello board to break down things
into simple "tasks", so I try to take down at least one or two of those a day.

[1] [http://ejohn.org/blog/write-code-every-day/](http://ejohn.org/blog/write-
code-every-day/) [2]
[http://instagram.com/p/ngoaRQg0Fq/](http://instagram.com/p/ngoaRQg0Fq/)

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orkj
I am also on a similar path (87 days atm). I have noticed a couple of things
that forces its way into a state of mind:

\- I have started to always open source everything I do. It's the same as the
gameification aspect, I just need to get another spot on that graph.

\- I immidiately try to fix/report issues I encounter with other projects,
even if they are minor (instead of just being a little annoyed about it).
Also, opening issues counts towards the streak!

\- I force myself to learn new things, all the time. Finished with a small
project? Time to learn a new language and push the project to github.

So I'll recommend the "code every day" or "100 days of github" to anyone
interested in learning new things or contributing more back to open source.

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kylemaxwell
I stopped messing with the contributions after it became clear how arbitrary
and frustrating the feature can be. Not only does it still struggle with time
zones and branches, when you leave an organization or otherwise lose access to
a private repository, all of those contributions disappear from your graph. I
have found the concept to work better for me by tracking my streaks using
other tools like Habit RPG.

