
Ask HN: Lesser-known open source projects that need contributors? - sauravt
I am a python developer and I am looking to contribute to some lesser known open source projects in python.
Do you know of any such projects ?<p>Thanks
======
jordigh
The thing is, if it's lesser known, why would you want to contribute to it?
Your contribution would probably just languish in obscurity.

That being said, I have one project that I really would like to see thrive: sh
(and perhaps give it a different name)

[http://amoffat.github.io/sh/](http://amoffat.github.io/sh/)

I really hope this some day becomes the standard Python interface to the
system shell.

I also work with Mercurial and Octave. Mercurial is a very lively and smart
community. We always need more contributors, and hg is of course less popular
than git:

[http://mercurial.selenic.com/wiki/ContributingChanges](http://mercurial.selenic.com/wiki/ContributingChanges)

Drop by #mercurial in Freenode if hg seems like your thing.

~~~
freehunter
Getting practice working with existing projects or contributing to open source
is a good reason to seek out projects to contribute to, and finding lesser-
known projects takes a bit of the stress out of trying to learn by
contributing to high-profile projects.

~~~
jordigh
> finding lesser-known projects takes a bit of the stress out of trying to
> learn by contributing to high-profile projects.

Can you please explain this? I don't understand. Is the fear that, say, if I
contribute to Linux and Linus absolutely hates my patch, he will make a huge
mockery of me and the mockery might even end up on the front page of HN? Or
are high-profile projects just in general very unwelcoming? I mean, Mozilla
appears to be very friendly:

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

Is it not actually friendly?

I honestly don't understand, because I just send my patches wherever I can
send them, regardless of their social status. I have never experienced this
kind of stress.

~~~
pm215
I think that high-profile projects have a necessary tendency to default to a
fairly high bar for contribution quality and a more heavyweight process for
how much testing/review/rework needs to be done to get the patch in. This
flows from the fact that they have a lot of users (so regressions are bad and
UI changes or new features need more thought/consensus) and often a high rate
of patch submission (so maintainers can be short on time to help bring less-
than-perfect contributions up to standard). Within that there are of course
more and less friendly projects.

~~~
endersshadow
You're also forgetting the biggest thing, I think, standing in the way:
Intimidation. Perhaps in their minds, they aren't expert developers, and are
just learning, and therefore, their contributions to a very large project like
Firefox or Linux would be unwelcome--as they probably are a little too scared
to start. A self-confidence issue, as it were.

Through the lens of the internet, it certainly feels sometimes like everybody
knows everything--you often forget that you're getting thousands of viewpoints
rather than just one super programmer doing everything. I can definitely see
how this would be intimidating for newer developers.

Cutting your teeth on obscure open source projects is a way to build up your
self-confidence, work with others, and see your contributions make a tangible
benefit.

~~~
freehunter
These two things are exactly what I had in mind. Lack of confidence in your
skills while starting out and a barrier to entry (my patch very well might
break something else). Not that large OSS projects are unwelcoming, but a
little bit of training goes a long way.

------
briancurtin
Python itself. Check out the developer guide at
[https://docs.python.org/devguide/](https://docs.python.org/devguide/) and the
mentorship list at [https://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/core-
mentorship/](https://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/core-mentorship/) to get
started.

------
sciurus
Looking through Debian's Work-Needing and Prospective Packages pages for
projects written in Python might give you some ideas.

[https://www.debian.org/devel/wnpp/](https://www.debian.org/devel/wnpp/)

The list is composed of packages that need Debian maintainers for whatever
reason. I realize you're looking to contribute to developing software rather
than packaging it, but there may be a correlation between projects that need
packagers and those that need developers.

------
molsson
"Critic" is an open source web app for doing code reviews. It's written in
Python and could use more contributors.

Code: [https://github.com/jensl/critic](https://github.com/jensl/critic)

See it running: [https://critic-review.org/dashboard](https://critic-
review.org/dashboard)

------
declension
Quod Libet [1] is a mature but "lesser known" audio project written in Python
and GTK+ (3).

Whilst there are probably some quite high barriers to entry (the user
community is very tech- and music-savvy, the project is fairly feature-
complete, and the codebase quite complex), we're fairly welcoming and try to
take care of our (large) backlog of tickets whilst welcoming useful
contributions where possible, or at least discussing / explaining their
considered rejection.

In particular, we could really do with a dev (or in fact buildmasters /
testers) who are Mac-based ideally with some knowledge of building and testing
Python and GTK+ apps on OS X. Probably best to email the list for further
details.

[1] [http://code.google.com/p/quodlibet/](http://code.google.com/p/quodlibet/)

------
dalek2point3
openstreetmap, a global project, could really do with some more developers.
for example, we still need a reporting framework that displays a dashboard of
stats. many other projects can be found here:
[https://github.com/osmlab](https://github.com/osmlab)

~~~
rohitv
Could you elaborate on the reporting framework? Couldn't find any details on
it...

~~~
bjelkeman-again
A good open-source set of tools to assemble good dashboards and reporting
would be useful in many areas, including the work I am involved in. We are
looking at building some of this ourselves at the moment.

------
teabee89
NuPIC: [https://github.com/numenta/nupic](https://github.com/numenta/nupic).
Numenta Platform for Intelligent Computing: a brain-inspired machine
intelligence platform, and biologically accurate neural network based on
cortical learning algorithms.

~~~
svankie
That's a neat project.

------
rglullis
About two years ago I got a contract to work on one project that needed to
integrate a web service with a mobile app that was using Parse. I looked into
the client libraries and the current one for Python was lacking. David
Robinson[1] forked it and was trying to revive it somewhat[2]. I got to take a
good look at the things I thought were missing and were needed to my project,
and started submitting patches.

David is super open to new contributors and no contribution is too small.
"Real work" stops me nowadays to contribute some more, but I sure know how
good it would be to have a couple of more people focused on completing
feature-parity with the API.

    
    
      [1]: https://github.com/dgrtwo  
      [2]: https://github.com/dgrtwo/ParsePy

------
michaelmior
I don't believe Strider[1] is very well known. At least, I don't see
discussion of it often despite over 1k stars on GitHub It's a continuous
integration/deployment server written in JS, but with support for building
projects in many different languages.

One of the cool things is that it's very easy to deploy on Heroku so you can
have your own private CI server up and running in a few minutes. That said,
there's tons of room for improvement, especially on the side of language
support, so more contributors would be awesome :)

[1] [https://github.com/Strider-CD/strider](https://github.com/Strider-
CD/strider)

------
pp19dd
For the mc geeks, two node.js projects: nmp and mineflayer.

(1) NMP: node minecraft protocol (2) mineflayer: minecraft bot API

The first project is what mineflayer uses to communicate with minecraft
servers, and it's usually behind when a minecraft release comes out.

The second project is a bot API that uses it, with some interesting plugins
(such as navigate, that uses the A* algorithm). Some of the things that are
missing from that project are higher functioning routines, such as inventory
management, a flexible work queue, a command control panel.

------
tomswartz07
Fast Linux Deployment Toolkit (FLDT) is a project that was originally created
by a high-school student and was adapted for use in our school district.

We'd love to have support to help build it out. :)

The main repo is here:
[https://github.com/pennmanor/FLDT](https://github.com/pennmanor/FLDT)
However, my updated version is here:
[https://github.com/tomswartz07/FLDT](https://github.com/tomswartz07/FLDT)

------
NoMoreNicksLeft
Haha. I've been writing scripts to grab paperless statements off of bank
websites (and utilities, and so on). Want to help?

[http://www.reddit.com/r/paperless](http://www.reddit.com/r/paperless)

Some of the nasty ones are challenging, but a typical website takes only an
hour or two to write the script for. So it's not as if you have to make a big
investment in time.

------
dirkc
I recommend trying to find something that you would want to use yourself to
work on.

I have a neglected project at work - The Mechanical MOOC
([https://github.com/p2pu/mechanical-
mooc/](https://github.com/p2pu/mechanical-mooc/)) is a tool we use to run
signups and mailing lists for large online courses.

------
atmb4u
These python projects could help some love

[https://github.com/atmb4u/marlin/](https://github.com/atmb4u/marlin/) \- Fast
and easy ReST API server on redis

[http://atmb4u.github.io/butler/](http://atmb4u.github.io/butler/) \- Python
Dictionaries and Lists on Steroids

~~~
olinbg
Didn't see issues for these, what did you have in mind?

------
anilgulecha
Have a mac? I'm looking for help porting Trelby to it. I can guide/assist with
anything in the code. You'll need to figure out the mac specific parts.
[http://trelby.org](http://trelby.org) Contact me offline via email if you're
interested.

~~~
kazinator
I don't have a Mac, yet I maintain an OS X port of the TXR language. I use a
VirtualBox image running 10.7.3 (Lion); host OS is Windows 7, currently.
Initially, an interested user was doing the port by himself. To do it right
and maintain it going forward, I grabbed a VM and took over.

Every time I make a release, I build seven binary images (all Intel): Windows
(via MinGW and Cygwin), Ubuntu, Debian, Solaris, FreeBSD, and OS X 7.1.3. The
regression tests have to pass on all of them. Only the Win and Deb are rolled
using real machines; the rest are VM's.

------
oleavr
Frida is still looking for contributors:
[http://www.frida.re](http://www.frida.re)

There's a lot of fun things to hack on. Drop by #frida on FreeNode to learn
more.

------
apapli
Opencart? It's a very neat ecommerce solution but could still benefit from a
lot more development. Eg proper eBay integration, improved reporting,
responsive design...

~~~
ayrx
Opencart is the last project anyone should contribute to. The developer has an
absolutely horrible attitude. As an example,
[https://github.com/opencart/opencart/pull/1594](https://github.com/opencart/opencart/pull/1594)

------
SelfishDuck
Check out Pydio whose sync client has been fully rewritten in Python
[https://github.com/pydio](https://github.com/pydio)

------
madisonmay
The Theano project could use some love:
[https://github.com/Theano/Theano](https://github.com/Theano/Theano)

------
tych0
[http://qtile.org](http://qtile.org) is written in python and always looking
for contributors :)

------
roschdal
[http://github.com/freeciv/freeciv-web/](http://github.com/freeciv/freeciv-
web/)

------
kraymer
beets? the media library management system for obsessive-compulsive music
geeks. New contributors are always welcome to tackle the growing list of
issues/wishes
<[https://github.com/sampsyo/beets/issues?state=open>](https://github.com/sampsyo/beets/issues?state=open>)
!

------
JoshTriplett
libffi is widely used by Python and many other languages, but it has very few
contributors, and needs help.

------
glamp
python ggplot needs some help!

[https://github.com/yhat/ggplot](https://github.com/yhat/ggplot)
[https://github.com/yhat/ggplot/issues?state=open](https://github.com/yhat/ggplot/issues?state=open)

------
mjhea0
[https://openhatch.org/](https://openhatch.org/)

------
Pxtl
"Are there any lesser know open source projects that need contributors?"

All of them.

------
techload
OwnCloud?

~~~
tomswartz07
ownCloud is a great project. We use it in our organization across all client
machines.

That being said: I've found it very difficult to contribute to the project.
I've had multiple pull requests languish for months. Currently, there are 10
open pull requests that have not been touched by the devs in months (some are
from January and earlier).

However: don't let that stop you from trying to contribute! :)

~~~
j_s
Can you share any details on how ownCloud is used within your organization?

~~~
tomswartz07
Surely.

I work at a school district in central Pennsylvania. All of our staff
(teachers, secretaries, custodial, etc) use ownCloud as a backup and recovery
solution.

We chose ownCloud because it allows us to keep confidential records on our own
servers, something that Sugarsync, Dropbox, etc did not allow us to do.

~~~
j_s
Thanks! I was wondering if it supported aggregating the extra/unused storage
of all the client desktops, but it sounds like you are using it for the server
stuff.

