Don't Contribute to Open Source

@christitustech made the perfect follow up video to this. If you want to do open source RIGHT, I think this is a must watch. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JF8F7uaGfV8

This is how you contribute to open source: Use open source, notice a bug, investigate the bug, write a bug report and offer to fix it

I'm going to invoke Goodhart's Law here: “When a metric becomes a target, it ceases to be a good metric.”

The most important message is: “If you don’t know where to contribute, you shouldn’t”. If you are not solving or improving a product you are using (even docs are fine), don’t contribute.

contributing to opens-source is hard for both maintainers and contributors. It's in no way an activity for noobs.

I also believe many new developers are putting a language or framework before the project. They want to “learn typescript” but don’t even know what to build with it. Imagine saying “I want to learn how to use a drill” and having nothing to drill into. Pick your project first, then pick your technology. I also feel that you’re far more likely to be engaged if it’s a project you picked on your own and truly have a passion to complete it

just like noone needs to get married: "All my friends are married so I'll propose to the first person I find"

ngl i had this mindset earlier in my career that i NEED to do open source to better myself but i just couldn't do it, i was just aimlessly wandering around github looking for some work to do in my spare time. at some point later when i matured as a dev i found myself contributing to open source not because i wanted to better myself, but because i wanted to better the project i was contributing to and that was the game changer. my advice to beginners would be if you don't know where to contribute to some vague idea of Open Source – start a pet project, direct your energy into learning

maybe title your video "Don't Contribute to Open Source if you're a beginner" but I guess that won't be a click-bait enough title for YouTube. But yeah I completely agree with your point in the video. Also I've never once thought about contributing to open-source projects just for the sake of contributing. Like if I don't even understand the project, it won't be a meaningful contribution. But I guess it does happen. Thanks for bringing light to this.

Good take. I couldn't have contributed to open source project in the early stages of my carreer ( didn't have the skills to do so ), and nor did I want to. Now a decade later and with a deeper understanding of "code", I find myself going through the source code of libraries and frameworks, usually to solve bugs and add features as I need them and give back to the community as well.

Goals come from things you understand, not things you don't 💯 Nice advice Theo

The problem is that the "how to get a tech job on 2023-2024" videos on YouTube recommend contributing to open source. And yes a lot of beginners haven't been around long enough to like a project and contribute to it. It's like the egg or the chicken dilemma, you need to start somewhere but every decision is the wrong decision. I think it comes down to your values more than your level of seniority. Every contribution you make should benefit the project, even if it's a small one but make it good.

I remember the first time I contributed to open source. It wasn't a huge project, but I used it a lot and I encountered a bug that noone else seemed to have encountered yet. So I went ahead and fixed it. Submitting that pull request almost gave me a heart attack because I was so nervous I missed some guideline, or that my code wouldn't be up to snuff, or even worse that I'd introduce a new bug with my code. So I went over my small 5 line fix probably a dozen times, and eventually submitted it. I was in absolute imposter-syndrome induced agony for what felt like ages. But eventually one of the devs responded, merged my stuff and thanked me for helping out. I was riding the dopamine rush I got out of that for days. That's when I fell in love with open source. There's just something so pure and wholesome about the idea of just helping someone out because you have the resources to do it. The reality of course not such a fairy tale (like it's clearly demonstrated in this video), but this interaction will forever be what I think Open Source *is*.

so it was clickbait afterall

Best definition - “OPEN SOURCE IS AN ECOSYSTEM OF TALENTED PEOPLE WORKING HARD TO KEEP THE WEB AND ALL OF SOFTWARE DEVELOPMENT ALIVE.”

influencers telling you what to do and not do, the wheel keeps turning

Originally, most of my open-source contributions were to solve my work problems. I did not do it out of the goodness of my heart. I did it because I needed a bug or a feature I wanted fixed. And since I did not want to maintain my fix or bug, so I contributed.

This video is actually so good. Im not an experienced dev and I genuinely thought that its all about adding pull requests and getting more exposure. Thank you so much for making this video. And the "identifying the problem in the application we work" is on spot.

While the title of this video is a bit of a head turning oversimplification, the aspects the video goes on to cover are definitely on point. “Cart before the horse” took the words out of my mouth as I was watching.

As a new grad developer trying to find a job, I completely agree with this as I see more and more of my peers just trying to checkbox that they contribute to oss. Sure it may be tempting but ultimately it's more valuable to actually be a part of a community first, using the project and actually contributing. Instead of just putting your two cents of a pr