If you are a newbie developer and not living under a rock, you might a come across the biggest open source festival of the year, Hacktoberfest. Read on for my personal Hacktoberfest experience and advice on how you can participate in this year’s event.
🔗 So, What is Hacktoberfest?
Hacktoberfest is a month-long celebration of all things open source software. It began in 2014 as an initiative to increase collaboration and contributions among the developer community with free software. Whether you’re new to open source or a seasoned coder, there are plenty of ways to get involved. If you have not visited the website, please make sure to visit the website now, you will really appreciate the beautiful website! 😍
First you have to register through their website, you can either register as a maintainer or a contributor from 26th September to 31st October. If you are contributor, you have to make at least 4 good PRs to get Hacktoberfest swag and remember to follow Hacktoberfest guidelines always.
🔗 Why should you participate in Hacktoberfest?
Hacktoberfest is a great way to get your feet wet with open source. You will meet and collaborate with very helpful developers across the globe. It’s a fun way to learn more about software and the communities that build and maintain open source projects 🚀 It is also a great way to contribute to the open source community and learn about the various projects people are working on. You can also use your code contributions as part of your job application process in your resume.
🔗 My Hacktoberfest Experience
The month leading up to Hacktoberfest was a bit hectic for me. I was finishing my college internals exam before the end of the month. Needless to say, I was super busy 😫. But I did make some time to look for projects to contribute in various discord communities. I was very selective about the project I chose. I wanted to make sure that I was genuinely interested in the project so that I would be excited to contribute even when I was busy.
Luckily, I came across a really nice project from a member in EddieHub Community, "Milan". This project aimed to connect various NGOs with appropriate donors with less hassle. I really liked the project's aim and since its frontend used React, it was just perfect for applying my new React dev skills. I found that there were plenty of issues that were well-suited for a newbie like myself. I also made sure to look through the website to find additional issues and enhancements.
In a matter of a week, I was very happy that I made meaningful contributions to that Project, also ticking the 4 PRs requirement to complete Hacktoberfest. This project had really nice documentation and made good use of Github Actions and bots. So, all my PRs very mostly related to coding part of the project.
🔗 What did I learn from Hacktoberfest?
Even though I had planned to participate in Hacktoberfest all along, I didn’t really know what I was getting into. Participating in a large-scale open source initiative was a new experience for me. To be honest, I did even know how to make PR's correctly, I just knew how to drag and drop files to github. But thankfully, there were many helpful resources on Github by Kunal Kushwaha, Github Mini courses from Eddie which helped me make a prcise PRs.
I also made sure to read Contributing Guidelines before raising issues or PRs. I also learnt that you need to ask for the issue to be assigned before working on that to prevent confusions between the maintainers. I learned to be patient and to wait for the maintainers to respond. I also learned that it often takes longer than expected to complete an issue. I learned that it is important to be kind and respectful with your time and the time of others.
🔗 Final Thoughts
I thoroughly enjoyed my Hacktoberfest experience. From the start, I felt welcomed and appreciated by the open source community and project maintainers. Participating in open source and Hacktoberfest was a great way for me to shake off some of the stresses of engineering college. I also really enjoyed meeting new people and connecting with developers from around the world. Participating in open source is a great way to give back to the developer community. Open source allows us to collaborate and share our knowledge and expertise with others. It also gives us the opportunity to receive help and guidance from others while learning at the same time.