Writer/Editor-turned-Coder Does Hacktoberfest 2024, Realizes She’d Been Writing in the Wrong Industry All Along

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This is a submission for the 2024 Hacktoberfest Writing challenge: Contributor Experience

After over two years of learning code, she thought her academic writing days were totally behind her. But Hacktoberfest 2024 brought an unexpected epiphany: “Why did I spend years writing papers no one reads when I could’ve been fixing typos for strangers on GitHub and getting thanked for it?”

From Footnotes to Pull Requests: A Familiar Struggle with New Rewards

With more than two years of coding experience, she figured Hacktoberfest would be a walk in the park. “Four pull requests in a month? I survived thesis deadlines. I can handle this,” she thought. Things started off strong—her first two PRs were polished, neat, and delivered with the precision only someone traumatized by academic formatting can manage. “Correcting grammar in documentation? That’s basically proofreading a student essay, just without the soul-crushing sense of doom.”

But as PR #3 rolled around, reality hit. “Git threw me a merge conflict, and I was suddenly back in dissertation mode—confused, over-caffeinated, and wondering where it all went wrong.”

The problem wasn’t a lack of effort—it was life. “Between work, existential dread, and trying to keep my plants alive, Hacktoberfest kind of slipped through my fingers. October 29th sneaked up on me like that ‘Can you submit by EOD?’ email from a boss.”

Lessons from an Almost-Hacktoberfest Champ

Plan Ahead (Or Pretend You Will): Telling yourself you’ll finish early is just part of the ritual. Panic-scrambling on October 31st is inevitable—embrace it.
Copy-Pasting is the New Research: JSTOR never had anything as glorious as Stack Overflow. And here, copying and reusing code is basically good practice.
Documentation is Underrated: Editing README files is like writing an abstract, except people actually read it and don’t suggest you “reconsider your argument.”
Failure Feels Refreshingly Fast: No waiting months for rejection emails—here, your mistakes are instant and obvious. It’s brutal, but at least it’s over quickly.
Two PRs Are a Win: Sure, she didn’t finish four. But she made a meaningful impact—and honestly, two PRs are worth more than a 30-page paper gathering dust in a library.

No Four PRs, No T-Shirt—But No Regrets

Despite falling short of the full four PRs, or the shirt they would earn her, she’s oddly content. “In academia, even when you finish something, it feels like you didn’t. In coding, I fixed stuff, and it worked. That’s a win in my book.”

So, does she miss academic writing? “Absolutely not. I’ve spent years working on papers only three people read—and one of them was my mom. In coding, if I fix a bug, people notice. And they thank me. Do you know how rare that is?!”

As Hacktoberfest draws to a close, she takes a deep breath and smiles. “Sure, I only got halfway this year, but next year I’ll be ready. Four PRs, no excuses. Or at least three. Okay, definitely more than two.”

With a final sip of now cold coffee, she opens her laptop to tackle her unfinished PR—because even if she didn’t finish Hacktoberfest this year, she’s hooked. “Coding gives me the satisfaction I thought I’d get from publishing. Except here, if you mess up, no one sends you a 10-page critique about your ‘limited theoretical scope.’ They just help you fix it.”

See you next Hacktoberfest—no word limits, no citations, and no judgment!

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