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Avneesh Agarwal for ByteSlash

Posted on • Edited on • Originally published at blog.avneesh.tech

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What is Open Source and how to get started?

What is Open Source?

Open source is a commonly used term for the code which is publically accessible and people can see, edit, and share the data. In open-source projects, developers from all around the world can contribute to the project and make it better.

Benefits of Open Source

  • Lower cost
  • Higher quality software and code
  • Secure as code is public
  • Flexible
  • Faster development

Cons of Open Source

  • Needs maintenance
  • Hidden costs
  • Support
  • User friendly

Getting Started

Getting started with open source as a maintainer

To get started with open source as a maintainer, you need to do the following steps

  • Build a project
  • Add it as a public repo to GitHub, GitLab, or BitBucket.
  • Add some docs on what it is and how to contribute
  • Add a license to your repo
  • Add some issues in the issues section (if you have any)
  • Let everyone know about it (if no one knows about it then no one will be able to contribute :P)

Getting started as a contributor

  • Find a repo you want to contribute to
  • Add the features or bug fixes
  • Make a pull request
  • Wait for your code to be merged

The main trouble for every beginner while starting to contribute is finding repositories.
So here are some useful articles-

If you were ever thinking of contributing to open source, now is the perfect time to start 😉

Useful links

Open Source Initiative

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