Are there any open source projects you use in any of the work you do? That's a good place to start. Occasionally, I'll look at dependencies in projects I'm working on and see if they have any issues I could help with. It's a good way to give back.
Also, contributions don't need to be large or complex. I've made contributions where the only thing I helped with is to fix some spelling mistakes or fix typos in documentation.
Some general advice when you want to make a contribution:
Start by thanking the author(s) of the project. It always helps to be nice.
Read their contribution guidelines. Most projects have one. For example, some projects don't accept new features.
If you're unsure if they'd accept a change, open an issue and propose your change. Ask them if it's something they'd be interested in.
If you find a bug, submitting an issue with a failing test case helps. Then if they ask if you have time to fix it, you're already on your way.
Try to be available to communicate in a somewhat timely manner. Sometimes a pull request might go back and forth through a few rounds of changes. Timely communication helps and makes the process easier for everyone.
Follow the conventions laid out by the project. If they write tests a certain way, try to follow that instead of your own style.
When you open a pull request, try to explain as much as possible. If the project has a pull request template, follow that.
In general, be nice and easy to work with. No open source maintainer is going to get mad at you for being nice.
Good luck! Contributing to open source is a worthwhile endeavor. If you make it something you do regularly, you'll have a handful of contributions one day.
I'm a Software Engineer, from Portugal, a GitHub Star and a mentor at Black CodHer Bootcamp and "As Raparigas de Codigo" organization. Previously, I've been an admin at AnitaB.org Open Source.
Are there any open source projects you use in any of the work you do? That's a good place to start. Occasionally, I'll look at dependencies in projects I'm working on and see if they have any issues I could help with. It's a good way to give back.
Also, contributions don't need to be large or complex. I've made contributions where the only thing I helped with is to fix some spelling mistakes or fix typos in documentation.
Some general advice when you want to make a contribution:
Good luck! Contributing to open source is a worthwhile endeavor. If you make it something you do regularly, you'll have a handful of contributions one day.
These are really good recommendations 🙌🏾🙌🏾🙌🏾