Sunday 17 January 2016

Open Source & Contributing To Software

This post will briefly speak of two open source software packages that anybody can contribute to and how it can be done.

parsedatetime Library

The parsedatetime library is an open source python library able to parse human-readable date/time strings  and can be obtained at https://github.com/bear/parsedatetime. It supports many different types of date formats. I've used the library before in the past for personal projects and I've always found no matter the string, it's able to come out ahead with the correct parse. The license for the project is the Apache License.
  1. Go to there issues tab on github to see any problems with ongoing development. https://github.com/bear/parsedatetime/issues
  2. To contribute a patch, make a "pull request" through git for the issue. 
  3. Wait for the author to comment and review your proposal.
  4. If thoroughly review and approved, the project author will merge the pull request.
The author will respond very quickly and the pull could be added quickly if he approves. Even in the same day sometimes. Other times, bugs or problems will be cataloged for others to go through to fix themselves. Although the project is very thorough throughout the years, there are still edge cases here and there that the author needs help fixing.

jQuery

jQuery is a JavaScript library designed to simplify the client-side scripting of HTML. jQuery is the most popular JavaScript library in use today. I have personally used it many times while working for clients who required intricate details for their web projects. It can be obtained at https://jquery.com/. It uses the MIT License. To contribute:
  1. Go to https://contribute.jquery.org/ 
  2. Through the side menu decide whether you want to contribute to:
    • Bug Triage
    • Code
    • Community
    • Documentation
    • Support
  3. You'll need to establish the need for a fix or feature.
  4. Discuss the ticket with the team
  5. Create a pull request
  6. Respond to code reviews and wait for it to be accepted.
When contributing, it's important to follow the style guide found here https://contribute.jquery.org/style-guide/ and to make sure unit tests are added. The community itself has many ways to support through forums or even Meetups. This is a quick and easy way to join an open source community.

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