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Open Source from the Trenches
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Chris Aniszczyk
February 12, 2010
Programming
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Open Source from the Trenches
How to get involved and be successful in open source land.
Chris Aniszczyk
February 12, 2010
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Transcript
Open Source from the Trenches How to get involved and
be successful Chris Aniszczyk - @cra http://aniszczyk.org
Who the hell am I and why should you listen
to me?
Eclipse hacker/evangelist at Red Hat Involved heavily at Eclipse. From
committing to leading Eclipse Foundation Board of Directors Hacking on open source for the last several years... Gentoo Linux, Eclipse, Fedora, etc... IBM -> Self Employed -> EclipseSource -> Red Hat I get paid to work on open source software
Why are we here? Well, a student approached me recently
with a question...
“How do I get involved with open source and get
good at it so I can get a job?”
At first, I was like... WTF What do I know?
He said there’s no practical “getting started with open source” guide out there...
He wants practical advice... If I’m giving advice, I’ll do
it the open source way and share it with the world
My advice? Find your passion. Contribute to it. Brand yourself.
Find the right open source project
Find open source projects that are newbie-friendly Don’t get distracted
with SF.net and other project hosting sites...
Look at Google’s Summer of Code list of mentoring organizations...
http://socghop.appspot.com/gsoc/program/accepted_orgs/google/gsoc2010
These organizations have already been vetted and tend to be
more welcoming to new contributors Which brings me to my next point...
Mentors, Mentors, Mentors
I believe having a mentor is crucial to your success
in getting involved with open source... Without a mentor you’ll waste precious time...
There are a open source projects out there that have
mentoring programs... http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Mentors http://www.eclipse.org/soc https://wiki.ubuntu.com/MOTU/Mentoring Take advantage of them!
Are you a student? Do Google’s Summer of Code* program!
http://code.google.com/soc/ *you get paid to hack on open source, that’s beer money!
Contribute to your passion
Many open source projects are meritocracies In order to get
involved, you have to contribute and build your repertoire
So simply do the work by finding bugs you can
fix Your mentor can help you find some low hanging fruit...
Remember, there are many ways to contribute outside of code...
If you like books, this can give you an insight
on how some OSS projects are ran http://producingoss.com/
Get an ohloh.net account Track your passions...
Brand yourself
This may be odd to hear for developers, but you
are a brand and you should control your image
Everyone is watching... http://www.switched.com/2007/11/13/lying-male-intern-busted-in-a-dress-on-facebook/
Like your peers... And any future employers... http://bhc3.wordpress.com/2009/03/17/how-to-tweet-your-way-out-of-a-job/
In open source land, things are done in the open
Be mindful about it Avoid negativity at all costs and kill people with kindness
If no one can find you, how you can expect
to be successful in an environment that is all about being open?
Get a website & blog Get on Twitter Get on
GitHub.com Get on IRC Get on LinkedIn.com Share your passion with the world via conversations
In the end, the point is that you have to
understand you’re a brand and if you want to help your open source career, you need to be findable
You should brand yourself for the career you want, not
the job you currently have
Networking is important The opposite of networking is NOT WORKING
Networking is one of the most important things you can
do for yourself Build a network via conferences and online interactions
Attend conferences, tweetups and meetups There is no better way
to connect to folks than sharing a frosty beverage in person
Thanks for listening I hope my advice helps Questions? Chris
Aniszczyk http://aniszczyk.org http://twitter.com/cra