[Apache CommunityOverCode NA 2025] Becoming an Apache Airflow Committer from 0

https://communityovercode.org/past-sessions/community-over-code-na-2025/

How a Complete Beginner in Data Engineering / Junior Computer Science Student Became an Apache Airflow Committer in Just 5 Months—With 70+ PRs and 300 Hours of Contributions

This talk is aimed at those who are still hesitant about contributing to Apache Airflow. I hope to inspire and encourage anyone to take the first step and start their journey in open-source—let's build together!

Transcript

1. Becoming an Apache Airflow Committer from 0 Zhe-You(Jason) Liu
2. Before we begin – Slido Q&A session slido.com #16153380
3. Before we begin – Slide
4. Table of Content 1. What is Apache Airflow? 2. Why Contribute to Open Source? 3. From First PR to Committer 4. Getting Started with Airflow Contributions
5. Zhe-You(Jason) Liu • I’m from Taiwan 󰑐 • Apache Airflow Committer • LFX'25 Mentorship - CNCF Krkn • Upcoming Intern @Microsoft • NCKU CSIE Senior GitHub: jason810496 LinkedIn: zhe-you-liu
6. Part 1 What is Apache Airflow?
7. • Most Common Data Orchestration Tool • 40k+ stars on GitHub • Used by over 70k companies ◦ including Apple, Uber, LinkedIn …
8. Workflow as Code
9. Dag == Workflow in Airflow (Directed Acyclic Graph)
10. 1. Dag
11. 2. Task
12. 3. Dependency
13. Operator • PythonOperator • BashOperator • GCSToS3Operator • HiveToMySqlOperator • KubernetesPodOperator • BranchOperator • … 173 integrations
19. What Problems Does Apache Airflow Solve? 1. Integration with Data Ecosystems 2. Retry-ability of Workflows 3. Workflow Observability Significantly reduce operational workload
20. Part 2 Why Contribute to Open Source?
21. How to get US Remote Job from Taiwan by contributing to OSS
22. OpenSource4You 源來適你 There are 4 Taiwanese contributors among the top 10 collaborators of Apache Kafka !
23. Why Apache Airflow? 1. Written in Python ! 2. Ranked as the 4th most popular project in the ASF 3. Over 40k stars on GitHub 4. Widely used in Data Engineering
24. Benefits of Contributing to OSS • Coding skills ▪ Design Patterns, Unit Test, Code Review • System Level Design • Career Opportunities (?)
25. Benefits of Contributing to OSS • Collaborate with top contributors over the world • Communication Skills • Design Documentation
26. Part 3 From First PR to Committer
27. The First Pull Request
28. API Server Refactor
29. Authn & Authz for API Server
30. Authn & Authz for API Server
31. Resolve OOM when reading large task logs Out Of Memory! When log volume increase ⬆
32. Resolve OOM when reading large task logs
33. Resolve OOM when reading large task logs
34. Resolve OOM when reading large task logs • This PR has been rewritten twice • It took half a year to get merged
35. 70+ Pull Requests
36. 300 Hours in 5 months avg 2 hours per day
38. Your own Apache email address!
39. Part 4 Getting Started with Apache Airflow Contributions
40. Setup Airflow Dev Env with 1 Step - Breeze
41. How to find Issues to Resolve? 1. Look for "Good First Issue" labels 2. Recent Issues and Pull Requests 3. Apache Airflow Slack 4. Airflow Improvement Proposals (AIPs) 5. Dev mailing list discussions
42. 1. Good First Issue Provider bugs, minor bugs, and docs
43. 2. Recent Issues and Pull Requests
44. 3. Apache Airflow Slack
45. 4. Airflow Improvement Proposals (AIPs)
46. 5. Dev mailing list discussions
47. Note for Using AI to Contribute • Short answer: Yes ! • Understand the context of the issue ourselves • Take responsibility for the generated content
48. How to become a Committer? • Contribute consistently • Participate in discussions • Get noticed by the community Demonstrate your impact!
49. Community Over Code
50. Community Over Code - Code Review
51. Community Over Code - Airflow Town Hall #protm ➞ PR of The Month
52. Community Over Code - Airflow Town Hall
53. Community Over Code - Meme
54. Welcome to the Apache Airflow Community!
55. OpenSource4You (源來適你) • Actively contributing to OSS from Taiwan • Each project has at least one mentor • Projects under ASF ◦ Airflow, Ambari, Datafusion ◦ Gravitino, Kafka, Ozone, YuniKorn • Flyte, KubeRay, Ray, Liger-Kernel, etc Facebook / GitHub / Slack: opensource4you
56. Thank You! Any Questions? GitHub: jason810496 LinkedIn: zhe-you-liu