Hacktoberfest is a month-long event to celebrate opensource by encouraging all to contribute to the opensource ecosystem. This year is no exception. Hacktoberfest 2021 has been started in full swing. There are a considerable amount of contributions already. But we still have a long way to go.

This article discusses a few facts to keep us involved well with the open-source communities.

First thing first, how to get STARTED?

To get started with Hacktoberfest, please register yourself here. You can register yourself as a contributor, project maintainer, event organizer, or all of them. Ayushi Rawat wrote an excellent article guiding us about Hacktoberfest 2021. It is a must-read.

https://ayushirawat.com/beginners-guide-to-hacktoberfest-2021

If you are new to open-source, this Twitter thread may come in handy.

Also, do not miss to read this incredible article by Catalin Pit,

• Getting Started With Open-Source: How To Contribute As A Beginner

Alright, now the tips.

It's NOT just the CODING alone

The Opensource contributions are not only about coding, enhancements, and bug fixes. It is way more than that. Please find your opportunities to contribute to a project's documentation, automation, build, test, and many more.

We all love swags, but the QUALITY Contributions first

Who doesn't love Hacktoberfest swags? The stickers, t-shirts are the most fantastic rewards that one can get. But hold on. Do not target that alone. It would be a wrong move on your part to spam the open-source projects for swags.

FOUR contributions are too less and way more

You need to try creating at least 4 quality pull requests to get acknowledged by the Hactoborfest community.

The number four could be very few for some or a bit more for a few. Try your best to reach this mark without creating spam. If you can continue beyond the four, it's truly amazing.

Maintainers ENCOURAGE Contributors

The open-source project maintainers have a significant stake in the Hacktoberfest event. They put forward their projects, guide issues, handle PRs, may mentor contributors.

If you have a public GitHub repository and want others to contribute, please make it ready by following a few simple steps documented in this thread,

When you start receiving contributions to your project, please acknowledge contributors' hard work, time, and effort. Something trivial to you may be just very challenging to others and vice-versa. Please be respectful. Thank them publicly for their quality contributions.

At the same time, do not tolerate malpractices. As mentioned in the thread above, create clear CODE-OF-CONDUCT and CONTRIBUTING guides.

LIFE beyond Hacktoberfest

An event like Hacktoberfest is an excellent opportunity for the tech communities to come together, build networking, make friends for a lifetime. Try to continue to be associated with the open-source project you have contributed to before. Try to learn from the project maintainers and plan for it yourself.

Opensource contribution is a habit. Once you build it, there is no looking back.

Looking for a project to get started?

You can start looking here for all the projects taking part in the hacktoberfest.

• https://github.com/topics/hacktoberfest

Take a look at this article by Catalin Pit on how to,

• Find Open Source Projects To Contribute As A Beginner

I'm maintaining these four projects you can contribute to,

• A playground for JavaScript Web APIS

• A tool to create, manage, export, and share shapes

• A notification widget

• A bunch of resources/quizzes help you to prepare with JavaScript Async operations and promises.

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That's all for now. I hope you found this article informative, and it will help you to get started with Hacktoberfest.

Let's connect. You can find me on,

• GitHub(atapas)
• Twitter