2025-07-25 –, Auditorium
The classic open source dichotomy is well known: everyone uses it, but few give back for the convenience we've all grown so used to. What sustains a community? And how can we help ensure that the frameworks and libraries we rely on daily remain viable and healthy in the long run? In this talk, I intend to show how easy it is to get started with your open source contributions, regardless of your seniority.
The classic open source dichotomy is well known: everyone uses it, but few give back for the convenience we've all grown so used to. What sustains a community? And how can we help ensure that the frameworks and libraries we rely on daily remain viable and healthy in the long run?
Contributing is easier than it seems. Maintainers are, more often than not, more welcoming and kind than you'd expect, and I want to show you how simple it can be to take your first steps in this world. After all, it wasn't that long ago that I was in that exact same place.
In this talk, you can expect to:
- Learn a bit more about the open source ecosystem;
- Understand how these decentralized communities operate at a basic level;
- Get practical tips on how to start contributing and explore possible paths you can take.
Talk outline:
- Personal introduction
- Open source and its sustainability
- Demystifying barriers to contributing
- Maintainers — what do they want?
- How senior do I need to be to contribute?
- How to start contributing?
- Mentorship programs
- Djangonaut Space
- Getting involved in communities and forums
- Mentorship programs
- Practical tips for contributing to OSS projects
- Navigating repositories
- Using AI to help understand codebases
- Finding good issues to start contributing
- Best practices for contributing
- Conventional Commits
- TDD
- Documentation updates
- Communicating with maintainers
Intermediate
What are the main topics of your talk? –Open source, community
Amanda is an Engineering Manager at Vinta Software. She considers herself to be a hybrid professional, having a background in business and software engineering. Amanda enjoys getting into technical topics, having been a speaker at conferences such as DjangoCon US, DjangoCon Europe and Python Brasil in the past, but loves discussing the overlap and challenges around technical and non-technical domains. She’s a social introvert with a passion for cooking, writing, music, video games and (shockingly, based on her history) strength training. Her current goal is to be less chronically online and touch some grass from time to time.