So I have decided to dedicate part of my free time working on an open source project.
Right. No problems coming up with that, but what should I look for and where should I start?
After doing my reading I decided on two main selling points for me to join a project: Fun and Something-I-Would-Use
The first part was easy. Of course it should be fun! It is something I am going to be spending my free time on.
The big contributor to the fun part is doing something that is interesting to me. Although coding itself is already enjoyable, working on something compelling will get me going. How many times have I not gotten too excited explaining how I solved a problem or fixed a bug, when a person expected a simple answer by asking how my day was.
Ted Leung was talking about people who joins open source projects in the Herding Code podcast:
In general the whole thing with open source is you let people work in what they are interested in. They will probably gravitate towards what they are interested in and what they are good at. That means their quality of work will be a lot higher.
I agree. If working with something that interests me will generate quality output, and I get some fun out of it; I am happy with that!
Now the Something-I-Would-Use part. I came to that conclusion reading a post on Steve Yegge’s blog which was not on joining open source projects, but I believe is still applicable to this situation:
So when translated into project selection, Buffett’s and Lynch’s advice becomes: only build what you know. The longer, more accurate of the version of the investing rule — only invest in what you know and are excited about using yourself right now — has a simpler formulation for products and businesses.
Steve was talking about how software requirements are unimportant (not exactly the word he used). Specially if you are working on something that you use, because you know what the requirements are.
Again, I totally agree. People should join a project of a product they use in their own time. It will benefit from the current knowledge and experience of how the product should behave.
So now I am off to Google Code, Sourceforge, and Freshmeat to find a project that is fun and it is something-I-would-use.
