There is no general answer, because every project has a different workflow and culture. If you would like to hack on my little command-line bug tracker the answ

There is no general answer, because every project has a different workflow and culture. If you would like to hack on my little command-line bug tracker the answers would be like this: - checkout the code from GitHub http://github.com/beza1e1/later http://github.com/beza1e1/later - use the "later" executable itself to find out, what issues are unresolved (e.g. "Web frontend") - get familiar with the code base and especially the plugin architecture - write some code (with whatever IDE or editor you like) - send me a message, when you have something to look at - after some reviewing (and probably changing) we can merge your code into the mainline - Congratulations!