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I only hope it would not be some kind of common sentiment "you have to contribute to an open source project to earn better grade or get a job". It will end up a

I only hope it would not be some kind of common sentiment "you have to contribute to an open source project to earn better grade or get a job". It will end up as Huawei Linux kernel "contributions" - a lot of pointless commits that are only a pain for project maintainers and bring zero actual value.

ElViajero 5y ago
From the article, and up to your point. On the expected learnings there is: ... > Choosing realistic contribution goals. (Initially students tend to wildly overestimate their ability to contribute to a project.) This is a key activity in agile development sprints; ... also > Try to contribute a trivial fix as a warm-up exercise and as a way to test your ability to follow the project's workflows.
- yoz-y 5y ago
  > Try to contribute a trivial fix as a warm-up exercise and as a way to test your ability to follow the project's workflows. Finding trivial fixes is no trivial task though. Some projects do have a tag like `good_starter_bug` but most don't. Projects that actually have lingering trivial fixes tend to be rather huge too.
JetAlone 5y ago
We're already creeping in that direction. Everyone wants some work for free, or at a discount rate and enough people are willing to offer that in hopes of rapid advancement, so we'll keep ratcheting the value of our skills to the bottom, starting with passion projects and moving to desperate make-work hustle. Not even mad about it, it's the way of things.
matsemann 5y ago
I think a better description would be how Hacktoberfest turned out, with lots of inexperienced people spamming simple PRs to lots of projects.
- arp242 5y ago
  You'd hope that in a more guided environment where people are actually rated on the quality of the contributions things wouldn't be quite so bad. But yeah, I'm not looking forward to a future where every inexperienced student needs to be guided through the basics. There is already quite a lot (too much, IMO) being put in the shoes of volunteer maintainers with very little concrete in return, and this will only add to that. To put it bluntly, I am not your unpaid teaching assistant, and would consider it dubious if I was used as such without consent.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
aritmo 5y ago
Why disparage China when you have Hacktoberfest?
- easterncalculus 5y ago
  Huawei is just the latest example - and it really isn't an attack on China...
fomine3 5y ago
Context: https://www.theregister.com/2021/06/26/linux_kernel_contributor_from_huawei/ https://www.theregister.com/2021/06/26/linux_kernel_contribu... Meanwhile Huawei is a real big contributor. https://news.itsfoss.com/huawei-kernel-contribution/ https://news.itsfoss.com/huawei-kernel-contribution/

ElViajero 5y ago

From the article, and up to your point. On the expected learnings there is: ... > Choosing realistic contribution goals. (Initially students tend to wildly overestimate their ability to contribute to a project.) This is a key activity in agile development sprints; ... also > Try to contribute a trivial fix as a warm-up exercise and as a way to test your ability to follow the project's workflows.

yoz-y 5y ago
> Try to contribute a trivial fix as a warm-up exercise and as a way to test your ability to follow the project's workflows. Finding trivial fixes is no trivial task though. Some projects do have a tag like `good_starter_bug` but most don't. Projects that actually have lingering trivial fixes tend to be rather huge too.

JetAlone 5y ago

We're already creeping in that direction. Everyone wants some work for free, or at a discount rate and enough people are willing to offer that in hopes of rapid advancement, so we'll keep ratcheting the value of our skills to the bottom, starting with passion projects and moving to desperate make-work hustle. Not even mad about it, it's the way of things.

matsemann 5y ago

I think a better description would be how Hacktoberfest turned out, with lots of inexperienced people spamming simple PRs to lots of projects.

arp242 5y ago
You'd hope that in a more guided environment where people are actually rated on the quality of the contributions things wouldn't be quite so bad. But yeah, I'm not looking forward to a future where every inexperienced student needs to be guided through the basics. There is already quite a lot (too much, IMO) being put in the shoes of volunteer maintainers with very little concrete in return, and this will only add to that. To put it bluntly, I am not your unpaid teaching assistant, and would consider it dubious if I was used as such without consent.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]

aritmo 5y ago

Why disparage China when you have Hacktoberfest?

easterncalculus 5y ago
Huawei is just the latest example - and it really isn't an attack on China...

fomine3 5y ago

Context: https://www.theregister.com/2021/06/26/linux_kernel_contributor_from_huawei/ https://www.theregister.com/2021/06/26/linux_kernel_contribu... Meanwhile Huawei is a real big contributor. https://news.itsfoss.com/huawei-kernel-contribution/ https://news.itsfoss.com/huawei-kernel-contribution/