The FreeBSD project has an institutionalized mentor program. So before/when you are raised from just an occasional contributor (someone sending in occasional pa

The FreeBSD project has an institutionalized mentor program. So before/when you are raised from just an occasional contributor (someone sending in occasional patches) to a commiter (someone with commit access) you are given a mentor, who teaches you the culture/process/methods to commit changes. Not quite as good as a apprentice/mentor day-in day-out but it is supposed to work pretty well.