{"id":67309,"date":"2022-09-19T09:01:18","date_gmt":"2022-09-19T09:01:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.cryptocabaret.com\/?p=67309"},"modified":"2022-09-19T09:01:18","modified_gmt":"2022-09-19T09:01:18","slug":"i-got-my-first-pull-request-merged","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.cryptocabaret.com\/?p=67309","title":{"rendered":"I got my first pull request merged!"},"content":{"rendered":"

I got my first pull request merged!<\/span>
\nOluwaseun<\/a><\/span>
\nMon, 09\/19\/2022 – 03:00<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

Words cannot express my joy when I got the notification about the merge below, and I owe it to my current engineering school, AltSchool Africa<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\n
\"successful<\/div>\n
Image by: <\/span><\/p>\n

(Awosise Oluwaseun, CC BY-SA 4.0)<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/article>\n

Before this, I had been introduced to open source many times, told about its importance in the tech space, and even attended open source conferences (e.g., OSCAFest). I had all the instant excitement to start, but imposter syndrome set in on opening GitHub to create something.<\/p>\n

Fast forward to Monday, the 8th of August, 2022, when I watched Bolaji’s video on contributing to open source. I felt pumped again, but I wanted to apply what I learned, so I noted some steps.<\/p>\n

The steps:<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. I made up my mind I was going to contribute to a project.<\/li>\n
  2. I was focused on a site (good first issue<\/a>) to pick my first project from, which I filtered to suit my skill level. I kept opening the next page till I found one.<\/li>\n
  3. I made sure I was equipped with the required Git and GitHub<\/a> knowledge to complete the project.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n
    \n
    More great content<\/div>\n
    \n
    Free online course: RHEL technical overview<\/a><\/div>\n
    Learn advanced Linux commands<\/a><\/div>\n
    Download cheat sheets<\/a><\/div>\n
    Find an open source alternative<\/a><\/div>\n
    Explore open source resources<\/a><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n

    The project<\/h2>\n

    After long hours searching for projects, I finally found one titled, Ensure no missing alt attributes<\/a>. I was to give descriptive alt values to images from the site. Alt values in images help to improve the accessibility of the site such that screen readers can provide a detailed description of the image to, say, a visually impaired person. Easy right? Yes, but if I didn’t make up my mind to get the first contribution, I wouldn’t find it, and open source would continue to be a myth to me.<\/p>\n

    I was still pumped until I discovered it was from MDN<\/a>. Wait, MDN? As in Mozilla developer? Will they merge my contribution even with how seemingly easy it looks? Imposter syndrome<\/a> set in.<\/p>\n

    Upon checking the issue, I saw that people were already contributing. I summoned my courage and started reading about it. Taking my time to read and understand the project and how I needed to approach the issue was another challenge I had to overcome.<\/p>\n

    The project is as easy as you try to understand it.<\/p>\n

    So, I picked two images to begin with. I gave alt values to them, committed my changes, then made a pull request. The time between when I made the pull request and when I got the approval mail was full of self-doubts. Should I close the pull request? This is MDN. Well, it’s not coding… What if I don’t get merged? I might never contribute again. All it took to clear all of the doubts were the emails I got from my reviewer below:<\/p>\n

    \n
    \"Email<\/div>\n
    Image by: <\/span><\/p>\n

    (Awosise Oluwaseun, CC BY-SA 4.0)<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/article>\n

    \n
    \"mail<\/div>\n
    Image by: <\/span><\/p>\n

    (Awosise Oluwaseun, CC BY-SA 4.0)<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/article>\n

    \n
    \"congratulatory<\/div>\n
    Image by: <\/span><\/p>\n

    (Awosise Oluwaseun, CC BY-SA 4.0)<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/article>\n

    I was indeed delighted, and this inspired me to check for more. It gave me the courage I needed to request additional issues to solve.<\/p>\n

    \n
    \"Mail<\/div>\n
    Image by: <\/span><\/p>\n

    (Awosise Oluwaseun, CC BY-SA 4.0)<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/article>\n

    Summary<\/h2>\n

    A few lessons I’d love you to take home from this article are:<\/p>\n