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[Doc]: helping new contributors with choosing issues to work on #28476
Description
Documentation Link
Problem
I have noticed comments on "good first issues" about pull requests (where people ask how they can help, and others respond with, this issue wouldn't be a good place to start because there's already a pull request), and have seen a trend of people starting multiple pull requests for the same issue instead of collaborating. I think it may be more efficient to include a section in the contribution section of the documentation about how to decide what issues to contribute to.
Suggested improvement
Include a section called "Determining How to Contribute" with some text along the lines of "When determining what issues to work on, take steps to ensure that there is a reason to work on a particular issue. Read through the existing comments, click on links between comments, check for existing pull requests, and communicate with people who are already trying to solve the issue. Having multiple competing pull requests for the same issue stretches reviewer resources."
Activity
story645 commentedon Jun 27, 2024
Would you be open to opening a PR making those changes?
Mostly b/c I think everything you mentioned is already in the docs, but sounds like not in the best/most obvious places & could be worded clearer 😅
timhoffm commentedon Jun 27, 2024
Won't other (scientific) libraries have the same issue? (Thinking numpy, scipy, pandas, ...) How do they solve it? Would it make sense to create an independent guide how to contribute and link to that?
story645 commentedon Jun 27, 2024
There's https://learn.scientific-python.org/contributors/ which looks like it's led by @juanis2112
And one of the outcomes of
@melissawm's grant was a meta guide: https://contributor-experience.org/
story645 commentedon Jun 27, 2024
But also I'd welcome a PR on this because I'm fairly certain Melissa and I have written most of this information into our guide 😅 so like if it's not being communicated clearly I'd much appreciate a revision.
melissawm commentedon Jun 27, 2024
From a wider perspective of seeing other projects (mostly SciPy and NumPy) they don't have nearly as many cases of multiple prs per issue. But Matplotlib also has more New contributors in general, and the Matplotlib New contributors tend to also be new to the open source, so that may explain it. I'd appreciate any suggestion on wording this better!
story645 commentedon Jun 27, 2024
So thinking about this a bit more, would reorganizing contribute.html so that it better matches the structure here help pull information up front/make it more likely to get read?
basically what I'm thinking is this, and also renaming "work on an issue" to "choose an issue" (something like @priscillajordan's determine language but shorter)
ETA -> Also we could move that navigation card to contribute.html & include it in index.html so that the page is more anchored maybe?
priscillajordan commentedon Jul 9, 2024
Hey, yes I'd be able to open a PR to address the issue. I think your proposed structure would definitely help beginners @story645
story645 commentedon Jul 9, 2024
Please do then!
anpaulan commentedon Aug 1, 2024
Looking to work on this issue, but wanted to check if @priscillajordan is working on this so we are not overlapping: I checked PRs and did not find any related to "28476." I also saw in #28557 that this issue is currently "waiting on."
To me the target markets of this issue are, first time open-source contributors and project collaborators, based on the "Problem" statement.
Ironically, I am also looking for my first open source contribution, so I can incorporate the "pain points" I had. @story645 you are right, the information is there, however not centrally located, which may be contributing to the "Problem." I believe providing first time contributors with explicit steps would help mitigate duplicate PRs, and should save admins time from answering/responding to similar issues.
priscillajordan commentedon Aug 5, 2024
I apologize for my late response. Feel free to take over! @anpaulan
anpaulan commentedon Aug 5, 2024
@priscillajordan no worries at all, on it!
story645 commentedon Aug 6, 2024
Thanks @anpaulan for checking and @priscillajordan for following up! We've got a new contributors meeting tomorrow and a doc meeting Friday and you're welcome to come to both/either. Info at https://scientific-python.org/calendars/
anpaulan commentedon Aug 6, 2024
@story645 thank you for sharing the calendar! Are any of these sessions recorded?
story645 commentedon Aug 6, 2024
No, but you're welcome to join our new contributor channel and ask questions there if you can't make it to the meetings. Link is in https://matplotlib.org/devdocs/devel/contribute.html#get-connected
story645 commentedon Sep 8, 2024
Hey @anpaulan , I'd really like to get this and some follow ups sorted out before PyData sprints in early November, so just checking on whether you have time to work on this before then?
anpaulan commentedon Sep 9, 2024
Hi @story645, apologies for the delay, currently wrapping up my capstone project and will start working on this 9/13, will definitely have follow ups, and finalized before September ends. Does this timeline work?
story645 commentedon Sep 9, 2024
Sounds great!
udpated contribution doc matplotlib#28476
udpated contribution doc matplotlib#28476
anpaulan commentedon Sep 24, 2024
@story645 just put in a PR
unsure what caused the failed check, but here are the outputs.
I ended up keeping the navigation card in the index because I believe it reads well.
Let me know what you think about the new structure and the added content.
udpated contribution doc matplotlib#28476
udpated contribution doc matplotlib#28476
Merge branch 'updated-contribution-guide-matplotlib#28476' of https:/…
updated contribution doc #28476 (#28871)
QuLogic commentedon Oct 31, 2024
Is this closed by #28871?
story645 commentedon Oct 31, 2024
Sorry about that, thought it would autoclose.