What is Hacktoberfest ?

Hacktoberfest is DigitalOcean's annual event that encourages people to contribute to open source throughout October with registrations from 26th September and starting from October 1st. Much of modern tech infrastructure, including some of digitalocean’s products - relies on open-source projects built and maintained by passionate people who often don’t have the staff or budgets to do much more than keep the project alive. Hacktoberfest is all about giving back to those projects, sharpening skills, and celebrating all things open source, especially the people that make open source so special.

Is it different from contributing to normal Opensource ?

No, it is not. In the event duration when you contribute to Opensource you receive some bonus swags for it ! For the past 9 years, thousands of people—coders and non-coders alike—have participated in hacktoberfest to support the projects they use and love, learn and practice skills that will enhance their careers, and meet new people who love open source as much as they do.

What's new this year ?

🍦 Low or non-code contributions

Contributing to open source isn’t just for technical folks who want to write code. There are lots of opportunities to use your professional skills in support of open-source projects. This year, Hacktoberfest's making a point to encourage contributions that require some technical experience or none at all. No matter your experience, you can participate in hacktoberfest!

🍦 Aspects for the above

Here are some examples of how someone with less technical experience can also contribute with non/low code :

Resources for beginners

Hacktoberfest 2020 was overwhelming for me, I dived into knowing nothing about Opensource, and whatsoever, still i fell in love with it ! Here are some resources for beginners, prepared by Hacktoberfest themselves to get started !

So how do I get to be a contributor/ Maintainer ?

It's as simple as making use of a simple hacktoberfest label in the pull requests and also in the repository topics so that folks get to know .

1. Take a look at the Contributors guide 👨‍💻
2. Take a look at the Maintainers guide ⛑
3. Measures to reduce Spam ⚠
4. Pull / Merge request Guidelines ✅

See you there

• Don't forget to join Hacktoberfest's discord community
• Access Hacktoberfest's live site
• Follow me on Twitter and Linkedin