Getting started
I would love to share a "getting started" tip, and this seems like as good a place as any:
Over the years, I've written a handful of modules. Sometimes, I get spread a little thin, and the issue queues get longer than I'd like them to be. This can be incredibly stressful! If I can carve out a few hours to work on my modules, I often spend hours just wading through the issue queues, attempting to figure out what's a bug, what's a support question, which are dupe's - and which of the dupe's have the most meaningful background information. When my time is up, I'm lucky if I've tested and committed 2 patches - not to mention new features. It's kind of a drag :(
So, when a friend of mine asked how he can get into Drupal, I asked him to start helping me clean up some of the issue queues on some of my modules. We started by identifying dupes and closing them, an activity which requires almost no knowledge at all. With this newfound familiarity, the support questions ended up being a pretty easy task. Pretty soon, my friend was testing patches, and the next thing I knew, he was writing bug fixes! It helped him get up to speed in a welcoming environment, and seeing a way to forward inertia was practically life-changing for me.
Perhaps this is nothing more than an example of exploiting my friends to do my dirty work. But the takeaway I hope you'll take away is that tiny contributions are significant and a great first step. There are off-putting attitudes in any community and sometimes it's scary to jump in. However, no developer in her right mind would complain if you started to work through a beleaguered issue queue.
I couldn't agree more
I couldn't agree more !!!
This is actually how I got started -- helping out with the CCK issue queue when it was getting overrun. It's a great way to help the project, it's a great way to let others know you're willing to give as well as get, it's a great way to learn how your favorite modules work, it's a great way to build Drupal karma, and it pretty much guarantees that when you need help or have a request you'll get a quick response from the grateful maintainer.
And you never know where else it might lead :)
Great tip! Here's another one...
Regarding issue queue cleanup, additionally, something Addi likes to point out is that module developers are generally busy people. When there is a choice between implementing feature A which was suggested by someone who's been helping you clean up your issue queue, saving you time by answering support requests and reviewing patches, etc. or feature B by some random person, feature A naturally gets the priority.
Another trick I employ is exchanging knowledge for documentation.
I needed to know about the state of Drupal mapping/locations for a project we were doing. Demoing all of the location-related modules and reading a bunch of code and googling and stuff would've taken me a week or more to do. Instead, I asked Bdragon, resident Drupal location expert, if he could just brain-dump what he knew to me in IRC. Then, in exchange I ghost-wrote a 'where locations in Drupal need to be' post in the Mapping group that formatted our IRC log into paragraphs legible by humans. ;) This helped me, it helped him, and it helped anyone else who would come across that same question later.
I also find generally that documenting something helps me to learn it better, and it's also one of those areas in Drupal that's perpetually neglected, so you naturally get a great deal of "karma points" for helping out here.
It's weird...
Until I had my own issue queue, I was hesitant to jump in an help with anyone else's issue queue because I didn't want to step on anyones toes. Now I know better. Still it's nice to see you guys (the veterans) reaching out for help in this area. It's makes me much more inclined to "just do it" next time I feel I can help out. :)
How do you help with documentation?
I'd love to help with documentation, especially in the areas that I use all of the time. I'm good at editing, and would love to help with that too.
How do I start?
Join the docs team:)
All you have to do is ask!
http://drupal.org/contribute/documentation
That's a great place to start
I really got into Drupal by writing up how to get started because I had trouble finding good stuff on DO (I know that never happens to anyone else).
I can certainly offer any of my modules for anyone that wants to help with documentation or issue queue patrols.
Nancy W.
Drupal Cookbook (for New Drupallers)
Adding Hidden Design or How To notes in your database
well, duh -- there's an issue queue for that too
It took me a while to find the issue queue:
http://drupal.org/project/issues/documentation
Would input there be helpful?
Aid for Subscriptions module documentation
@codeknitter, I'm working on documentation for subscriptions module, would you like to take a look? Please let me know.
Thanks in advance!
--
(3 John 1:2) Dear friend, I pray that you may enjoy good health and that all may go well with you, even as your soul is getting along well.
Yes!
Even just reviewing things in the issue queue and getting familiar with it to mark duplicates and such would be a help. But giving feedback, taking a stab at things that need to be updated and such would be awesome. We had a "docs sprint" at DrupalCon last month where folks just ran through issues and closed outdated ones or updated info, etc. We need to keep that kind of work rolling along. Also, if you haven't yet, please join the docs mailing list. We've been having some interesting conversations lately about docs in the big picture.
Other fun tasks:
Comment rolling: find handbook pages with comments and roll them into the page. Then create an issue to get the comments deleted. You can get to last more easily if you turn on the Contributors block in your account (go to My Account > Edit, look for the Contributors block checkbox, check it and save. You get a list of useful links in your sidebar - one of which is Handbook tools > w/ comments.)
Learn/review: I will pick a section of the handbook that I want/need to learn about myself and go through each page looking for grammatical/wording corrections, testing to make sure it actually works, clarifying things that I have trouble with, etc.
Lullabot loves you
Double Jeopardy (female AND not a techie)
I'm glad I joined here - this is already useful. As a non-programmer, the attitude that if you don't contribute code, you don't contribute, period, is pretty off-putting. I'd like to help with documentation, evangelism, marketing, training - where my solid skills are - and now I have some ideas for how to start.
I suspect a lot of women may come to Drupal from less programmerish backgrounds, like me, and that finding ways to welcome non-techies will help more women get involved, and help Drupal become more widespread as a platform. Website decisions are often driven or at least heavily influenced by marketing, design, and other non-IT people. I can attest that Drupal makes it easy to do quite a lot without knowing a line of code.