Let me ask you a question

When you think of October, what three things come to mind? If you had guessed Fall, pumpkin spice lattes, or Halloween, you're close. In the tech world, Hacktoberfest comes to mind. So, what's Hacktoberfest, you ask? Well, it's not your typical Oktoberfest with those giant beer mugs. It's more like a month-long open source party, where people dive into projects and throw in their ideas through those clever Pull or Merge Requests (think of them as neat little code and no-code suggestions to enhance open source projects). Feeling a bit nervous? I get it! I felt the exact same when I first heard about it. But, guess what? I shook off those nerves with some practice and even managed to send in four pull requests in the first week of my very first Hacktoberfest. Now, I'm about to let you in on the strategies that got me there!

Strategy 1: Participate in Preptember

Like any challenge in life, you need to prepare for it, especially ones like Hacktoberfest. That’s where Preptember comes in. Simply put, open source projects post pre-Hacktoberfest repositories where open source contributors make contributions all September long so they can get used to working with Git and GitHub. Even though I’m a seasoned open source contributor, I decided to to participate in this part of Hacktoberfest to brush up on my skills. Here is a list of Preptember repositories that have been helpful in my journey to Hacktoberfest:

• BioDrop: In this repository, all you have to do is add your name to a list. It’s a great way to learn how to do a Pull Request.
• Virtual Coffee: In this project, you add your name and a list of open source projects you recommend for Hacktoberfest. They provide specific steps to look out for in open source projects. It’s a great way to learn the traits of a healthy open source project. Since I’ve been contributing to open-source projects a bit before Preptember, I decided to list projects that have been helpful in my journey. (note: you have to join their group in order to contribute. Here’s a link: https://virtualcoffee.io/).

Now participating is only one method that has helped me thrive in Hacktoberfest. Let’s look at another.

Strategy 2: Support Smaller Open Source Projects

If you want to contribute to big projects like Microsoft or Drupal on your portfolio, feel free. However, if you want to increase your chances of getting your contributions reviewed and merged, I highly recommend aiming for smaller projects. Smaller open source projects tend not to get as crowded as others, which means you might get a higher chance of your contribution being reviewed and merged at a quick pace. As a contributor, I wanted to use Hacktoberfest as an opportunity to work with YAML files for open source projects. Luckily for me, I have been talking to Arshad Khan about this on X(Twitter), so I created greetings YAML files for their projects, FarmHub and Tindog. It was a bit of a learning curve as the greetings won’t go through, but after reading that permissions: write-all is helpful in making third-party greetings work, I added that to the files, and bam, my PRs got merged!

Hold on, before, you rush off to make Pull Requests, there’s just one strategy that I want to share with you.

Strategy 3: Go Beyond Four

Remember how Lay's Chips tells you, 'Betcha Can't Just Have One'? Well, I decided to take a similar approach to Hacktoberfest. Currently, I've had 14 PRs accepted, and I'm not planning to stop there! 😊 Among them are adding intermediate quiz questions to FreeCodeCamp’s Developer Quiz repository,adding more detail about the process organizations need to follow when creating a profile picture on GitHub, and writing an open source roadmap to SheSharp's knowledge hub repository. The possibilities are endless! 😊

So, there you have it, the three strategies that helped me secure four accepted PRs in just one week! 😊 If there's one thing I'd like you to take away from my journey, it's this: plan your path, don't settle for the minimum, and most importantly, savor the experience. Hacktoberfest isn't just a challenge; it's a celebration of open source. Make the most of it!😊