Eclipse Top Ten: #4 Complaints taste better with a side order of contribution

Photo by Leon Nanda

Sometimes the people have unusual perceptions of what constitutes participating in open source.
Open a feature request.
Done!
Someone else is going to fix my problem!
Nope.
It’s not a viable business plan to expect others to fix the bugs that you care about.
If you want to ensure that your issue gets fixed, get involved in the process.
Ask how you can help.
This gives you credibility in the community.
As a committer, I’m much more likely to look at a bug if the person offers to help.
Once you get your hands dirty with all that delicious open source code, perhaps you’ll decide to that you want to do more.
Triage a few bugs.
Verify several fixes.
Write some patches.
You’re walking along the path to becoming a cook committer too.

Previous Top Ten posts

1, 2, 3