Before you start, make sure you have the following:
There are some links below the video to help you get these elements ready in case you are missing some.
Now, we can get started.
Go to the project’s repository and click the “Fork” button at the top left of the page. This will create a copy of the repository in your own account.
On your new fork, click the green “Code” button and copy the link that appears there to get the URL for cloning it.
Now, open your terminal (or Git Bash, if you’ve installed Git for Windows) and type the command git clone followed by pasting the URL you just copied. With this, you now have a local copy of your fork.
Finally, change to the directory of the repo you just cloned and add the the project’s repo as the “upstream” remote repository by typing the following:
git remote add upstream https://github.com/organization-name/project-name.gitMost open source projects have their own contributing guide, which explains the steps needed for setting up your development environment. You’ll usually find them in the root directory of the repo. We recommend that you create a new environment for this.
To create and activate a new Conda environment, type the following commands in your terminal (or Anaconda Prompt on Windows):
conda create -n [NAME] python=3
conda activate [NAME]After you have created your new Conda environment, you need to install the project’s necessary dependencies (This depends on which project we will be using for this video):
conda install …Now we need to select the issue we want to fix on the issues tab (Add link of Project’s issue tracker to display in video here) issue tracker of the repository and reproduce it in the development version of our project. (Not sure this applies, again it depends on the project).
First create a branch for your work. Run the following command in your command line:
git checkout -b [BRANCH NAME]Open your editor or IDE in the file that you need to solve the issue and save your changes.
(Not sure this applies)
Now, you are ready to add and commit your changes with a descriptive message. Type the following command in your terminal:
git commit -a -m “descriptive message”Finally, push your new branch with your changes to your fork on GitHub:
git push -u origin [BRANCH NAME]Enter your GitHub username and password if requested.
Entering your username and password every time you run git push can get tedious!
Luckily GitHub lets you use an SSH key to authenticate automatically.
Basically this involves creating two special files: one kept secret on your computer, and one uploaded to GitHub. If you want to set that up, see here:
You can also set up an SSH key using the gh command-line tool: https://cli.github.com/manual/ if you prefer.
Mac and Windows users (but not Linux users!) who prefer to use git through a GUI can manage authentication using the GitHub Desktop app.
Now, you can submit your changes to the project’s repo.
Go to the project’s repository on Github, and you will see the option to open a Pull Request. You also have to make sure that you select the correct branch to merge your changes.
You have now made your first contribution to open source!