CONTRIBUTING.md

Contributing to GitHub Maintainer Month

👍🎉 First off, thanks for taking the time to contribute! 🎉👍

This document provides guidelines and instructions for contributing to the Maintainer Month website.

Getting Started - What do you want to do?

Choose your contribution type to jump to the right section:

🎉 Add a New Event

Want to showcase your maintainer-focused event during Maintainer Month? → Jump to Adding a New Event

📚 Add a New Resource

Have a helpful resource for maintainers (article, video, tutorial)? → Jump to Adding a New Resource

✏️ Fix Typos or Content Issues

Spotted a typo or content error that needs fixing? → Jump to Fixing Typos or Content Issues

🔧 Make Code Changes

Want to improve the website functionality or structure? → Jump to Making Code Changes

🚀 Set Up Development Environment

Need to run the website locally for testing? → Jump to Development Guidelines

Quick Navigation

• How to Contribute
• Contribution Walkthrough
• Development Guidelines
• Content Guidelines

How to Contribute

1. Fork the repository and create your branch from main
2. Make your changes following the guidelines below
3. Test your changes locally if possible
4. Submit a pull request with a clear description of your changes

Contribution Walkthrough

Adding a New Event

1. Navigate to the content/events/ folder
2. Create a new markdown file with a descriptive name (e.g., 2025-05-20-your-event-name.md)
3. Use the following template:

---
title: 'Your Event Title'
metaTitle: 'Your Event Title'
metaDesc: 'A brief description of your event'
date: 'MM/DD'
UTCStartTime: 'HH:MM'
UTCEndTime: 'HH:MM'
type: 'meetup'
language: 'English'
location: 'Virtual or Physical Location'
userName: 'organizationName'
userLink: 'https://link-to-organization.com'
linkUrl: 'https://link-to-event.com'
---

Detailed description of your event goes here. You can use markdown formatting.

4. All frontmatter fields (between ---) are mandatory
5. Submit a PR with your changes

Adding a New Resource

1. Open the content/library/resources.json file
2. Add a new entry to the resources array following this format:

{
  "title": "Resource Title",
  "author": "Author Name",
  "description": "Brief description (max 200 characters)",
  "link": "https://link-to-resource.com",
  "type": "video|article|tutorial|etc",
  "topics": "relevant topic tags"
}

3. Submit a PR with your changes

Fixing Typos or Content Issues

Found something that needs fixing? We appreciate your help! Here's how to contribute corrections:

What to Fix

• Spelling or grammar errors
• Broken links
• Outdated information
• Formatting issues
• Missing or incorrect event details

Where to Look

• Website text: Files in the content/ directory
• Event information: Files in content/events/
• Resource library: content/library/resources.json
• Homepage content: Files in content/home/
• General site text: content/commons.json

How to Fix

1. Locate the file with the content that needs correction
2. Make your corrections (keep existing formatting and structure)
3. For events, be careful not to modify frontmatter variable names (between ---)
4. Submit a PR with a clear description of what you fixed

Quick Tip: For simple typos, you can even edit directly on GitHub by clicking the pencil icon on any file!

Making Code Changes

We welcome both minor improvements and structural changes, but the process differs:

Minor Code Changes

For small improvements like:

• Bug fixes
• UI/UX tweaks
• Performance optimizations
• Code cleanup or refactoring

Process:

1. Fork the repository and create a branch
2. Make your changes following existing code patterns
3. Test locally with npm run dev and npm test
4. Submit a PR with a clear description

Structural Code Changes

For significant changes like:

• New features or pages
• Major architectural changes
• New dependencies or build processes
• Breaking changes to existing functionality

Process:

1. Open an issue first to discuss your proposal with maintainers
2. Wait for feedback and approval before starting work
3. Follow the project's coding style and patterns
4. Test your changes thoroughly locally
5. Include clear documentation for any new functionality
6. Submit a PR referencing the issue

Development Guidelines

Setting Up Your Environment

1. Clone the repository
2. Install dependencies: npm install
3. Start the development server: npm run dev
4. Visit http://localhost:3000 to see your changes

Code Style

• Follow the existing code style and patterns
• Use descriptive variable and function names
• Write comments for complex logic

Testing

• Run tests with npm test before submitting changes
• Add new tests for new functionality when appropriate

Content Guidelines

Frontmatter Fields

Important: Do not modify variable names in frontmatter sections (between ---). These are required for the website to function properly.

Event Fields

• title: Event title
• metaTitle: Title for SEO meta tags
• metaDesc: Description for SEO meta tags
• date: Event date in MM/DD format
• UTCStartTime: Start time in UTC, in HH:MM format
• UTCEndTime: End time in UTC, in HH:MM format
• type: One of: podcast, stream, talk, meetup, fundraising, conference, misc
• language: Primary language of the event
• location: Virtual or physical location
• userName: Organizer/organization name
• userLink: Link to organizer profile/website
• linkUrl: Direct link to the event

Library Resource Fields

• title: Resource title
• author: Author or creator name
• description: Brief description (max 200 characters)
• link: URL to the resource
• type: Content type (e.g., video, article, tutorial)
• topics: Relevant topic tags

Static Content

Other content files are organized as follows:

• content/home/: Content for the homepage sections
• content/commons.json: Common website text (menu, footer, page titles, etc.)

When editing these files, maintain the existing structure and frontmatter fields.

Questions?

The Maintainer Month website is maintained by the Open Source team at GitHub. You can reach out at <maintainermonth @ github .com>