contributor-skills.md

Exosphere Contributor Skills

You don't need all the skills mentioned below to start contributing to Exosphere. We aim to create a welcoming environment where people can learn by doing.

Areas of Exosphere with Relevant Skills

Skill↓ | Area→	User interface	Instance configuration	OpenStack interactions	Browser tests	Documentation
Elm Web Development	Essential	Optional	Essential		Optional
Linux and Ansible		Essential	Optional		Optional
Cloud APIs	Optional	Optional	Essential		Optional
Python BDD Testing				Recommended
Interaction Design	Recommended
Git and GitLab	Essential	Essential	Essential	Essential	Optional
Markdown					Essential
A+ Written English	Essential	Optional	Optional	Recommended	Essential

Key:

• Essential: Must learn to contribute effectively
• Recommended: Can get started without but may need later
• Optional: Could be helpful some of the time
• (Blank): Not applicable

Skills, with links for learning more

• Elm Web Development
  • An Introduction to Elm | The Official Elm Guide
  • elm-ui
  • Debugging with Elm | elm-lang.org (written for older version of Elm, but still useful)
  • Learn Web Development | MDN
  • Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP) | MDN
  • What are browser developer tools? | MDN
• Linux and Ansible
  • The Linux command line for beginners | Ubuntu
  • Get Started | Ansible
• Cloud APIs
  • OpenStack Tutorials | Ubuntu
• Python BDD (Behavior-Driven Development) Testing
  • Python for Beginners | Python.org
  • behave Tutorial - Behavior-Driven Development (BDD), Python style | ReadTheDocs
  • behaving - Behavior-Driven Development (BDD) for multi-user web/email/sms applications | GitHub
• Interaction Design
  • Best Interaction Design Courses & Certifications | Coursera
  • Learn Interaction Design | Codecademy
  • Learn Interaction Design with Online Courses, Classes, & Lessons | edX
• Git and GitLab
  • GitLab is a very similar service to GitHub; if you're familiar with one, using the other is quite straightforward.
  • Git | GitLab
  • Learn GitLab with tutorials | GitLab
• Markdown
  • Markdown Cheatsheet | GitHub
  • GitLab Flavored Markdown | GitLab
• A+ Written English
  • This includes:
    • In a user interface, the ability to write text that does not contain obvious mistakes or confuse the reader.
    • In documentation, the ability to communicate technical concepts succinctly, with an awareness of the likely audience.
    • Consistent use of grammar, punctuation, and capitalization.
  • The Elements of Style
  • Subject-verb agreement
  • UX Writing Guide | PatternFly

On Git Skills

Git is an advanced version control system, so there are different levels of git skill.

To make your first Exosphere contribution, you only need basic familiarity with the clone, switch, add, commit, and push commands. Our quick start section shows each git command to run. This is about the same skill level you'd need to host a small personal project on GitHub.

To work collaboratively on major changes to Exosphere's codebase, or to become a project maintainer, you will need deeper git knowledge. This includes knowing, at least roughly:

• How to write effective commit messages
• How to structure and order commits so that code reviewers can follow a multi-commit change
• How to manage multiple git remotes (one for each colleague)
• The difference between git fetch, git merge, and git pull
• The difference between a fast-forward merge and a two-parent merge
• How to rebase changes
• What merge conflicts are, and how to resolve them
• Optional but helpful, Git's basic data structure