KDE and Open Source

KDE and the community

I must say, I’ve been very impressed of the KDE community. Coming from experience with communities that have long wait times for questions and an unpleasant vibe, the fast responsiveness of the KDE telegram chat contagiously added a sense of warmth and friendliness. I thank all the mentors profusely for creating such a positive atmosphere. The first time I joined the chat room, I was greeted with ebullient enthusiasm and happiness! With this warm welcome, the effect motivated me to contribute more.

 

Google Code In

So far, my work has been focused on building interest for WikiToLearn as well as GCompris, creating logos and designs, making tutorial videos, and evaluating components of the website among others.

Logo that I made for GCompris

Characters for GCompris

The Experience

While participating in the Google Code-In has definitely brought me closer to the open source community, I didn’t expect that I would learn so much. Here are a few points that I have learned and perhaps it remind you of your first days of open sourcing! (is that even a word?)

Happiness

Among the many new experiences I have discovered so far, contributing to a project that is devoted to helping other people brings about an unstoppable drive of happiness. The thought of knowing that something that I did was going to benefit someone else in this world is the best feeling and this made me feel more rewarded and fulfilled about my life.

 

Never give up

When I was working on creating a tutorial video for running WikiToLearn locally on Windows I ran into many errors. With each error, my motivation grew further and further away but someone stopped me. My mentor at the time, Luca Toma encouraged me to try and try again by offering solutions to the problems even when I thought there were no more. Error after error, he did not lose enthusiasm and I was struck in awe, inspired by his perseverance. After that, I challenged myself to persevere in my school and academics. As a result, I’m proud to say that I’ve enrolled in a programming course in my school district and I can’t wait to bring these skills to use.

Future

With the encouragement of the community and mentors, I am proud to announce that I will be a developer to WikiToLearn! I’m very excited and am looking forward to meeting and working with you guys in the future.

Within a few weeks, I have met a brilliant community, contributed to projects that will help others world, and learned lessons that will help me further in life.

With the brand new year of 2016 and more open source projects than ever before, what’s next?