39 lines
3.7 KiB
Markdown
39 lines
3.7 KiB
Markdown
# What is "Contributing"?
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### Definitions:
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[My Favorite](https://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=contributing)
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[The Actual Definition](https://www.dictionary.com/browse/contributing)
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### The Answer to the Title.
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Contributing is the act of helping further the given environment/community by means of labor or assistance, over other methods; such as Moderating or Donating.
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The most classic way of doing so is through means like Bughunting, Bug Reporting, Patches, or other meaningful contributions, such as this nice wiki you are reading.
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The basic goal is to ease off some of the pressure on the given leadership of the community; in the case of Thunix, the SysAdmins/Staff. As such, contributing is really any task that accomplishes that goal.
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Contributing is a great way to give back to a community you love and support where you cannot be part of the staff team or compensate some other way, usually financially.
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It is understandable that everyone cannot pitch in through these other means, as everyone is on their own walks of life, so these little things add up and help make a community like Thunix what it is.
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Take my personal case for example:
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I (dovahkin) have been part of Thunix for a good while, about 2(ish) years. I was part of the original Thunix, and honestly was shocked when I heard about the service!
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I mean, who wouldn't be?!?! A completely free SSH Shell that offers no caps on pretty much anything, Where the SysAdmins are a message away, with only rudimentary rules? Not to mention an active community, often which is friendly enough to help you when you are doing something stupid or unfamiliar?
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HELLS YES. I'll take two! (Anyhow, I digress...)
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I honestly should've contributed more; and I feel that could be said for a majority of the service at the time.
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(Mad props to ``hexhaxtron`` for putting up with us on his own time, btw.)
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Anyhow; that's a mistake I made sure not to repeat. When I heard about the re-launch of Thunix, I immediately sent 5$ as a donation.
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It isn't much when you consider the cost of the bottom line of what it takes to operate Thunix as we know it, but it was what I could spare; and I know it was appreciated :).
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Seeing how my financial situation doesn't exactly allow me to be sending donations every month, I put my brain to work on how I might contribute by other means.
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I proposed I head and maintain the wiki, as a sort of weekend project; just something to do in my spare time. Look at how it expanded!
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Instead of some random things every week/other week, we have three contributors! All making more pushes to the wiki than I can bear listening to the notifications for!
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Something so innocuous, as this little weekend project, turned into a major part of Thunix, and set an example of how powerful small contributions are.
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With every push to this wiki, is one less thing that the SysAdmins have to explain to the skid asking questions in IRC (Which is usually me, lets be real....).
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At this point, I am rambling... You get the poimt? Contributing is an effective means to help where one cannot by other means.
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### Cool story bro, now how the fuck is that relevant to outside of Thunix?
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The point was this; No matter how big or small a contribution might be, it has the potential to really affect the entire ecosystem.
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Now, let's talk about the giant in the room, being the way most might be familiar with contributing to; [Git/Version Control.](/wiki/contrib/top1_sub1). Prepare yourself for a crash-course and generic overview of Git. (We will probably release a dedicated topic for just git Eventually <sup>TM</sup>)
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