Finding A Bug Is Harder Than You Think

It's not easy looking for a bug. No, really.  With all of these issues that are all over GitHub, looking to be solved, it took me all day to figure this out.  

I started with my interests which included virtual reality, so I decided to head over to the A-Frame repository to get started.  Head over to the Issues tab and look for some issues with the easy label and come across a really interesting one.  To discuss it quickly, the issue was related to virtual hands showing up even when no controllers were connected resulting in a poorer user experience.  I did exactly what I had to do, and left a comment to see how I could help.  Someone else had taken it, but I wanted to try in the event that they couldn't finish it.  Check it out below.

A response! Welcome to Open Source!

The contributor who took it over responded and I was excited to start interacting in the open source space.  He was welcoming as well which was great.  However, as you can tell, I also referenced a merged commit that makes it look like the issue is closed.  By doing so, I commented on the commit in hopes to get an answer in the event that I actually completed the work and it was deemed unusable.

Generally, this wouldn't bother me but because of our time constraints for the open source course I'm taking I wanted to make sure I could be assigned something I could work on and continue.  Below is my comment on the merged commit.

Still nothing. :(

Since I wasn't able to get an answer I decided to move on but keep my eyes and ears on this in the event I could eventually work on it.  I started taking a look on Bugs Ahoy! and found one I could also work on.  I'm pretty sure we went over it in class too so I did exactly what I did last time in hopes of getting an assigned bug that I could start right away.

Pretty sure I've seen you before.

All the enthusiasm!

I understand that everyone in this industry works hard because it really is a fast-paced environment.  No one is going to just sit and wait by the forums for someone to comment.  At this point, I was getting nervous about not being able to find something I was interested in working on, but...

Like a million unicorns appearing out of nowhere, a miracle occurred.  Dave Humphrey came through with a post in our Slack channel.  A beautiful link to a Twitter page....in all of its glory.

Dave Humphrey (@humphd) to the rescue!

Funny enough, Dave and I discussed different topics when I first introduced myself to him and he brought up DevTools after I explained my desire to work on items that are the unsung heroes of software development.  I got on this right away to make sure I didn't miss out.  

After I found it and read what the bug entailed, I got right in the comments and after being assigned to the issue, I was asked to join the Slack channel to get started.  What I like about this team and environment is how transparent it is.  In their documentation, they state how they will mentor a new contributor if it's their first PR.  No joke.

I joined Slack and introduced myself, only to be greeted by Jason Laster himself.  When I asked a relatively simple question that I could have answered through trial and error, he responded without hesitation.

Now, I have the project cloned and am ready to get started.  I had to install a new dependency management system, Yarn, and with the updated Node version I am ready to get started.  I'm a little nervous about it, simply because I want to do a good job to prove to myself that I can pick up something new and be able to contribute.  It's a little intimidating because you don't know the reaction you'll receive but being a confident people person who practices humility, I'll brave the new territory with pride.

Let's do this. 

***UPDATE #1***

I heard back from Patrick Brosset for the CamelCase bug where it was assigned to me.  I will gladly welcome it in order to get more comfortable. :) 

***UPDATE #2***

Since I never linked to any of my bugs directly, I'd like to do that now.  Dave also thought it was a much better idea and I agree with him.  Also, I have had my first PR merged into the debugger.html project which is a phenomenal feeling.  Anyway, here they are:

https://github.com/devtools-html/debugger.html/pull/4230
https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1402387