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<!DOCTYPE html>
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<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" lang="" xml:lang="">
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<head>
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<meta charset="utf-8" />
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<meta name="generator" content="pandoc" />
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<meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width, initial-scale=1.0, user-scalable=yes" />
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<title>The Contributor Competition</title>
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</head>
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<body>
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<h1 id="the-contributor-competition">The Contributor Competition</h1>
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<p><br></p>
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<div style="text-align: center;">
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<p><img src="images/ruin_sword.jpg" /></p>
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</div>
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<h4
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id="open-source-projects-compete-for-contributors.-how-can-you-win">Open
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source projects compete for contributors. How can you win?</h4>
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<hr>
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<h2 id="a-case-study.">A case study.</h2>
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<hr>
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<p>    Python and Julia are programming languages that fill a very
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similar niche. They're both dynamic scripting languages popular in the
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scientific computing space. People use them to replace Matlab and R. Why
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is Julia languishing, while Python is flourishing?</p>
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<br>
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<div style="text-align: center;">
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<p><img src="images/Python_vs_Julia.png" /></p>
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</div>
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<p><br></p>
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<p>    Julia has been relatively successful at attracting users. Most CS
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students that I went to college with learned Julia. But very few have
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been convinced to become contributors. I was curious, so I looked at the
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recent PRs. I was looking for a PR from someone not in the Julia
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programming language organization. I found one. It was the 63rd PR I
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looked at. A prolific contributor who wasn't technically in the
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organization, but had contributed all over the Julia package ecosystem.
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I scrolled through a few more pages, but couldn't find a name that I
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didn't recognize. The Julia community is very tight-knit and
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insular.</p>
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<p>    I did the same for Python. The fourth PR from the top was a first
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time contributor. The Julia organization on Github has 187 members.
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Python has by far more users, but only 129 members. Anyway, this is
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circumstantial evidence that doesn't prove anything. But something is
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going on here.</p>
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<p>    No language is "better" than another. Usually these comparisons
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are an excercise in tribalism. But bear with me here. Let's look at only
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the technology. In a vaccum, Julia just seems "better" than Python.</p>
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<p>    It's faster. It automatically deduces types, then uses them to
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jit compile using LLVM ORC. You can compile a function and read the
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assembly. It has perhaps (tied with ipython) the best REPL in the world,
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built into the base language. It solves the <a
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href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Expression_problem">expression
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problem</a>, which python cannot. It has a more principled package
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manager. You can run Julia code on the GPU. The compiler is extensible.
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Very fancy. It's a complex and incredible marvel of engineering. It has
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everything going for it, from a technical perspective.</p>
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<p>    Why, then, does Julia not attract contributors? Surely all of
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that should make people want to work on it, right?</p>
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<h2 id="the-problem">The problem</h2>
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<hr>
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<p>    Yeah, no. here's the problem. None of that matters. Nobody
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cares.</p>
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<p>    Fundamentally, what contributors want is to solve their own
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problems and optimize their own experience. They are selfish. They think
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about how to use the project to accomplish their own goals. They don't
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care about the maintainer's problems as much as the maintainer may hope.
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Especially if they cannot at a glance understand those problems. Julia
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is too complicated to contribute to without sacrifice. I know, because I
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have sacrificed.</p>
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<p>    Potential contributors may support your mission, but they won't
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sacrifice anything for it. They have a very short attention span. They
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want to contribute so that they can avoid pain, not take on more pain.
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If they can't immediately solve their problem, they will leave. They'll
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find a workaround without upstreaming a fix, or they will just find some
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other project. The only way to get someone to sacrifice for your cause
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is to pay them, or offer some other incentive. Nobody wants to clean up
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your mess for you.</p>
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<p>    I consider Julia to be a cautionary tale. I've had multiple
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conversations with the maintainers to the effect of "We have a long list
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of good first issues, why is nobody picking them up? We have like three
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hundred of them! Fix our type inference bugs! Debug our segfaults! Why
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are there no new contributors?" They forget that nobody wants to do
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that. People have their own problems to deal with.</p>
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<h2 id="the-solution">The Solution</h2>
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<hr>
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<p>    The solution is to drastically lower the barrier to entry while
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making the project as useful as possible. That way, useful contributions
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to your project will not require much sacrifice. The risk (wasted time)
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vs reward (features merged) calculation becomes more favorable. Then
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maybe some of those short term contributors will keep using your project
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and turn into long term contributors and maintainers. People that you
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can design new features with, who can review your code and point out
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conceptual issues.</p>
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<p>    It's actually not enough to lower the barrier to entry. You need
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to make sure that people know that it's low. This is more important than
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it actually being low. Frequent communication is key. If people know
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that they can go on discord for help implementing a feature and expect
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that it will be approved and merged within a day, then who wouldn't want
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to contribute? But if you need to find someone willing to review your PR
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and you haven't already befriended a maintainer, and you're not sure if
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you can even understand the code in the first place, then maybe not.</p>
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<h1 id="actionable-advice.">Actionable advice.</h1>
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<hr>
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<p><br></p>
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<div style="text-align: center;">
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<p><img src="images/Haruhi_Thumbs_Up.jpg" /></p>
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</div>
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</body>
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</html>

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