About Open Source & Github
Open source technology is software whose source code is freely available on the internet and that anyone can contribute to and use as they feel like.
You can think of open source as a big building that everyone can freely use. You can even propose architectural changes to the building. If the owners of the building think your proposal is good, you can make the changes to the building yourself.
One of the most important terms for open source technology is Github. Github is a collaborative software development platform that was created in 2008 and acquired by Microsoft in 2018. The main purpose of Github is to make it easy for developers to work together on projects.
The core of Github is something called Git. Git is a system that allows developers to track changes in their code. Before Git, if a developer would make changes to their code, they would probably make a back-up folder to make sure they could still go back to his old code if necessary (if mistakes). Git does this for the developer. It tracks the changes you make in your code and make sure you can go back to previous versions.
Github extends this principle online. By using Github, developers can work together on projects, see what changes have been made to the code, and accept or reject these changes. Github is the main platform for open-source projects, where thousands of people can work together to propose changes to open-source software. To give you an idea: in 2018 more than 19,000 people contributed to Microsoft’s open source project VSCode.
Contributors to open source projects are highly respected in the developer world. Developers usually have a Github profile where others can see the contributions they have made to various projects. A list of the most important contributors can be found here: http://git-awards.com/users. If you want to see the impact that those contributions have, check out the number of Twitter followers of top contributors like TJ Holowaychuk, Hakim El Hattab or Mike Bostock.
This blogpost is part of Texidi’s mission to make tech understandable for non-tech profiles. Check out other blogposts explaining tech terms in an easy and fun way.
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