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Honestly, just contribute to whatever software you're already using! The most obvious example (that somebody else mentioned already) is Lemmy itself, but surely there are many other open source pieces of software that you use on a daily basis. If there's something that annoys you, or think it could be improved... there you go.

At least, that's how I got into programming.

Sounds like you want to contribute to something for the sake of contributing (hopefully that's not true). You're skill is worth something.

Going to spew some jaded bs: Don't pick a project that makes you sign some bullshit release, pick something that some rando started and released with no intention of monetizing. Volunteer to work on a passion project that you're also passionate about. Not something that will be used by some 9-5 300k a year tech bro. That's just my opinion though. "Open source" has been used by big companies to generate free labor (looking at you Adobe, etc).

Off the top of my head, the SignalK project is something I've wanted to volunteer for. They make some software that lets marine sensors (depth sounders, Windex, speed paddles, temp sensors, etc.) Communicate in one standard format. They built a web app with node and react as a proof of concept. It could for sure be improved. It'd be neat if it caught on because vendor lock-in is huge in marine hardware / software.

I like looking for issues that are tagged as „good first issue“.

There are sites that make this even easier.

https://goodfirstissue.dev/

Look for projects that you think you might want to support in a language you know and help them out in those issues.

It's not as "glamorous" as coding often is seen as, but what almost every open source project needs is better documentation. It's also something that can help you be productive as you're learning a codebase.

For me, it was starting to use neovim that got me into open source. Because it has so many plugins, and authors are usually super thankful for contributions (most of them have day jobs and limited free time).

I wrote my own neovim plugin and I got like 10 people making contributions to it within a few months. It doesn't sound like much but it actually feels really nice and fun.

But yeah, if you want python, it's not the right start for you. Plugins are written in lua and it's not as full featured as python. But much faster.

If you're into JavaScript, https://github.com/dynamoose/dynamoose is a project I maintain, and has a lot of great documentation, Slack channels, and more.

Although my attention on it goes in waves, it could for sure use more help. I'm also totally willing to help answer questions and point people in the right direction.

We currently have 80 open issues, 6 open PRs. 9 of those issues are marked as "good first issues" and 8 are marked as "help wanted".

So there are for sure some easy jumping off points to get started. But I'm also always happy to answer questions and assist in anyway I can as well.

Beyond that, it's all about diving into something. I found Dynamoose when it was much smaller, and just started with small contributions and built up from there. Following developers on social media, and following programming communities and newsletters can be helpful too.

This is an unusual question, but how have you been programming for four years and not know how OSS works?

Don’t you interact regularly with GitHub for work?

Any chance you know more than one human language? Some projects need translators!