What learned from an open github project

by Jack Pu

Last year, I have tried to finish an interesting react-native project on my GitHub. React-native-percentage-circle is a component which supports you to define your percent data and draw a circle. And also you can use it as a progress bar and show some data in the circle. It does make a difference to my life.

Opearation

I published on 26 Aug 2017. Now it owns 144 stars and 27 forks. And it got 3,087 downloads. I have never imagined that it did solve some developers puzzles.

Npm Stats

But if you want to make your projects become more popular; You must do some things below:

  • Write the basic documents (REAMD.md, website, etc.) and you’d better provide some simple examples. Of course, they must be running well when users download it.

  • Do not miss some social network communities(twitter, facebook, reddit, google plus etc.). They play an important role when you hope to spread it with an amazing speed.

  • Pay more attention to each issue. Those fans are your biggest treasure and keep in touch with them.

Communications

I am a web developer from China. And I feel lucky that so many developers from different countries(USA, India, Russia, etc.) submit his issues and pull requests to the project. And This is really a good opportunity for me to have a conversation with him to improve my English. And these issues help me to get the right way to express the correct meanings.

What I Learned

React-native is an excellent framework and so many developers try to publish their plugins to make a difference to the new world. And creating your own open source project help you gain experience and enough knowledge. Maybe you should lean these tips when you try this amazing journey:

  • Learn how to Publish your npm package and upgrade your package;
  • Learn how to use integration tests to keep the quality(travis);
  • Learn how to merge others request and collect the new features;
  • Learn how to write English document and articles to spread your project;
  • Learn how to have conversations with different nation people.

When you begin your first project, you will never stop it.