Forem: Cynthia Iradukunda

My experience contributing to the ChRIS Project

Cynthia Iradukunda — Mon, 23 Jan 2023 15:33:21 +0000

Medical images are an essential part of medical diagnosis and treatment because they offer information that can be used to diagnose and detect a variety of illnesses and abnormalities, such as cancer, anemia, and brain tumors. However, because there are so many of them, it can take doctors hours or days to study them, which can have fatal or seriously harmful effects in medical emergencies. Additionally, existing research softwares to speed up the process are not user-friendly as they require medical professionals to be familiar with the terminal and command line.

In this blog, I'll discuss how the ChRIS project is solving that challenge as well as my own contributions to the platform through the Outreachy Program.

What is the ChRIS project?
My contributions to the ChRIS project
Final thoughts

What is the ChRIS project?

ChRIS, Childrens Research Integration System, is an open source, web-based medical image platform founded by the FNNDSC (Fetal-Neonatal Neuroimaging and Developmental Science Center) at Boston Children's Hospital. The ChRIS project seeks to close the gap between medical professionals and research developers by creating a web user interface(UI) that makes it easy to use those research softwares. Additionally, it strives to increase research collaboration and availability on computing through open cloud.

The MOC(Mass Open Cloud) is part of the Massachusetts Green High Performance Computing Center located west of Boston. It is an openStack powered infrastructure built by the Boston Children's hospital in collaboration with a number of institutions that faculty and students can use at no cost. MOC offers a secure, collaborative, and affordable computing and storage for conducting innovative medical research and big data analytics.

MOC and Red hat have a strong partnership with the ChRIS project. ChRIS project depends on some of Red hat services such as Red hat openShift and Red hat enterprise Linux to successfully perform analysis.

My contributions to the ChRIS project

Over the past one and a half month, I've enjoyed contributing to the ChRIS project because it gives me a chance to hone my software development skills as a react developer. I also appreciate that the ChRIS project provides a pleasant working atmosphere with mentors who are friendly and supportive. The following list shows the different contributions I have made to the ChRIS UI.

Migrated ChRIS Store plugin display page to ChRIS Core:

ChRIS store is where medical professionals browse for plugins(research softwares) that they are interested to use and then install them on their ChRIS core account. One of the ChRIS project goals is to merge both platforms as one to make plugins easily accessible to users. So in this PR, I migrated the ChRIS store plugin display page to the ChRIS Core.

Added keyboard functionalities to the create analysis wizard:

In this PR, I added keyboard functionalities to the create analysis wizard in the ChRIS core which reduced the time it takes to create analysis.

Improved the feature to add optional:.

Sometimes a user might need to fill optional parameters provided by the plugin for better analysis. Therefore the PR aims to improve the feature by making it faster to fill them.

Enhanced the file upload process feature:

When a user is creating an analysis, they can choose to either use a plugin, local files, or existing files on ChRIS. The PR aims to improve the process of uploading local files to ChRIS by making it faster.

Added responsiveness on the feed list table and node progress steps People find it difficult to get some information using their mobile devices, such as a list of feeds and the progress of a single step. I therefore improved responsiveness of the app to address that issue.

Final Thoughts

The ChRIS is built from different technologies such as React, Django, Python, kubernetes, etc. Furthermore, they are always looking for contributors in a variety of fields, including design, frontend programming, backend development, quality assurance, etc. Visit their contributor guide to learn more on how to start contributing to the project. If it's your first time contributing to open source, you can check my blog on more tips on how to get started.

If you find the blog helpful, don't forget to leave a like, share or bookmark it to reference later. Incase of any inquiries, you can find me on my Linkedin or Twitter page.

How to contribute to open source as a beginner

Cynthia Iradukunda — Mon, 09 Jan 2023 13:53:25 +0000

I was unsure of how to contribute to open source projects for a very long time. Even when I started, I would not successfully make a contribution. Luckily, through different research and tips from different people, I was able to make my first contribution. In this blog, I hope to inspire and support those who are interested in starting their open source adventure.

Table of Content

What is open source software and benefits.
The basic knowledge required to contribute.

a. How to find and create an issue.

b. How to make a pull request.

c. An Open Source License
How to find open source projects.
Open source programs to get started.
Final thoughts.

What is Open Source Software and Benefits

An Open Source Software(OSS) is project whose source code is accessible to anyone to see, modify or improve. Designers, developers, technical writers, testers, and other professionals can all contribute to open source. Basically, you can make meaningful contributions to open source projects according to your interests and skills.

As a beginner, contributing to open source projects has a lot of benefits:

Gain experience: To contribute, you do not need to submit an application. Therefore it is easy to put what you learnt in school or online courses into practice and make your resume stand out.
Improve your soft skills: By collaborating and communicating with other developers while contributing, you enhance your soft skills.
Mentorship: Through asking questions and requesting help, you get to learn and improve your knowledge from experts in the field.
Community: By consistently contributing to OSS, you come in contact with a wide range of people with varying backgrounds, skills, and cultural perspectives, fostering a supportive environment for exchanging ideas and experiences.
Flexibility: You can contribute to an OSS project remotely without relocating or commuting to another location.
Earn salary and benefits: The majority of the programs I will share below pay, although a few also offer benefits like t-shirts, internship opportunities with partners, and subscriptions.

The Basic knowledge needed to contribute

How to find and create an issue

An issue identifies a problem in a project that needs a fix. You can start contributing by solving exciting issues. Issues can be found under the project repository on the issue page and you can filter using different labels. As a beginner, you can filter using a good-first-issue label for newcomers as shown in the ChRIS project issues page below. Those issues are usually easy to solve and useful for learning the code base. If you find an issue that you are interested to solve, comment on it so that it can be assigned to you.

You might sometimes run across a problem when using the project and be eager to fix it. Then, using the new issue button shown in the image below, you can create an issue. For others to comprehend and offer support, it's essential to provide sufficient details about the issue, including the problem, the anticipated outcome, screenshots, and steps to reproduce the problem.

How to Make a Pull Request (PR)

A PR is a method of submitting a contribution. There are primarily 7 steps involved in creating a PR: Fork Repo -> Clone Repo -> Create a Branch -> Make a Change -> Commit -> Push -> Open a PR. If you have not made any PR before, you can follow the first contribution project guide to create one.

Congratulations on creating your first PR 🥳. After you open a PR, the maintainers review it, offer feedback if necessary, which may require you to make some changes, and then merge it.

An Open Source License

A license ensures that contributors are permitted to use, copy, edit, and contribute to the project without facing repercussions. A project without a license is subject to the default copyright, which grants only the owner the authority to alter, duplicate, or use the project.

In order to avoid repercussions, it is crucial to confirm that a project is licensed before you contribute. There are various licenses available, including the MIT, Apache, and Mozilla Public Licenses, and each provides terms and conditions that serve as a guide for contributors. Therefore, reading them before contributing is crucial.

How to Find Open Source Projects

You now possess the fundamental knowledge required to contribute to any project. It's time to select a real project and employ your newly acquired skills. Bellow, I will share some of the web apps that show good first issues from different OSS projects to help beginners make their first contribution. Using the filter option on those web apps, you can easily find an issue to solve or a project to contribute to based on your skills and what you want to improve.

First Contributions Project List: A list of OSS projects with good first issues to help you make your first contribution in 5 min.
Good First Issue: A beginner friendly web app to find good first issue from popular OSS projects and make your first contribution.
Codetribute: A Mozilla web app to find good first issue to make your first contribution on their products.

Open Source Programs to Get Started

They are various open source programs, run entirely remotely, to help beginners start contributing to open source.

Outreachy: A three-month paid internship program by Software Freedom Conservancy to increase diversity in open source. Please see my recent blog for more information here.
MLH Fellowship: It's a three-month paid internship initiated by Major League Hacking. The participants learn to collaborate on real open source projects with peers and engineers from top companies.
Google Summer of Code: A three-month paid internship organised by Google. It is focused on bringing new contributors into open source software development.
She Code Africa Contributhon: A two month paid bootcamp for African women by She Code Africa. It aims at increasing diversity and inclusion in the open source ecosystem of Africa.
GirlScript Summer of Code: A three month non-paid open source program by GirlScript foundation to foster diversity. Everyone can participate including men and people from outside India.

Final Thoughts

Back in 2021, when I was trying to find a project and ways to make my first contribution, I would comment on the issue and start working on it. However, I would get stuck in the middle and be afraid to ask for help since I used to think that doing so would be a sign of weakness, meaning that I might not have the necessary skills to contribute or haven't done enough research. As a result, the issue would be assigned to someone else.

If you face a challenge while trying to solve an issue, first do some research using different resources such as project documentation, stack overflow, or the web. However, if you continue to get stuck for 1 to 3 hours, consider asking for help. When asking for help, ensure to always mention the research you have done on that particular challenge and the result from trying what you got from the research to get a response from the maintainers. Moreover, when you ask for help, you not only get advice on how to solve the challenge, but also get an opportunity to connect with the maintainers/mentors.

I wish you all the best on your open source adventure. If you find the blog helpful, don't forget to like, share or bookmark it. You may find me on Twitter or LinkedIn, and I'll be pleased to assist you if you need help.

How I got into the Outreachy Program

Cynthia Iradukunda — Mon, 12 Dec 2022 12:54:29 +0000

Are you trying to find an internship? Look no farther than the Outreachy program!

📖Background

I'm Cynthia Iradukunda from Rwanda, a recent graduate from African Leadership College(ALC) with a degree in Computing. I am very passionated about software development and cloud computing; my tech stack consists of ReactJS, AWS, ExpressJS, and HTML/CSS. If you have any opportunities to share or grow my expertise, send them my way 😎.

My journey to open source started last year when I got accepted for the She Code Africa Contributhon program. During the program, I contributed to Jenkins documentation by adding code examples and online help. The flexibility, diversity, and experience I gained from industry experts while contributing, encouraged me to explore for further opportunities.

🔥Outreachy Program

Outreachy is a three month internship program which is organized by Software Freedom Conservancy for the people who are underrepresented in tech. It is a paid and remote internship which is conducted twice a year from May to August and December to March. The application consists of two main phases: initial application and contribution.

During the initial application, You respond to essay questions to demonstrate how you are underrepresented in your community. When writing your essays, be sure to read the prompt thoroughly and incorporate statistics to support them. Upon passing that phase, you go to the contribution phase, which lasts one month.

During this phase, you choose one or two open source projects to contribute to in accordance with your skills such as design, coding, or technical writing. It's critical to keep in mind that quality counts more than quantity when making contributions. Additionally, if you want to be chosen, collaborating with other applicants and communicating with your mentors are equally essential as contributing.

💎Faith, Honesty, and Courage

If I hadn't stayed true to my core values, I wouldn't have gotten an opportunity to be part of the Outreachy program. Only 64 interns were chosen this round out of 1378 applicants, demonstrating how competitive the program is.

Faith

"Faith is taking the first step even when you don't see the whole staircase." - Martin Luther King, Jr

It is so easy to feel like you can't be among those 64 interns due to your level of experience, skillset or background; I also experienced the same. However, by shifting my mindset to "How can I be one of the 64 interns?" I was able to start and submit my application.

Honesty

"Honesty is the first chapter in the book of wisdom." - Thomas Jefferson

Being truthful to myself and the people around me is vital to me. The initial application's numerous essay prompts can be overwhelming if you aren't used to writing essays. However, resist the urge to plagiarize other people's stories and strive to create your own. The satisfaction you get when you know you submitted an original application is encouraging. It will also save you a lot of time to choose a project during the contribution phase based on what you are skilled and passionate about.

Courage

"Success is not final; failure is not fatal: it is the courage to continue that counts." - Winston Churchill

My initial application was rejected twice. However, I did not give up, I kept seeking feedback from past outreachy interns. Therefore, when you get rejected, learn from it and keep trying. Don't be afraid to ask or seek for support during the application process.

👋 Final thoughts

As part of the Outreachy program, I am contributing to the ChRIS project, a Red Hat project, by consolidating and making reusable various react UI components from two user interfaces. My mentors are kind, accessible, and knowledgeable. I can't wait to start sharing my 12 month experience.

Follow the Outreachy page on Twitter to get notified when the application opens. Share, like, and comment if you found the article helpful!

Forem: Cynthia Iradukunda

My experience contributing to the ChRIS Project

Table of Contents

What is the ChRIS project?

My contributions to the ChRIS project

Final Thoughts

How to contribute to open source as a beginner

Table of Content

What is Open Source Software and Benefits

The Basic knowledge needed to contribute

How to find and create an issue

How to Make a Pull Request (PR)

An Open Source License

How to Find Open Source Projects

Open Source Programs to Get Started

Final Thoughts

How I got into the Outreachy Program

📖Background

🔥Outreachy Program

💎Faith, Honesty, and Courage

👋 Final thoughts