First Contributions

This project aims to simplify and guide the way beginners make their first contribution. If you are looking to make your first contribution, follow the steps below.

If you don't have git on your machine, install it.

Fork this repository

Fork this repository by clicking on the fork button on the top of this page. This will create a copy of this repository in your account.

Clone the repository

Now clone the forked repository to your machine. Go to your GitHub account, open the forked repository, click on the Code button, then click the copy to clipboard icon.

Open a terminal and run the following git command:

git clone "url you just copied"

where "url you just copied" (without the quotation marks) is the url to this repository (your fork of this project). See the previous steps to obtain the url.

For example:

git clone https://github.com/this-is-you/first-contributions.git

where this-is-you is your GitHub username. Here you're copying the contents of the first-contributions repository on GitHub to your computer.

Create a branch

Change to the repository directory on your computer (if you are not already there):

cd first-contributions

Now, create a branch using the git branch command:

git branch your-new-branch-name

For example:

git branch add-alonzo-church

Then, switch to this new branch with the git checkout command:

git checkout your-new-branch-name

For example:

git checkout add-alonzo-church

Make necessary changes and commit those changes

Now open the Contributors.md file in a text editor, and add your name to it. Don't add it at the beginning or end of the file. Put it anywhere in between. Now, save the file.

If you go to the project directory and execute the command git status, you'll see there are changes.

Add those changes to the branch you just created using the git add command:

git add Contributors.md

Now commit those changes using the git commit command:

git commit -m "Add your-name to Contributors list"

replacing your-name with your name.

Push changes to GitHub

Push your changes using the command git push:

git push -u origin your-branch-name

replacing your-branch-name with the name of the branch you created earlier.

If you get an errors while pushing, click here:

If you get the below error:

remote: Support for password authentication was removed on August 13, 2021. Please use a personal access token instead.
remote: Please see https://github.blog/2020-12-15-token-authentication-requirements-for-git-operations/ for more information.
fatal: Authentication failed for 'https://github.com/<your-username>/first-contributions.git/'

Go to GitHub's tutorial on generating and configuring an SSH key to your account.

If you try to push at this point, you'll still get prompted for username and password and get authentication error. To fix this, you'll need to change the remote address on your repo. Start by running git remote -v to check your remote address.

If it looks anything like this:

origin	https://github.com/your-username/your_repo.git (fetch)
origin	https://github.com/your-username/your_repo.git (push)

Then you will change it using this command:

git remote set-url origin [email protected]:your-username/your_repo.git

The exact url (after origin) can be obtained on your GitHub repo, similar to the steps taken when originally cloning the repo. Only difference is, once you have clicked on the Code button, you should switch to the SSH tab, and click the copy to clipboard icon there.