Improve contributing guidelines.

[tech4him1]

We need to have a better system to allow new contributors to jump in quickly. We need to have a better system for contributing to this project, as right now we don't have a whole lot of standards in place. We would like to open this up for discussion, if anyone has some suggestions, please feel free to chime in!

cc/ @Benaiah @erquhart @talves
related/ #982

[erquhart]

Super excited for this!

cc/ @verythorough @phae @neutyp

[phae]

A place to start might be gathering any examples out there of other OSS projects that do it well / have inspiring guidelines?

[talves]

I am not sure the focus of getting them in faster to contribute is the whole picture, but is a good start. Making it clearer how to contribute is a core reason someone might hold off on a contribution.

Here is a starter list of where we should probably start:

• Step by step docs of how to start contributing for all areas (see next)
• Documents by area to contribute (docs, org site, widgets, core cms app, etc)
• Structured testing plans for new/existing contributors
• Contributor retention is a focus that needs to be considered.
• Issues need to be reviewed, categorized and put into timelines or ratings for urgency in a timely manner by level of experience needed

These are all time consuming tasks. No magic here in my opinion. @phae makes a good point on mirroring what works for others.

Maybe have special contributor roles that are time consuming get benefits from Netlify services like reseller access to the API and/or higher limits and/or access to paid services for free.

[cory-wc]

Need to link in general Contributing guide -- Contributing guide for docs is at https://github.com/netlify/netlify-cms/tree/master/website - readme.md

And I'm claiming this!

[erquhart]

Nice @cory-wc!

[jerdog]

I'll start putting headings in as a guide for improving this while here at WTD

[jerdog]

May not be fully done by end of WTD Writing Day but will submit a PR with where we're at when the day is done.

[stale]

This issue has been automatically marked as stale because it has not had recent activity. It will be closed if no further activity occurs. Thank you for your contributions.