# Contributing Guidelines

DevFeed: [Contributing Guidelines](<https://devfeed.tech/articles/contributing-guidelines-70359.md>)

Original publisher: [Read original article](<https://github.blog/news-insights/the-library/contributing-guidelines/>)

Author: Kevin R. Barnes

Published: 2012-09-17T23:03:11Z

Content type: article

Language: en

Sources: [GitHub Blog](<https://devfeed.tech/sources/github-engineering.md>)

Topics: [Open Source](<https://devfeed.tech/topics/open-source.md>), [open source maintenance](<https://devfeed.tech/topics/open-source-maintenance.md>)

Tags: [contributing](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/contributing.md>), [guidelines](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/guidelines.md>), [news-insights](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/news-insights.md>), [pull-request](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/pull-request.md>), [the-library](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/the-library.md>), [view](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/view.md>)

## AI overview

Open-source projects can use a CONTRIBUTING file in the repository root to explain code formatting, testing fixes, and submitting patches. GitHub added support for linking to that file when contributors create an issue or pull request, making maintainers' contribution guidelines easier to find.

## Source excerpt

Oftentimes open source projects place a CONTRIBUTING file in the root directory. It explains how a participant should do things like format code, test fixes, and submit patches. Here is...