Community

Don't Use Forms for Event RSVPs

Stop Using Forms (or spreadsheets) for Event RSVPs If you’re organizing an event, and you’re still using a form or a spreadsheet to collect RSVPs, stop. This is 2025, and there are better tools out there to help you manage your event RSVPs. Why Do You Need RSVPs? “All I need is a list of people who want to come to my event”. Why do you need this list? And how does spreadsheet help you with this?

Saturday, July 5, 2025 | 13 minutes Read

Perks of Being a Python Core Developer

Things you can get/do as a Python core developer I’ve been a Python core developer since January 27, 2017. Being a Python core developer comes with perks, privileges, and also responsibilities. Sometimes I can’t tell whether something is a perk, or a privilege, or a responsibility. I think depends on who you’re talking to, they might see it as an optional nice thing they could get/do, but the same thing might be seen as burden responsibility to others.

Tuesday, October 8, 2024 | 10 minutes Read

Python Core Sprint 2024: Day 5

Python Core Sprint 2024: Day 5 Datetime and Hypothesis I reviewed some issues that came to the CPython repo. There were a few interesting tickets related to the datetime module. These issues were discovered by Hypothesis, a property-based testing tool for Python. I’ve been hearing a lot about Hypothesis, but never really used it in production or at work. I watched a talk about it at PyCon US many years ago, and I even had ice cream selfie with Zac who maintains Hypothesis. Anyway, I’ve just been interested in learning more about Hypothesis and how it could solve issues not caught by other testing methods, and I think this is one of the perks of contributing to open source: getting exposed to things you don’t normally use at work, and I think it’s a great way to learn new things.

Friday, October 4, 2024 | 12 minutes Read

How to Say Thanks to Python People

The Python Community Python is not just code, but a community. The Python community members contribute in many ways and in many forms. The obvious ones are code contributions, by maintaining or contributing to the open source library that you depend on. Other forms of contributions are in the form of documentation, tutorials, educational content, bloggers, and public speakers. Other kind of contributions that are often unseen and not obvious are community leaders who run your local Python meetups, and regional conferences.

Thursday, September 5, 2024 | 9 minutes Read

PEP Talk

Talk Abstract If you use Python, chances are you’ve heard of PEP 8, the Python style guide. But do you know what PEPs really are? PEPs are more than just a style guide. A PEP stands for Python Enhancement Proposal. It’s a proposal documentation for when you want to change the Python programming language in a big way, for example when you want to change the syntax of Python. Think of the addition of f-strings, the walrus operator, or the ExceptionGroup, those changes all started with a PEP.

Saturday, July 29, 2023 | 3 minutes Read

Contributing to Python

Talk Abstract Python is one of the most popular programming language out there, and it is also an open source project. The Python community relies on contributions by volunteers, and you too can take part in this rewarding experience. Contributing to open source is not just about opening pull requests. In this talk, we’ll go through the workflow of contributing to CPython repository, as well as other ways to contribute to the project, including documentation, triaging, and infrastructure.

Wednesday, January 11, 2023 | 1 minute Read

Oops! I Became an Open Source Maintainer! 😱

Talk Abstract I consider myself relatively new to the open source world; my first open source contribution was in summer of 2016. Pretty soon I found myself being given commit rights to other people’s open source projects. Being a new open source maintainer brings a set of unique challenges that I was not fully prepared for. In this talk, I will share my journey and the things I’ve learned along the way, and some advice for other aspiring open source maintainers and contributors.

Friday, May 14, 2021 | 2 minutes Read

What Is a Python Core Developer?

Talk Abstract How do you become a Python core developer? How can I become one? What is it like to be a Python core developer? These are the questions I often receive ever since I became a Python core developer a year ago. Contributing to Python is a long journey that does not end when one earns the commit privilege. There are responsibilities to bear and expectations to live up to.

Saturday, November 3, 2018 | 2 minutes Read

Dial M For Mentor

Talk Abstract One of the nicest things about Python community is the availability of mentors willing to help you. Various mentors have helped me navigate the open source community and help advanced my skills. I realized finding a mentor is not as easy as it seems, and it takes a lot of courage to reach out in the first place. And then, there is impostor syndrome, where one may feel like they don’t deserve the help. In this talk, I will provide advice about working with a mentor. Asking for help is not a failure.

Friday, May 19, 2017 | 2 minutes Read