The feeling of finally getting your project to the point where you want to share it with the world is surreal. You’ve spent weeks on it, and it needs to get the recognition it deserves. This guide will explain key tips and tricks to get your project recognized and make an impact on your developer profile.
What will we learn
How to use GitHub to upload projects.
How to maximize your project’s publicity.
What kinds of projects you should be posting.
It’s important to note first that this guide will help with open-sourcing your projects. It’s very difficult to grow your developer profile without open-sourcing your projects. Before you decide to post a project, be sure you have licensing attached to it such as an MIT, Apache 2.0, BSD Clause 3 or GPT 3 license to prevent blatant reproduction and plagiarism of your work.
How to use GitHub to upload projects
If you’re a developer, I’m sure you’ve heard of GitHub before, however, if you’re new to the scene, then GitHub is an online version of Git which is a version control tool that manages different versions of your project and puts it in what's called a repository. GitHub takes your Git repository and uploads it to the internet on your GitHub account. You can make your repository public or private, however, if your repository is public, you can view it from anywhere in the world!
So after creating your project the first thing you should do is install Git. The following link is a simple tutorial on how to install Git. Installing is relatively easy as it’s simply a command line tool.
https://git-scm.com/book/en/v2/Getting-Started-Installing-Git
After installing, you want to go over to https://github.com and create an account. It has a really cool sign-up screen btw 😆. Once you're done with that you want to follow the instructions on the repositories screen to upload your Git repository to GitHub. Whilst you're at it, you can also check out my GitHub page and see my projects. GitHub repositories are public by default, but you can update this in the repository settings. However, for this tutorial, I advise against this as we want to build a developer profile.
You can think of GitHub as your Developer Portfolio. Job hirers will definitely look to see your GitHub profile so it's important to have an appropriate profile picture, bio, and relevant projects!
Not everyone will be able to decipher what your project is about or know its full capabilities, so creating a README.md to is incredibly important. A README is a markdown file that describes what your project does, how to use it, and what it’s used for. You can also describe future plans for it in your README too. Writing a good README is a skill in itself, so I will be creating an article on this later.
How to maximize your project’s publicity
Now that your project is available for the whole world to see, it’s time to make sure they see it. Google SEO does a fairly good job getting people to find your repository but if you want it to be most effective then follow these steps:
Choose a good name. Most repositories have relatively short and to-the-point names that are relevant to the project they made. Here are 2 examples of a good and bad name
Good: flutter_notes_app
Bad: mycoolnotesappmadewithflutter
Use tags. Tags are a great way to get your repository in a lot of searches as GitHub will purposely put this in the HEAD element of their site so it can pop up in more relevant searches. Only use relevant tags and roughly 2 - 5.
Include a README. I said it before, and I’ll say it again, CREATE A README.
A personal favorite way of boosting a project’s publicity is posting to developer communities. Reddit is the best place to do this. If you made a project in python, go on r/python and create a post about your project, asking for feedback, maybe showing a demo, and putting the link to your repository in your description. Make sure your title is eye-catching but also quick and easy to read so people don’t just scroll by. The first time I did this, I received over 50 stars on my repository in one day! You can also post on Discord communities, different but relevant subreddits, telegram channels, etc. Anywhere that is relevant to your project and you see fit.
Posting on social media only works when you have a large developer presence on said platform, but even then, it doesn’t always generate as much publicity as uploading to developer communities.
GitHub will do the rest of the magic for you, and over time you will generate more stars on your repositories and get more views.
What kinds of projects should you be posting?
Posting a large-scale project is great because it shows a lot of your capabilities as a developer beyond coding such as file structure, reusable code, use of good practices, etc. Be cautious when doing this, however. People can easily take your ideas and pass them off as their own so it’s important to include some kind of licensing on your project.
Not every project has to be completely original work. Remember you’re not in competition with anyone. You can post things that other people have done but in your own kind of way. Say someone else posted their own python snake game, you can post essentially the same game but with your own twist to it.
Avoid posting tutorial projects that you got from YouTube as these are only meant to help you practice your skills and are not meant to be passed off as your own.
Conclusion
Publicizing yourself as a developer is key to getting jobs and building credibility in today’s fast-moving world. Your projects are your first and most important step to being a great developer as it resembles your public foundation of knowledge as a programmer.
I hope this article was of use to you. If it was, feel free to read my other articles too with more tutorials, experiences, and guides!
In God we trust🙏🏾