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Description
Current Behavior
The README.md file currently provides information about the project's purpose, installation, and usage. However, it lacks a dedicated section to acknowledge and give credit to the individuals who have contributed to the project through code, documentation, bug reports, or other means.
Suggested Improvement
I propose adding a "Contributors" section to the README.md file. This section should list all individuals who have made valuable contributions to the project, linking to their GitHub profiles.
Benefits
- Appreciation and Recognition: Formally acknowledges the effort and time contributors have invested, fostering a positive and appreciative community.
- Encourages New Contributions: Publicly recognizing contributors can motivate others to get involved with the project.
- Project Credibility: Shows that the project is actively maintained and supported by a growing community.
- Community Building: Helps to create a stronger sense of ownership and collaboration among contributors.
Possible Implementation
There are a couple of ways to implement this:
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Manual Updates: Manually add a list of contributors' GitHub usernames and link to their profiles. This is simple to start but can be difficult to maintain as the number of contributors grows.
Example:
### Contributors - [@username1](https://github.com/username1) - [@username2](https://github.com/username2)
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Automated Tool: Integrate a tool like all-contributors to automate the process. This tool uses a bot to automatically add contributors to a table in the README based on their contributions (code, design, docs, etc.) via comments on issues or pull requests. This is a more scalable and maintainable solution.
Example using
all-contributors:[](#contributors-) <table> <tr> <td align="center"><a href="[https://github.com/username1](https://github.com/username1)"><img src="[https://avatars.githubusercontent.com/u/12345?v=4](https://avatars.githubusercontent.com/u/12345?v=4)" width="100px;" alt=""/><br /><sub><b>User One</b></sub></a><br /><a href="#code-userone" title="Code">💻</a></td> <td align="center"><a href="[https://github.com/username2](https://github.com/username2)"><img src="[https://avatars.githubusercontent.com/u/67890?v=4](https://avatars.githubusercontent.com/u/67890?v=4)" width="100px;" alt=""/><br /><sub><b>User Two</b></sub></a><br /><a href="#doc-usertwo" title="Documentation">📖</a></td> </tr> </table>
Alternatives Considered
- CONTRIBUTORS File: We could create a separate
CONTRIBUTORS.mdfile in the root of the repository. However, this is less visible than having the section directly in the mainREADME.md, which is the first entry point for most users and potential contributors. - GitHub's Contributor Graph: Relying solely on the repository's "Contributors" tab on GitHub. This is useful but doesn't allow for acknowledging non-code contributions (e.g., design, triage, community management) and is less prominent than a section in the README.
Additional Notes
Adopting a tool like all-contributors is the recommended approach for long-term maintainability and for recognizing a diverse range of contributions beyond just code commits.