A toast with code! A Hacktoberfest experience from Toronto

Hi everyone! This is Miranda.
Toronto has recently been experiencing more days with temperatures exceeding 20 degrees Celsius, and I'm looking forward to summer arriving soon.
Speaking of summer in Toronto, it's all about patios! Patios refer to rooftop areas like restaurant terraces or beer gardens. In Toronto, drinking alcohol outdoors is generally prohibited, so I can't wait to enjoy a beer on a patio on a hot day.
And speaking of beer, many of you might be thinking of Oktoberfest. It's a famous beer festival that originated in Germany.

But this time I'm going to introduce...

Hacktoberfest

The names may be similar, but the events are completely different. We're here to tell you about an event where the focus is on code, not beer!

Introduction: What is Hacktoberfest?

Hacktoberfest is a global event held every October to support open source development.
It was started in 2014 by DigitalOcean and is now run with the support of many tech companies such as GitHub and GitLab.

Official website 👉 https://hacktoberfest.com

The process to participate is very simple!

Participants can contribute to the open-source community by submitting Pull Requests (PRs) to open-source projects on GitHub and GitLab.
Until 2023, participants received commemorative T-shirts, stickers, and other items after four PRs were merged. While the
2024 official website doesn't explicitly mention commemorative items,
searching for terms like "Hacktoberfest 2025 swag list" reveals that various companies are distributing limited-edition goods such as hoodies and backpacks (rules and rewards vary from year to year).
An example of a 2024 Swag List: 🔗 https://hacktoberfestswag.vercel.app/

It's okay if you can't write code!

One of the biggest attractions of Hacktoberfest is that you can participate even if you don't write code.
Small tasks like correcting typos in READMEs, translating documentation, or improving the UI are all valuable contributions to open source.
Therefore, the event has an atmosphere that makes it easy for anyone, from beginners to veteran developers, to participate.

Why participate? The appeal and benefits of Hacktoberfest

The biggest appeal of Hacktoberfest is undoubtedly the opportunity to contribute to open source alongside developers from all over the world.
It allows you to participate at your own pace, hone practical skills, and connect with a global developer community.

Benefits include:

✅ Practical Skill Development
By participating in ongoing open-source projects, you will acquire essential tech skills needed in the real world, such as understanding the flow of team development, the ability to read other people's code, and experience in receiving reviews and making improvements.
A major advantage is that you will naturally develop self-reliance, such as how to interpret issues and how to fix what needs to be fixed.

✅ can be used as part of your portfolio
Pull Requests (PRs) you actually submit
This can be used not only as a portfolio when applying for jobs or changing careers, but also as a record of your growth as an engineer.

✅Meeting the Community
: Hacktoberfest provides a platform to connect with participants from around the world, including dedicated Slack and Discord communities and event-specific forums.
Asking questions about code, learning from other people's pull requests, and gaining inspiration and connections that you wouldn't get on your own are some of the great things about it.

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🌎 "Experience" is crucial for finding a job in North America!
Especially in the IT industry in Canada, particularly Toronto, "practical experience" is highly valued.
Your resume and LinkedIn profile will require specific details about "what projects you were involved in and how," so activities like Hacktoberfest are a great asset.

When I started my career as an infrastructure engineer with no prior experience, I had a very hard time finding a job in Canada. I
remember feeling anxious because I had little experience to put on my resume and felt I had to create some kind of achievement to showcase.

Even if you feel anxious at first, "you can gain experience by taking that first step."
This was exactly the lesson Hacktoberfest taught me. Small successes, like "I did it!", build self-confidence.

As I mentioned in my previous blog post, Toronto has many active tech events and meetups, such as TorontoJS, HackerNest, and DevTO.
You can often find Hacktoberfest attendees in these local communities, and it's a great opportunity to connect with others through shared interests.

🔗What is a Hackathon? Introducing recommended tech events you can attend in Toronto

How to participate? The process from registration to PR

The process for participating in Hacktoberfest is very simple, but it may feel a bit intimidating for first-time participants. Here, we will introduce specific steps to help you proceed without getting lost, even if it's your first time participating

① Enter on the official website

First, register to participate on the official Hacktoberfest website.
Log in with your GitHub or GitLab account and click a button such as "Start Hacking" to complete your registration.
*Your pull requests will not be counted unless you register, so be sure to register in advance!
→ Official website: 🔗 https://hacktoberfest.com

➁ Find the issue in the target repository

Next, you look for an issue to work on.
Hacktoberfest repositories are marked with labels such as "hacktoberfest" and "good first issue," which are beginner-friendly labels.

This search site is useful when looking for these kinds of issues: 🔗 https://goodfirstissue.dev/
You can also filter by language, so you can quickly find issues that you can work on in your preferred language!

③ Fork and develop locally → Create a Pull Request

Once you find a repository you want to work on, "fork" it on GitHub and copy it to your account. Then
, clone that repository to your local environment and code the parts you want to modify or add.

Once you've finished your work, submit a "Pull Request"!
Submitting a total of four or more valid PRs by the end of October is a basic requirement for Hacktoberfest.

④ Review and make corrections as necessary

When you submit a pull request (PR), you may receive a review from the project manager (maintainer).
If you receive comments such as "Please fix this a little," simply respond politely and resubmit.
Don't get discouraged if your PR is rejected midway through! That's also part of the learning process. In fact, it's a sign that you're growing.
Experiencing the "actual development flow in a real-world setting" through the review process is a unique learning experience that only Hacktoberfest can offer.

Try participating in real life

My first experience at Hacktoberfest was when I was studying programming at Seneca College in Canada. At the time, I was taking a class called "OSD600 (Open Source Development)," and participation in Hacktoberfest was a required part of the course. I
was able to get my code merged even though I had absolutely no knowledge of what open source was, but I remember it being very difficult.

Having actually participated, the following points were particularly memorable:

✅ Finding beginner-friendly issues can be surprisingly difficult.
Even issues labeled "good first issue" often require more specialized background knowledge than expected, or the issue description is difficult to understand because it's in English. What
helped in those situations were relatively simple tasks such as document revisions and translations. By starting with these kinds of issues, I was able to get used to the project flow and review culture, which gradually led to the confidence that "I can do this too."

✅ I realized how truly important the ability to read other people's code is.
To submit a PR, you first need to thoroughly understand the existing code. This took much longer than I expected.
I spent overwhelmingly more time reading existing code than writing new code myself - this was a major difference from school assignments.
But I later strongly realized that this "ability to read code" is actually the skill that is truly needed in the real world.

✅Even the smallest contribution can boost your confidence.
The joy I felt when my pull request was successfully merged was indescribable.
Even correcting a small spelling mistake means "contributing to developers around the world."
The experience of having my first pull request merged motivated me to study programming!

✍️ My PR Experience
: I've documented my first PR submission in this blog post:
🔗 Hacktoberfest 2021! My first contribution

Summary: Cheers to code this fall!

Autumn is the season for reading, eating, and...the season for chords!
While toasting with beer is great, why not try something a little different this autumn and toast with chords?

Hacktoberfest is an entry point into open source that even beginners can take on with confidence. Those who normally find it difficult to take the first step should take advantage of the power of such a global event and take the first step. Even a small contribution will surely lead to great confidence!

It's a good idea to familiarize yourself with GitHub now in preparation for the event in October.
Practicing how to find issues and submit pull requests little by little will help you participate smoothly when the event actually takes place!

🍁Let's celebrate this fall with code! Cheers to your first contribution.🍁

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