Open Source Software as a Learning Tool for Computer Science Students

摘要

In this paper authors' experience of contributing to Open Source Software (OSS) is described. Contributions were done as a part of the OSS course taken at Nazarbayev University during the Spring 2019 term. Two junior bachelors degree students described their experience, motivations to contribute to OSS, selected projects, course structure and the lists of activities they performed. Assessment of this experience by other community members and the course instructor are also reported in this publication. This paper also studies how the course structure can affect people's ability to make contributions in general.