What's not in the README: Soft Skills for Contributors

Contributing to free software communities goes far beyond writing code, opening pull requests, or fixing bugs. Projects rarely fail due to technical limitations—they fail due to human burnout, poorly resolved conflicts, and relationships that break down over time.

In this talk, we will discuss the soft skills that truly sustain Free Software communities and that almost never appear in the documentation: clear communication, empathy with beginners, healthy disagreement, emotional responsibility, and consistency in collaboration.

The goal is to provoke reflection on the role of each contributor in the health of the project and present practical triggers that can be applied daily, regardless of technical level or experience.

Because, in the end, code scales—people don't.

Med: Daniel Lenharo de Souza

Opptak fra DebConf26, Santa Fe, Argentina (2026-07-20..2026-07-25): https://debconf26.debconf.org/talks/38-whats-not-in-the-readme-soft-skills-for-contributors/