Add daily email for 2023-12-01

The contribution-first workflow

src/content/daily-email/2023-12-01.md

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+---
+title: >
+  The contribution-first workflow
+pubDate: 2023-12-01
+permalink: >
+  archive/2023/12/01/the-contribution-first-workflow
+tags:
+  - software-development
+  - open-source
+---
+
+I've worked on many software projects with a lot of custom code.
+
+Not all the code is specific to that client or project, and often, code is identified as it can be extracted from the project and open-sourced as a Drupal module, PHP or JavaScript library, or Tailwind CSS plugin.
+
+Usually, the code is written as custom code initially, with the best intentions to revisit it once the project is complete and open-source it.
+
+But this rarely happens, as there's always the next sprint or project waiting.
+
+It takes too long to extract the code as it usually needs to be tidied or refactored beforehand.
+
+It may have been written with the client or project name within the code, which needs changing.
+
+My suggestion is to avoid this step.
+
+## Here's the thing
+
+Instead of writing it as custom code and hopefully extracting it later, start it as a separate module, library or plugin, and use Composer or npm to add it to your project as another dependency.
+
+Whilst it's a slightly smaller overhead, it's better and less risky than rewriting or refactoring code later and it's already open-sourced.
+
+Plus, you may get some issues, testing and improvements from others along the way.