I'm an experienced programmer but I never got into the "flow of open source development". By that I mean some github users who's profile has consistent green squares for so many months in the past (meaning regular and frequent contributions).

I think it may have something to do with the process or some habit or approach that I'm missing:

- TDD?

- agile? ship it quick?

- divide a big feature into multiple small features, each consisting of well-tested small-size commits?

- what about documentation? pseudocode?

- how much time do they spend code reviewing pull requests? how do they make sure their code stays high-quality (doesn't become spaghetti)

- how often do they refactor?

- etc, etc, etc

I also have a habit of not settling down on a toolchain and then I end up exploring new tools more often than actually writing code and making a working product or feature.

Any comments/advice highly appreciated.