Community Member Monday: Khushi Gautam
Tell us a bit about yourself!
Hi, I am so glad to be a part of this community. I live in Delhi, India. Currently, I am a software developer serving at Amazon MiniTV.
I have experience in both frontend and backend development for mobile and web applications. I graduated a year ago with a Bachelor of Technology in Computer Science and Engineering from Harcourt Butler Technical University.
I’ve been involved in the open source community since my first year of undergrad, starting with AnitaB, and then moving on to ODK-X. My major contributions have been to LibreOffice.
In my free time, I love writing articles, trying out different cuisines, and meeting new people. I also enjoy traveling and exploring new places with my friends and family.
What are you working on in the LibreOffice project right now?
I’m currently working on fixing bugs in my Outreachy project, “Sidebar Deck for Quick Find”, alongside Google Summer of Code students to make further progress. This feature was something I created during my internship at LibreOffice.
Why did you choose to join the project, and how was the experience?
LibreOffice includes applications like Writer, Calc, Impress, Draw, and Base, and is the default suite for Linux. I started my journey with LibreOffice as an Outreachy applicant, which was my first time contributing to LibreOffice and interacting with other developers on the IRC channel. After researching various organizations and projects, I chose to contribute to the “Sidebar Deck for Quick Find” project because it aligned with my skills as a C++ developer.
Weekly mentoring chats with Ilmari Lauhakangas were incredibly helpful during the contribution phase. He guided me in setting up my project locally and introduced me to starter tasks, which made me more comfortable with the project and the organization. I also learned to operate Gerrit and successfully made my first patch.
Later, I was selected as an Outreachy intern to work on the “Sidebar Deck for Quick Find” project. My mentors, Jim Raykowski and Heiko Tietze, were instrumental in making the project successful. I was thrilled when my patch for the feature was merged after three months of hard work.
My experience with LibreOffice was enriching, as I got to work closely with the entire codebase, something I always wanted to do. The community is very supportive, and I’m looking forward to meeting them in person at the upcoming conference.
Anything else you plan to do in the future?
These days, I’m aiming to join a multinational corporation as a backend developer and hope to achieve this goal soon. I also aspire to join LibreOffice as a developer. Even though I’m already contributing, I love that open source allows me to continue working freely. Additionally, I plan to create a wiki for the feature I’ve developed and take ownership of presenting it to the world upon its launch.
What does LibreOffice really need?
I would say: more developers and contributors like me!
Big thanks to Khushi for all her contributions! Everyone is welcome to join our community, build new skills, and help to make LibreOffice even better for the whole world 😊