6.2Running a Healthy Community

Great projects grow from good community management.

■ Conversation vs tasks • GitHub Discussions = fits "conversations" like questions, idea sharing, and chat—rather than tracking work. In the Q&A category, mark a helpful reply as the Answer so others reach the solution quickly. • Issues = use for "work to track," such as bugs and tasks. Choosing the right tool per purpose is key.

■ Releases and operations • Releases = publish a specific version tied to a tag, with release notes and built files (assets). • Pinned issues = pin important issues to the top of the list. • triage = labeling, prioritizing, and organizing to prevent a backlog of unattended items.

■ Community health • Community health files (README, CODE_OF_CONDUCT, CONTRIBUTING, SECURITY, issue/PR templates, etc.) placed in the .github directory make a project welcoming. Put them in an organization’s .github repo to apply them as defaults across the org’s repos. • The Community profile checks whether recommended files are present. • InnerSource = applying open-source practices (openness, collaboration, reuse) inside an organization. • GitHub Sponsors = financially support OSS developers and projects (Star is a free bookmark, separate from funding). GitHub supports OSS via free public repositories, Sponsors, Discussions, and more.