Next time you go to the dentist, and you are nervously sitting in the chair, take a look at the walls. You will see framed diplomas and certifications convincing you that you have made the right choice when it comes to who you can trust. You should seek a similar experience when hiring a Magento developer to care for your website. You want to know they are the best. Let us break down what a Magento Contributor offers, we want your next developer experience to be less painful than that root canal.
Magento Community and Open Source approach
Two years ago, Magento was recognized as a leading commerce platform and was acquired by Adobe Experience Cloud. At the time, it was unknown how this acquisition would impact the future of the Magento community. As it turned out – Adobe fully understood and adopted the philosophy behind the originally open-source platform. Currently, Magento provides two solutions for a merchant to choose from:
- Community Edition – fully open-sourced
- Enterprise Edition – the same codebase with extended additional features
For more information on these solutions visit: Magento Open Source vs. Magento Commerce features comparison
A large part of the Magento source code is open for anyone to contribute their suggested code changes. The open-source approach enables the possibility to roll out new features much faster thanks to help from developers from Magento Community. It also allows anyone to report bugs and issues specific to different industries and countries.
Broadly speaking, the Magento Community is comprised of passionate developers, who are continually practicing their skills and attempting to improve the Magento platform.
Get to know a Magento contributor
Thousands of passionate developers help to improve the quality of Magento. It’s not only bug fixing, but also adding new features to the Magento core. For example, Atwix developers wrote a large portion of the code to cover the GraphQl project, which connects the PWA storefront to Magento backend. As a result, our developers were acquainted with the new project’s features and gained experience before it was even added to the official release version.
Magento hosts a Community Engineering Team slack workspace, which enables a strong community atmosphere, where anyone can gain advice and share their experiences. Each month Magento publishes a rating of contributors, depending on how many changes were added and accepted. This adds a competitive edge and gamification element as additional motivation. Top contributors gain respect and get recognized by the community and eventually, they can become a Community Maintainer.
Who are Magento Community Maintainers?
Community Maintainers are developers who have proven their skills to Magento and are entrusted to review pull requests and accept code changes. They act as technical leaders, checking to ensure all Magento code development best practices were followed. A Magento Community Maintainer is incorporated into Magento architecture and backlog project planning, so they are the first to get information about the platform’s future. This knowledge becomes a game-changer when it comes to a long-term Magento e-commerce website development planning. Some features, requested by merchants could be already under development by the Magento Community and Core team. This allows the developer to add the feature to the projects’ roadmap, set correct priorities, and thus saving time on excessive development.
What makes a Magento Master?
Annually a list of Magento Masters is published on the official Magento website. Only 20 developers in the world can gain a Magento Master title. These Individuals have fully mastered Magento and share their knowledge with the world. Magento Masters are active contributors engaged in the community, driving innovation, and developing resources.
Magento Masters are chosen annually, awarded at Magento Imagine.
Summary
Lets review what a Magento Contributor can bring to the table for a merchant:
- Contributors have experience with new Magento features and projects even before they are introduced to the next release.
There’s a chance they were developing this feature themselves! - Are more efficient at catching and fixing bugs.
When a developer receives a bug issue to fix from a client, the first thing to do is check if a similar issue was already reported by the community. There’s a high likelihood that someone else from the Magento Community has prepared and shared a solution, which can be implemented right away. - Follow all Magento code standards.
Maintainers are not approving the code change if it’s not backward compatible or covered with tests. This helps to avoid errors and guarantees a higher code quality. Contributors are in the habit of making their code the best possible. - Have knowledge of all security issues and patches.
Contributors are usually active players and suggest security improvements on their own, taking this task away from the merchant. - Keep track of news and plans.
Magento core team shares their year roadmaps with the community to align development plans.
Another factor to consider when identifying a worthy partner to work with is Magento certifications. For more information, check out the article on Magento certifications and why they matter for the full picture on Magento professionals.