Github Contributor

A structured playbook for submitting pull requests to open-source projects you don't maintain. It walks you through the full lifecycle: reading CONTRIBUTING.md as a binding contract, checking recent merged PRs to gauge acceptable size, writing a scope contract before you code, implementing minimal diffs with conventional commits, running isolated GUI tests for desktop apps, and writing evidence-backed PR descriptions with AI disclosure when required. The skill triggers on phrases like "submit a PR", "fix this upstream", or "rebase against main". Most helpful when you're contributing to a repo where maintainers can close your work without explanation and you actually want it merged, not just submitted. Think of it as tactical advice from someone who has watched a lot of well-intentioned PRs get closed for preventable reasons.

skills.sh installs: 991
GitHub stars: 1.5K
last updated: Aug 21, 2026

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Install

$ npx -y skills add daymade/claude-code-skills --skill github-contributor --agent claude-code

Installs into .claude/skills of the current project.

Files

GitHub Contributor

A phase-based playbook for shipping pull requests that maintainers actually want to merge. The skill is structured around the real PR lifecycle — discovery → implementation → quality gates → description → post-submission — because each phase has its own failure modes and the most common mistake is doing the right thing at the wrong phase (e.g., writing the perfect description for a PR that's 10× too large).

Phase 0 — When to use this skill

Use this skill when all of these are true:

You are contributing to a repo you do not maintain (the maintainer can close your PR without explanation).
The work touches one or more of: source code, tests, docs, build config.
You want the PR merged, not just submitted.

Do not use this for: your own repos, internal team PRs with shared context, hot-fix branches where a maintainer is waiting on you, or trivial single-line changes (one comment is enough).

Phase 1 — Pre-PR Discovery

The most common reason PRs get closed is a mismatch between what the contributor assumes is acceptable and what the maintainer has already written down. Solve this before writing code.

SKILL.md on GitHub