How to upstream code to open source projects
Code commonly flows downstream, from an open-source project into an organization’s own products. Upstreaming is the process of reversing that flow—contributing code back to an open-source project. The value proposition of upstreaming includes harnessing the strength of an open-source community to examine code, find and fix problems, and add their own features that make the code more valuable to everyone using it.
As someone who has been deeply involved with open-source projects for many years—I’ve committed code to the open source FreeBSD operating system project for over a decade now, served on that project’s core team for two terms, contributed to open source ZFS, and co-written two books about ZFS—I’ve seen countless organizations meet the challenges and reap the substantial benefits of upstreaming. In short, contributed code that becomes part of a mainline open-source project receives shared maintenance, active development, and extension, with other members across the community often adding value that goes well beyond the initial contribution.