oss-find-real-issues

Find Real Issues

Don't wait for someone to file an issue. find real problems in the code. This skill analyzes a codebase for actual issues that maintainers would appreciate being fixed: missing tests, inconsistent patterns, silent failures, documentation gaps. You evaluate whether they're worth filing. the LLM just finds them.

Purpose

The best contributions aren't always in the issue tracker. Experienced contributors earn maintainer trust by finding and fixing problems nobody asked about. but that everyone benefits from. This skill teaches you to read code critically, spot patterns that are off, and evaluate whether a fix would be welcome.

Prerequisites

• A repo cloned locally
• Basic understanding of the codebase (from oss-prep-to-contribute or your own exploration)
• Check that the repo accepts unsolicited PRs (some don't. verify in CONTRIBUTING.md)

Process

1. Check if unsolicited contributions are welcome

Before analyzing anything:

# Read contribution guidelines
gh api repos/{owner}/{repo}/contents/CONTRIBUTING.md --jq '.content' | base64 -d 2>/dev/null

# Check if unsolicited PRs have been merged before
gh pr list -R {owner}/{repo} --state merged --limit 20 \
  --json title,labels,authorAssociation | \
  jq '[.[] | select(.authorAssociation != "MEMBER" and .authorAssociation != "OWNER")]'

Look for:

• "Please file an issue before submitting a PR": if present, you should file an issue first, not just submit a fix
• "We welcome contributions": green light
• No external PRs merged. yellow flag, ask in their communication channel first

Inform the user about the repo's stance on unsolicited contributions.

2. Systematic code analysis

Use Explore agents to analyze the codebase across multiple dimensions. For each dimension, look for concrete, specific problems. not vague "could be better" observations.

Dimension 1: Test coverage gaps

# Find source files without corresponding test files
find src/ lib/ -name "*.{ts,py,go,rs}" | while read f; do
  test_file=$(echo "$f" | sed 's/src/test/' | sed 's/\.ts/.test.ts/' | sed 's/\.py/test_&/')
  [ ! -f "$test_file" ] && echo "No test: $f"
done

# Find exported functions that aren't tested
# {language-specific analysis}