Comment by baduiux
> You may be held up by a problem in a dependency such as poor documentation. It is tempting to start filling in the missing docs, but try to resist that temptation. Better to make minimal personal notes for now and, after you’ve made good progress, considering scheduling time to contribute some docs to the dependency.
I agree with most of the article, but this part keeps me thinking. Scheduling to contribute later will almost never work. Either I do it now or never. The task is lost in a list of infinitely many tasks. Also, contributing to a dependency (if I understand this correctly) is always something that helps at least two: yourself - doing something good, helping to improve someone’s work, getting something done - and the person who works on the dependency project. The other gets (positive) feedback and knows someone uses their product/software/library
I try to think in terms of owing the dependency a contribution as a small payment for using it, and this bugs me until I do it. But, sure, better to contribute docs sooner rather than not at all.
(One advantage of deferring is that the contribution may be better quality when I've had more experience of using the dependency.)