Starter tasks for new contributors #5701

Hi everyone,

This thread tracks beginner-friendly issues carried under the starter-task label. Each one is self-contained and clearly scoped, picked so a new contributor can land a real change without first needing deep knowledge of the Amber engine or the distributed runtime.

If you're new to Texera and looking for a first contribution, this is a great place to start.

Browse the live list: starter-task

The list below is refreshed periodically as tasks get picked up and completed. The label above is always the source of truth — if an issue already has an assignee (someone commented /take), it's taken; pick one that's still unassigned.

What's available

A fresh batch of 14 unit-test-coverage tasks — each adds a focused spec for one small class/util, with no production-code changes. The gentlest possible on-ramp: read one file, pin its contract, open a PR.

Scala engine — Hugging Face codegen specs (continuation of the merged TextGenCodegen task; mirror the existing TextGenCodegenSpec):

• add unit test coverage for QaRankingCodegen #6249 — QaRankingCodegen (question-answering / zero-shot / similarity / ranking payload + parse snippets)
• add unit test coverage for ImageTaskCodegen #6250 — ImageTaskCodegen (9 image tasks; raw-binary vs base64+prompt routing)
• add unit test coverage for AudioTaskCodegen #6251 — AudioTaskCodegen (ASR / audio-classification / text-to-speech)
• add unit test coverage for MediaGenCodegen #6252 — MediaGenCodegen (text-to-image / text-to-video)

Frontend — pure utility specs (plain functions, no Angular TestBed; follow size-formatter.util.spec.ts):

• add unit test coverage for computing-unit.util resource helpers #6253 — computing-unit.util resource-parsing / conversion / validation helpers
• add unit test coverage for extractErrorMessage #6254 — extractErrorMessage (normalize an unknown error into a display string)
• add unit test coverage for calculateTotalTranslate3d #6255 — calculateTotalTranslate3d (sum translate3d(...) offsets)
• add unit test coverage for replaceOneImmutable #6256 — replaceOneImmutable (immutable array replace)
• add unit test coverage for parseLogicalOperatorPortID #6257 — parseLogicalOperatorPortID (parse "input-0" → {portNumber, portType})
• add unit test coverage for checkIfWorkflowBroken #6258 — checkIfWorkflowBroken (detect links referencing a missing operator)
• add unit test coverage for workflow-compilation-utils helpers #6259 — workflow-compilation-utils helpers (areAllPortSchemasEqual, addCompilationError)

Frontend — small-service specs (Angular HttpTestingController / RxJS streams — a small step up):

• add unit test coverage for AdminSettingsService #6260 — AdminSettingsService (site-wide key/value settings REST client)
• add unit test coverage for ShareAccessService #6261 — ShareAccessService (grant / revoke / owner / list REST client)
• add unit test coverage for PanelService #6262 — PanelService (two-Subject event bus)

How to pick one up

1. Comment /take on the issue (on its own line) to self-assign it — /untake releases it if your plans change.
2. Fork the repo and follow the contributing guide for the fork-based workflow, Conventional-Commit PR titles, and how to run the backend (sbt test) and frontend (ng test) tests.
3. Open a PR with Closes #<issue> in the description.

Questions are very welcome — ask right on the issue or reply here, and a committer will help you scope it. Looking forward to your first PR!