Per http://krita.org/join-krita, I have been inspired to introduce myself and offer my services:

My name is Shawn Peterson. I have been using linux as my only desktop since 2008 -- kde specifically since somewhere around 2011. I love the opensource mentality and the direction that KDE has taken, so I am interested in helping out in any way possible. However, I am not a programmer. Actually, I am an English high school teacher.

I have an English degree in creative and practical writing. I would like to help out with the technical writing needed for krita. However, I have never done technical writing before, so some initial hand holding (or at least some pointing in the right direction) would be in order. Having said that, if there is still interest, please let me know!

Hello and welcome! In fact, although open source projects rarely mention it, there's often quite a lot of writing to do. If you don't know where to start, well... the truth is most other people don't know either! Writing code and writing documentation are different skills, which is how you end up with brilliant programs with proportionally little documentation.

Often the best way to learn is to actually to get started. I wrote some tutorials, and to do those I mostly figured out what the features do by testing them one by one. However, if you want to help with the Krita handbook for example (help is Really needed there), you could be inspired by the Gimp's documentation for example: http://docs.gimp.org/

Krita and Gimp have different tools, but you could start with common tools such as selection tools, and from there get familiar with the process. Anyway, nobody says it is fast or easy, so we really appreciate any help you're willing to give. If you have something you really can't figure out and need to ask, you can usually find devs and experienced users on the IRC Channel.

Another category of writing that often needs to get done is documenting what's being developed at the moment. This rather requires the ability to hunt down the developers (on the IRC channel usually) and get them to cough up content. x D

Hi Shawn!

This is awesome! Nearly nobody in the Krita community is actually a native speaker of English, which means that your offer is very, very welcome! For writing stuff, there's the big job, which is the manual (currently on KDE userbase: http://userbase.kde.org/Krita/Manual) Basically, what's needed here is to write chapters describing how to work on Krita. Tyson Tan is doing work there, and ValerieVk has written heaps of tutorials. There is already kind of an outline -- but that is subject to change. If the manual is done, I actually want to submit it to a publisher like Packt, so the goal is not so much a menu-item-by-menu-item description of the interface, but a how-do-I-do-cool-stuff-with krita type of book.

For the krita.org website, we definitely could use an editor -- someone who checks incoming articles and who writes news items based on what happens in the community, then pushes the news out through the various channels (other websites, social media stuff). That's something where we'd love your help as well.

We mostly hang out on #krita -- a chat channel that's always open -- for coordinating work on Krita. It's easy to join: just use the webclient on the krita website.

Boud: Well, I think both "boring" description and "cool stuff" are both needed. The boring stuff is for when users wonder "How does this feature work?" and look up the documentation for that feature. I know Krita is pretty intuitive, but this is still the necessary basics that needs to be documented at least once.

As I said, Shawn, there are no specific guidelines, but often, you'll be surprised at what you can accomplish when you really get started.

Okay, wow. This is great. I wasn't sure what kind of response I would get. I am excited to be a part of this community.

From boudewijn: "For the krita.org website, we definitely could use an editor -- someone who checks incoming articles and who writes news items based on what happens in the community, then pushes the news out through the various channels (other websites, social media stuff). That's something where we'd love your help as well."

Yes, I think in the longterm picture, I would really enjoy doing this. Editing is something that I am very comfortable doing already, and I would love to get started on the other stuff. Unless you think there is a better starting point, I will begin by getting myself familiar with the links that you suggested (gimp, krita manual, etc). I look forward to you on the krita channel!

From valerievk: "Well, I think both "boring" description and "cool stuff" are both needed. The boring stuff is for when users wonder "How does this feature work?" "

This is also of interest for me basically because I agree with you. I will also begin by checking out your suggestions.

Thank you both for the quick response. I am looking forward to this!

Great! Glad to have you on board!
We may be updating the Support Krita page, so maybe skip that for now, but just be aware that you are welcome to poke your nose into just about anything! If you have any ideas of your own, those are great too!