Starter tasks for new contributors

[aglinxinyuan]

Hi everyone,

I went through the open issue backlog and tagged a fresh batch of beginner-friendly issues with the starter-task label — 21 newly labeled, bringing the total to 28 open starter tasks. 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 them all: starter-task

What's available

Unit-test coverage — add a focused spec for a single class or component (the gentlest on-ramp):

• add unit test coverage for MapOpDesc #5664 — MapOpDesc
• add unit test coverage for DeadLetterMonitorActor #5663 — DeadLetterMonitorActor
• add unit test coverage for HeaderField #5662 — HeaderField
• add unit test coverage for URLFetchUtil #5661 — URLFetchUtil
• Add unit tests for VisualizationFrameContentComponent #5474 — VisualizationFrameContentComponent

Small bug fixes — contained bugs with a clear fix location:

• Add timeout and retry to DatasetFileDocument file-service requests #5666 — add a timeout and retry to DatasetFileDocument file-service requests
• LogicalLink: writeValueAsString / readValue is not round-trippable for OperatorIdentity fields #5042 — LogicalLink is not JSON round-trippable for OperatorIdentity fields
• Schema missing error #3546 — schema-missing error
• Handling optional properties of operator #3524 — handle optional properties of an operator (enum validator)
• The description of read-only workflows are still editable #3497 — the description of read-only workflows is still editable

Frontend / UI polish — small, visible improvements:

• Fix the page height of the Admin Page #3588 — fix the page height of the Admin page
• Improve Frontend UI for Configuring JVM Memory Size in Computing Unit #3375 — improve the JVM-memory slider UI in the computing unit
• Need the Option to Sort By Last Execution Time in Workflows List #3406 — option to sort the workflows list by last execution time

Small features — bounded enhancements:

• Auto-submit dataset version when exporting workflow results to a dataset #4348 — auto-submit a dataset version when exporting results to a dataset
• Auto-Install latest package version when unspecified when creating Python Virtual Environment #4315 — auto-install the latest package version when none is specified (Python venv)
• Allow users to input a requirements.txt file when creating a Python Virtual Environment #4314 — allow uploading a requirements.txt when creating a Python venv
• Add Schema Constraint for Intersect, Difference, and Other Operators #1956 — add a same-input-schema constraint to Intersect/Union operators

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!

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Update — June 18, 2026

Added 7 more starter tasks, and closed two earlier items (#4119, #4319) that turned out to be already resolved. The live list is always at the starter-task label.

More unit-test coverage — same gentle on-ramp (a focused spec for one class/component, no production-code changes):

• add unit test coverage for PortIdentityKeySerializer and PortIdentityKeyDeserializer #5776 — PortIdentityKeySerializer / PortIdentityKeyDeserializer (the id_internal map-key serde + round-trip)
• add unit test coverage for DistributedAggregation #5777 — DistributedAggregation (the init/iterate/merge/finalAgg contract)
• add unit test coverage for TextGenCodegen #5778 — TextGenCodegen (Hugging Face text-generation payload/parse codegen)
• add unit test coverage for SessionUser #5779 — SessionUser (Principal delegation + isRoleOf)
• add unit test coverage for AdminGuardService #5780 — AdminGuardService (frontend route guard — admins allowed, others redirected)

Small bug fix:

• Switch single-file dataset downloads to use browser native downloads #3842 — switch single-file dataset downloads to use the browser's native download UI

Small feature:

• Support COUNT(*) for Aggregate COUNT function #3142 — support COUNT(*) in the Aggregate operator's COUNT function