How GitHub Models can help open source maintainers focus on what matters

Open source projects often rely on dedicated maintainers who manage issues, review contributions, and perform essential but repetitive tasks that can detract from their passion for development. GitHub Models, combined with GitHub Actions, introduces an AI-driven approach called Continuous AI to automate these tasks, allowing maintainers to focus on innovation. By surveying over 500 open-source project maintainers, key needs were identified: issue triage, duplicate detection, spam protection, and quality assurance. Continuous AI offers solutions like automatic issue deduplication, completeness checks, spam detection, and contributor onboarding to streamline project management. These AI tools are designed to enhance collaboration, reduce manual workload, and maintain the integrity of open-source projects. Rate limits on API usage are in place, and best practices suggest starting with one workflow and iterating for project-specific needs. By sharing effective practices, the open-source community can continuously improve AI tools, thus encouraging maintainers to embrace AI in their workflows.