[tucaz]

I’m going to reply to this just based on (my) logic and zero experience.

The question is: does it increase my chances dramatically?

I believe the answer is: if your contributions are dramatic I believe it does increase your chances.

How dramatic it needs to be is another discussion.

If you can make significant contributions to a certain community or company, so much that they can see the difference, how can it not help you?

[evex]

That's what first came to my mind as well.

I would like to hear from someone with experience just to rest my mind and go ALL IN contributing :D

[jolmg]

Also based on my own logic and zero experience on the matter, why should they hire you when you would work so much for them for free? What would be your standing in a job negotiation?

Not to say it can't happen. For example, if you make cool features for Gitlab, they may want to reserve it for the paid version but they won't be able to (I hope) unless you were an employee, causing you to surrender your copyright for said developments to them.

Still, I think you'd be setting yourself up for disappointment, if you only do that work with the expectation that they would eventually hire you, when they have given no indication that they would even consider it. It's too much investment with little to no guarantee of returns, and most benefit of the work is gratuitously given to someone else.

It might be better to spend that free time to build a portfolio of independent projects to showcase to potential employers. Those projects would have your name on them instead of some company's, and they make it easier to judge the quality of your work by potential employers. It's easier to judge the quality of a complete project, as opposed to a few commits here and there in a project that's been worked on by many people.

[evex]

> when they have given no indication that they would even consider it.

That's exactly why I'm asking this question,

> It might be better to spend that free time to build a portfolio of independent projects to showcase to potential employers.

I already have a couple(wordhunt.xyz, getquoter.app), but they do not seem enough to land me a job somehow, and I don't want to apply to 100+ companies to get someone to hire me.

I would like to choose a company that I like and believe are doing a good thing, and then apply and get accepted instead of randomly applying to any company with good pay.