Contributing

Want to contribute? Great! You can do so through the standard GitHub pull request model. For large contributions we do encourage you to file a ticket in the GitHub issues tracking system prior to any code development to coordinate with the pyLife development team early in the process. Coordinating up front helps to avoid frustration later on.

Test driven development

The functionality of your contribution (functions, class methods) needs to be tested by pytest testing routines. Please always run the test suite locally before you file a pull request. For any filed pull request the test suite will be run for different python versions and different operating systems as GitHub action. If any of them fails, please update your pull request accordingly.

Every bugfix or every new feature you are implementing – basically any function changing code – must be backed with a suitable amount of unit tests. If those unit tests are missing, we will have to decline your pull request.

In order to achieve maintainable code we ask contributors to use test driven development, i. e. follow the Three Rules of Test Driven Development:

  1. Do not change production code without writing a failing unit test first. Cleanups and refactorings are not changes in that sense.

  2. Write only enough test code as is sufficient to fail.

  3. Only write or change minimal production code as is sufficient to make the failing test pass.

We are measuring the testing coverage. Your pull request should not decrease the test coverage.

Coding style

Please do consult the codingstyle file for codingstyle guide lines. In order to have your contribution merged to main line following guide lines should be met.

Docstrings

Document your public API classes, methods, functions and attributes using numpy style docstings unless the naming is really self-explanatory.

Comments

Use as little comments as possible. The code along with docstrings should be expressive enough. Remove any commented code lines before issuing your pull request.

Making commits

Configure your git client

Please configure your identity in your git client appropriately. From the git command line you can do that using

git config user.name <Your Name>
git config user.email <your-email@...>

Writing good commit messages

Please consider following the commit guidelines when writing your commit message. We will not enforce this, but we would appreciate if you do. Here is a good read why this makes sense.

Branching and pull requests

Pull requests must be filed against the develop branch, except for urgent bugfixes requiring a special bugfix release. Those can be filed against master.

Branches should have meaningful names and whenever it makes sense use one of the following prefixes.

  • bugfix/ for bugfixes, that do not change the API

  • feature/ if a new feature is added

  • doc/ if documentation is added or improved

  • cleanup/ if code is cleaned or refactored without changing the behavior

If your branch does not fit any of those, you can also come up with another appropriate prefix.

License

Your contribution must be licensed under the Apache-2.0 license, the license used by this project.

Sign your work

This project tracks patch provenance and licensing using the Developer Certificate of Origin 1.1 (DCO) from developercertificate.org and Signed-off-by tags initially developed by the Linux kernel project.

Developer Certificate of Origin
Version 1.1

Copyright (C) 2004, 2006 The Linux Foundation and its contributors.
1 Letterman Drive
Suite D4700
San Francisco, CA, 94129

Everyone is permitted to copy and distribute verbatim copies of this
license document, but changing it is not allowed.


Developer's Certificate of Origin 1.1

By making a contribution to this project, I certify that:

(a) The contribution was created in whole or in part by me and I
    have the right to submit it under the open source license
    indicated in the file; or

(b) The contribution is based upon previous work that, to the best
    of my knowledge, is covered under an appropriate open source
    license and I have the right under that license to submit that
    work with modifications, whether created in whole or in part
    by me, under the same open source license (unless I am
    permitted to submit under a different license), as indicated
    in the file; or

(c) The contribution was provided directly to me by some other
    person who certified (a), (b) or (c) and I have not modified
    it.

(d) I understand and agree that this project and the contribution
    are public and that a record of the contribution (including all
    personal information I submit with it, including my sign-off) is
    maintained indefinitely and may be redistributed consistent with
    this project or the open source license(s) involved.

With the sign-off in a commit message you certify that you authored the patch or otherwise have the right to submit it under an open source license. The procedure is simple: To certify above Developer’s Certificate of Origin 1.1 for your contribution just append a line

Signed-off-by: Random J Developer <random@developer.example.org>

to every commit message using your real name or your pseudonym and a valid email address.

If you have set your user.name and user.email git configs you can automatically sign the commit by running the git-commit command with the -s option. There may be multiple sign-offs if more than one developer was involved in authoring the contribution.

Another option to automatically add the Signed-off-by: is to once use the command

git config core.hooksPath .githooks

in your pyLife working directory. This will then add the Signed-off-by: line automatically.

For a more detailed description of this procedure, please see SubmittingPatches which was extracted from the Linux kernel project, and which is stored in an external repository.

Any pull request with at least one commit missing the Signed-off-tag in the commit message will be automatically declined by a bot.

Individual vs. Corporate Contributors

Often employers or academic institution have ownership over code that is written in certain circumstances, so please do due diligence to ensure that you have the right to submit the code.

If you are a developer who is authorized to contribute to pyLife on behalf of your employer, then please use your corporate email address in the Signed-off-by tag. Otherwise please use a personal email address.