| # How to contribute # | |
| We'd love to accept your patches and contributions to this project. There are | |
| a just a few small guidelines you need to follow. | |
| ## Contributor License Agreement ## | |
| Contributions to any Google project must be accompanied by a Contributor | |
| License Agreement. This is not a copyright **assignment**, it simply gives | |
| Google permission to use and redistribute your contributions as part of the | |
| project. | |
| * If you are an individual writing original source code and you're sure you | |
| own the intellectual property, then you'll need to sign an [individual | |
| CLA][]. | |
| * If you work for a company that wants to allow you to contribute your work, | |
| then you'll need to sign a [corporate CLA][]. | |
| You generally only need to submit a CLA once, so if you've already submitted | |
| one (even if it was for a different project), you probably don't need to do it | |
| again. | |
| [individual CLA]: https://developers.google.com/open-source/cla/individual | |
| [corporate CLA]: https://developers.google.com/open-source/cla/corporate | |
| ## Submitting a patch ## | |
| 1. It's generally best to start by opening a new issue describing the bug or | |
| feature you're intending to fix. Even if you think it's relatively minor, | |
| it's helpful to know what people are working on. Mention in the initial | |
| issue that you are planning to work on that bug or feature so that it can | |
| be assigned to you. | |
| 1. Follow the normal process of [forking][] the project, and setup a new | |
| branch to work in. It's important that each group of changes be done in | |
| separate branches in order to ensure that a pull request only includes the | |
| commits related to that bug or feature. | |
| 1. Go makes it very simple to ensure properly formatted code, so always run | |
| `go fmt` on your code before committing it. You should also run | |
| [golint][] over your code. As noted in the [golint readme][], it's not | |
| strictly necessary that your code be completely "lint-free", but this will | |
| help you find common style issues. | |
| 1. Any significant changes should almost always be accompanied by tests. The | |
| project already has good test coverage, so look at some of the existing | |
| tests if you're unsure how to go about it. [gocov][] and [gocov-html][] | |
| are invaluable tools for seeing which parts of your code aren't being | |
| exercised by your tests. | |
| 1. Do your best to have [well-formed commit messages][] for each change. | |
| This provides consistency throughout the project, and ensures that commit | |
| messages are able to be formatted properly by various git tools. | |
| 1. Finally, push the commits to your fork and submit a [pull request][]. | |
| [forking]: https://help.github.com/articles/fork-a-repo | |
| [golint]: https://github.com/golang/lint | |
| [golint readme]: https://github.com/golang/lint/blob/master/README | |
| [gocov]: https://github.com/axw/gocov | |
| [gocov-html]: https://github.com/matm/gocov-html | |
| [well-formed commit messages]: http://tbaggery.com/2008/04/19/a-note-about-git-commit-messages.html | |
| [squash]: http://git-scm.com/book/en/Git-Tools-Rewriting-History#Squashing-Commits | |
| [pull request]: https://help.github.com/articles/creating-a-pull-request |