doc/www/patches.php

   1 <? include ("barry.inc"); ?>
   2
   3 <? createHeader("Submitting Patches"); ?>
   4
   5 <? createSubHeader("Coding Guidelines"); ?>
   6
   7 <p>If you are submitting code, please have a look at the
   8 <? createLink("codingguide", "Coding Guidelines page"); ?>.</p>
   9
  10 <p>Please keep some things in mind when preparing your patches
  11 for submission:
  12 <ul>
  13         <li>use one patch per logical change</li>
  14         <li>test all coding changes</li>
  15         <ul>
  16                 <li>If it is a change to the build system, make sure that
  17                         the test/buildtest.sh script still works.</li>
  18         </ul>
  19         <li>include some commentary above your patch in your email</li>
  20         <li>when mailing patches, try to keep one patch per email</li>
  21         <li>do not cut and paste patches... either read them in
  22                 directly to your mail body (preferred),
  23                 or send as an attachment</li>
  24         <li>add a [PATCH] prefix to your subject line</li>
  25 </ul>
  26 </p>
  27
  28
  29 <? createSubHeader("Why Submit Patches?"); ?>
  30
  31 <p>Submitting your changes via patch is a good thing.  It may seem like
  32 an extra bit of work to create a patch and post it to the mailing list,
  33 or to make your work available in a public git repo, but there are good
  34 reasons why Open Source works that way:</p>
  35
  36 <ul>
  37         <li>Patches tell the maintainer that you <b>want</b> your change
  38                 to be added to the tree.  It is often too easy for busy
  39                 programmers to misunderstand someone's intentions if
  40                 they just send a random file.  If intentions are not
  41                 clear, work gets dropped on the floor.</li>
  42         <li>Patches show that you have worked with the source code,
  43                 and hopefully have tested your change.</li>
  44         <li>Patches show that you have given some thought to where
  45                 your changes should go in the tree.</li>
  46         <li>Patches to a public mailing list encourage peer review, and show
  47                 that you are ok with your code being included in a public
  48                 project.</li>
  49         <li>Patches to a public mailing list or a public repository become
  50                 part of history, showing who did what, and when.</li>
  51         <li>Patches usually get top priority from developers.</li>
  52         <li>Patches make life easier for the developers, freeing up their
  53                 time for more features and bug fixes.</li>
  54         <li>Patches turn you into a developer.  Your name can be added
  55                 to the AUTHORS file.</li>
  56 </ul>
  57
  58
  59 <? createSubHeader("Generating Patches"); ?>
  60
  61 <p>Generating patches depends on the method you used to get the source code.
  62 <ul>
  63         <li>If you are using a tarball, expand the tarball once into
  64                 a pristine directory, and again into your "working
  65                 directory."  When you are finished and
  66                 ready to patch, do:
  67 <pre>
  68         cd barry-work
  69         ./buildgen.sh cleanall
  70         cd ..
  71         diff -ruN barry-orig barry-work > patchfile
  72 </pre>
  73         </li>
  74
  75         <li>If you are using CVS, make your changes in your working
  76                 directory, and then do:
  77 <pre>
  78         cd barry-cvs
  79         ./buildgen.sh cleanall
  80         cvs diff -u > patchfile
  81         grep ^? patchfile
  82 </pre>
  83                 Any new files that you've added to your tree will need
  84                 to be attached to your patch email, as CVS has no
  85                 way to add files without write access to the repository.
  86                 <br/><br/></li>
  87
  88         <li>If you are using the git tree, you can make your changes
  89                 in your own branch, and then create patches for each
  90                 commit you've made:
  91 <pre>
  92         cd barry-git
  93         git format-patch origin/master
  94 </pre>
  95
  96         </li>
  97
  98 </ul>
  99
 100
 101 <? createSubHeader("Methods for Submitting Patches"); ?>
 102
 103 <p>Submitting changes can happen in one of three methods:
 104
 105 <ul>
 106         <li>Send a patch to the
 107         <a href="http://sourceforge.net/mail/?group_id=153722">mailing list</a>.
 108         </li>
 109
 110         <li>Publish your own git repository (perhaps by creating a
 111                 forked tree on
 112                 <a href="http://repo.or.cz/">repo.or.cz</a>)
 113                 and notify the mailing list, indicating the
 114                 branch you want people to pull from when
 115                 you're ready.</li>
 116
 117         <li>Use the "mob" branch on <a href="http://repo.or.cz/w/barry.git">
 118                 Barry's git repository</a>, and....
 119                 send a notification to the mailing list.</li>
 120 </ul>
 121 </p>
 122
 123
 124 <? createSubHeader("Creating a Forked Tree on repo.or.cz"); ?>
 125
 126 <p>The git repo site repo.or.cz lets anyone create a forked tree based
 127 off the official Barry repo.  This saves space on repo.or.cz, and
 128 adds your fork to a list at the bottom of the official Barry page.</p>
 129
 130 <p>This way, users and developers can look at everyone's changes and
 131 test and mix them as needed.</p>
 132
 133 <p>To create a forked tree, visit the <a href="http://repo.or.cz/w/barry.git">
 134 Barry repo</a> and click "fork" at the top.</p>
 135
 136
 137
 138 <? createSubHeader("Using the Mob Branch"); ?>
 139
 140 <p>The public git repository service at repo.or.cz provides an interesting
 141 feature, which allows anyone to push to a "mob" branch of a repository,
 142 if so configured by the admin.</p>
 143
 144 <p> It would go something like this:
 145 <pre>
 146         # clone with mob user
 147         git clone git+ssh://mob@repo.or.cz/srv/git/barry.git barry
 148
 149         cd barry
 150         git checkout -b mob origin/mob
 151         git diff origin/master..mob             # make sure master == mob
 152         &lt;make changes&gt;
 153         git add ... && git commit
 154         git push origin mob
 155         &lt;send email to the list, include the SHA1 sum of the commit&gt;
 156 </pre>
 157 </p>
 158
 159 <p> This is a novel idea, as well as a security risk for anyone who blindly
 160 runs whatever is in the mob branch.  Hence the recommended diff check
 161 above, to make sure you're working on an official branch.</p>
 162
 163 <p> The mob user can only push to the mob branch, so all other branches
 164 are read-only, and have been reviewed at least once by the project
 165 maintainer.</p>
 166
 167 <p>  But the mob branch frees people up to use git, who may not have
 168 their own hosting, or who may not want to bother setting up their
 169 own git repo.  People can use it to collaborate on a feature as well.
 170 Let your imagination run wild.</p>
 171
 172 <p>You can read more about the ideas behind the mob branch at
 173 <a href="http://repo.or.cz/mob.html">the repo.or.cz mob page</a></p>
 174