valence/CONTRIBUTING.md

Valence has a public Discord server here. Check it out if you have additional questions or comments.

What version of Rust should I use?

For users of Valence, the most recent stable version of Rust is required. However, contributors should use a recent version of nightly (rustup default nightly). This implies that unstable #![feature(...)] attributes must not be used.

The reason for nightly is that we are using unstable rustfmt settings. Hopefully these settings will not require nightly in the future.

What issues can I work on?

Issues labelled good first issue are a good place to start. This label is reserved for issues that shouldn't require too much specialized domain knowledge to complete. New contributors are not required to start with these issues.

If you plan to work on something that's not an open issue, consider making one first so that it can be discussed. This way, your contribution will not be rejected when it is submitted for review.

Automatic Checks

When you submit a pull request, your code will automatically run through clippy, rustfmt, etc. to check for any errors. If an error does occur, it must be fixed before the pull request can be merged.

Code Conventions

Here are some rules you should follow for your code. Generally the goal here is to be consistent with existing code, the standard library, and the Rust ecosystem as a whole.

These guidelines are intended to complement the Rust API Guidelines.

Top-down Modules

Items in modules should be structured in a top-down style. Readers of the module should be able to understand your code by reading it from top to bottom. This implies that pub items are placed at the top of the file.

For instance, here are three functions. Notice how the definition of foo is placed above its dependencies.

pub fn foo() {
    bar();
    baz();
}

fn bar() {}

fn baz() {}

This rule applies to types as well.

pub struct Foo {
    bar: Bar,
    baz: Baz,
}

struct Bar;

struct Baz;

Separate Data and Functions

Types that are closely related should be grouped together separately from the functions that operate on them. impl blocks are placed below the type definitions.

Here is an example combined with the previous guideline:

pub struct Foo {
    bar: Bar
}

pub struct Bar;

impl Foo {
    // ...
}

impl Bar {
    // ...
}

Getters and Setters

Getters and setters should be named like this:

impl Foo {
    fn bar(&self) -> &Bar { ... }
    fn set_bar(&mut self, bar: Bar) { ... }
}

And not like this:

impl Foo {
    fn get_bar(&self) -> &Bar { ... }
    fn set_bar(&mut self, bar: Bar) { ... }
}

See SocketAddr for an example of a standard library type that uses this convention.

Under appropriate circumstances a different naming scheme can be used. Command is a standard type that demonstrates this.

Naming Quantities

Quantities of something should be named foo_count where foo is the thing you're quantifying. It would be incorrect to name this variable num_foos.

Documentation

All public items should be documented. Documentation must be written with complete sentences and correct grammar. Consider using intra-doc links where appropriate.