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Contribution Guide

Contribute to Arista ansible-avd collection#

Please take a moment to review this document in order to make the contribution process easy and effective for everyone involved.

Following these guidelines helps to communicate that you respect the time of the developers managing and developing this open source project. In return, they should reciprocate that respect in addressing your issue or assessing patches and features.

Reporting Bugs#

  • First, ensure that you’ve installed the latest stable version of ansible-avd. If you’re running an older version, it’s possible that the bug has already been fixed.
  • Next, check the GitHub issues list to see if the bug you’ve found has already been reported. If you think you may be experiencing a reported issue that hasn’t already been resolved, please click “add a reaction” in the top right corner of the issue and add a thumbs up (+1). You might also want to add a comment describing how it’s affecting your installation. This will allow us to prioritize bugs based on how many users are affected.
  • If you haven’t found an existing issue that describes your suspected bug, Do not file an issue until you have received confirmation that it is in fact a bug. Invalid issues are very distracting and slow the pace at which ansible-avd is developed.
  • When submitting an issue, please be as descriptive as possible. Be sure to include:

    * The environment in which ansible-avd is running * The exact steps that can be taken to reproduce the issue (if applicable) * Any error messages generated * Screenshots (if applicable)

  • Please avoid prepending any sort of tag (e.g. “[Bug]”) to the issue title. The issue will be reviewed by a moderator after submission and the appropriate labels will be applied for categorization.
  • Keep in mind that we prioritize bugs based on their severity and how much work is required to resolve them. It may take some time for someone to address your issue.

Feature Requests#

  • First, check the GitHub issues list to see if the feature you’re requesting is already listed. (Be sure to search closed issues as well, since some feature requests have been rejected.) If the feature you’d like to see has already been requested and is open, click “add a reaction” in the top right corner of the issue and add a thumbs up (+1). This ensures that the issue has a better chance of receiving attention. Also feel free to add a comment with any additional justification for the feature. (However, note that comments with no substance other than a “+1” will be deleted. Please use GitHub’s reactions feature to indicate your support.)
  • Before filing a new feature request, consider raising your idea on the mailing list first. Feedback you receive there will help validate and shape the proposed feature before filing a formal issue.
  • Good feature requests are very narrowly defined. Be sure to thoroughly describe the functionality and data model(s) being proposed. The more effort you put into writing a feature request, the better its chance is of being implemented. Overly broad feature requests will be closed.
  • When submitting a feature request on GitHub, be sure to include the following:

    * A detailed description of the proposed functionality * A use case for the feature; who would use it and what value it would add to ansible-avd * A rough description of changes necessary * Any third-party libraries or other resources which would be involved

  • Please avoid prepending any sort of tag (e.g. “[Feature]”) to the issue title. The issue will be reviewed by a moderator after submission and the appropriate labels will be applied for categorization.

Using the issue tracker#

The issue tracker is the preferred channel for bug reports, features requests and submitting pull requests, but please respect the following restrictions:

  • Please do not use the issue tracker for personal support requests.
  • Please do not derail or troll issues. Keep the discussion on topic and respect the opinions of others.

Branches#

  • Current development branch: devel
  • Branch namespace for release & development: releases/<release_id>

Pull requests#

  • Be sure to open an issue before starting work on a pull request, and discuss your idea with the ansible-avd maintainers before beginning work. This will help prevent wasting time on something that might we might not be able to implement. When suggesting a new feature, also make sure it won’t conflict with any work that’s already in progress.
  • Any pull request which does not relate to an accepted issue will be closed.
  • All major new functionality must include relevant tests where applicable.
  • When submitting a pull request, please be sure to work off of the devel branch, rather than master (deprecated). The devel branch is used for ongoing development, while releases/* are used for tagging new stable releases.
  • All code submissions should meet the following criteria (CI will enforce these checks):

    * YAML syntax is valid * Python syntax is valid * All tests pass when run with make sanity * PEP 8 compliance is enforced, with the exception that lines may be greater than 80 characters in length

Adhering to the following this process is the best way to get your work merged:

  • Fork the repo, clone your fork, and configure the remotes:

    # Clone your fork of the repo into the current directory
    git clone https://github.com/<your-username>/ansible-avd
    
    # Navigate to the newly cloned directory
    cd ansible-avd
    
    # Assign the original repo to a remote called "upstream"
    git remote add upstream https://github.com/aristanetworks/ansible-avd.git
    
  • If you cloned a while ago, get the latest changes from upstream:

    git checkout <dev-branch>
    git pull upstream <dev-branch>
    
  • Create a new topic branch (off the main project development branch) to contain your feature, change, or fix:

    git checkout -b <topic-branch-name>
    
  • Commit your changes in logical chunks. Please adhere to these git commit message guidelines or your code is unlikely be merged into the main project. Use Git’s git rebase feature to tidy up your commits before making them public.
  • Locally merge (or rebase) the upstream development branch into your topic branch:

    git pull [--rebase] upstream <dev-branch>
    
  • Push your topic branch up to your fork:

    git push origin <topic-branch-name>