CONTRIBUTING.md

Contributing to Kafscale

Thanks for your interest in Kafscale! This project follows Apache 2.0 conventions for licensing and contributions.

Before You Start

• Use the issue tracker to discuss larger changes.
• Keep changes focused and add tests for non-trivial logic.
• Contributions, issues, and code reviews are handled in English so the community can participate globally.
• Development happens on main via PRs; releases are tagged, but the repository always includes interim commits between releases.

Bug Reports and Feature Requests

We track bugs and enhancements in GitHub Issues:

• Report a bug: https://github.com/KafScale/platform/issues/new?template=bug_report.md
• Request an enhancement: https://github.com/KafScale/platform/issues/new?template=feature_request.md
• Browse the public archive: https://github.com/KafScale/platform/issues

We aim to acknowledge new bug reports and enhancement requests within 7 days.

License and Headers

All source and documentation files must include the Apache 2.0 license header used in this repo. Generated files under pkg/gen/ are exempt and should not be edited manually. JSON files under docs/grafana/ are excluded because the format does not support comments.

The CI workflow checks for missing headers and fails if new files are added without them.

Tests and Coverage

Pull requests must include strict test coverage for the changes they introduce. At a minimum:

• Add or extend unit tests for all non-trivial logic.
• Run make commit-check before opening or updating a PR.
• Run the relevant e2e suite(s). Broker changes should run:
  • make test-produce-consume
  • make test-consumer-group (if group behavior is affected)
• Extend e2e coverage when fixing bugs so regressions are caught earlier.

CI will run go test ./... and enforce a coverage floor.

Build and Test Tooling (FLOSS)

Kafscale builds and tests with FLOSS tools only:

• Build: Go toolchain + Makefiles (make build)
• Tests: go test, go vet, Go race detector (make test)
• CI: GitHub Actions workflows (.github/workflows/ci.yml)

Common invocations:

• make build
• make test
• make commit-check
• make test-full

The policy above (tests for new functionality) is enforced in code review and CI.

Compiler/Linter Warnings

We run go vet and the Go race detector in CI (make test) and treat warnings as fix‑before‑merge. Optional linting is available via make lint for contributors with golangci-lint installed.

Coding Standards

Contributions must follow the coding standards described in docs/development.md (see the "Coding Standards" section).

Release Notes

Each release should include a human-readable note in docs/releases/ that summarizes major changes and explicitly lists any known CVE fixes (or "None").

Development Workflow

See docs/development.md for build/test commands, environment variables, and local setup. Before submitting a PR, run make commit-check and fix any reported issues.

Code of Conduct

By participating, you agree to follow CODE_OF_CONDUCT.md.