ContributingCode < Training

---+ How to successfully contribute code to Free Software Projects

These few pages are the base for a short three-part tutorial
on how to contribute code to Free Software projects in order for
the contributions to become "mainline" with as few delays and
frustrations as possible.

---++ Part 1 - Overview
   * Understand the project (e.g. [[http://www.denx.de/wiki/UBoot/DesignPrinciples][U-Boot design principles]])
   * [[ContributionRequirements][Requirements]]


---++ Part 2 - Tools
   * Source formating
      * Lindent script bundled with Linux. [[UsingLindentWithEmacs]]
      * Syntax sensitive editors (e.g. M-x c-set-style in GNU/Emacs)
      * Whitespace checkers (in git-am and e.g. M-x whitespace-global-mode in GNU/Emacs)
   * Versioning system
      * [[http://git.or.cz/][Git]] (Official [[http://www.kernel.org/pub/software/scm/git/docs/tutorial.html][tutorial]] and my own [[GitFlyThrough][Git fly through]])
      * Gitk
      * [[http://procode.org/stgit/][StGit]]
      * [[http://git.or.cz/gitwiki/Tig][tig]]
   * Use available checkers
      * Use -Wall and handle all warnings!
      * Static analysers (in Linux)
         * checkstack - Generate a list of stack hogs
         * namespacecheck - Name space analysis on compiled kernel
         * headers_check - Sanity check on exported headers
      * [[http://www.kernel.org/pub/software/devel/sparse/][Sparse]] (in Linux)

---++ Part 3 - Examples and details (inside Linux)
   * [[CodingStyleIssues][Common problems with CodingStyle]]
   * [[http://www.denx.de/cgi-bin/gitweb.cgi?p=linux-denx.git;a=blob;f=Documentation/volatile-considered-harmful.txt;hb=f695e369ca929498bbbd837e1a4f322d6f66134d][Volatile considered harmful]]
   * Programming endianness clean
   * Abstracting from architectures with IO accessor macros
   * Use spinlocks, e.g. program for SMP even on UP