CONTRIBUTING

The project is open source and if you like you can help. Here are some contribution guidelines:

* we use the Apache 2.0 licence

* we recommend to use pycharm for editing and utlize the `Inspect
  Code` feature regularly on the files you modify and fix the sensible
  pep8 warnings.  Look at other warnings and errors

* use ``.format`` instead of ``%`` in print statements

* use ``from __future__ import print_function`` at the beginning of the file and use
  ``print("msg")`` instead of ``print msg``

* use as much python 3 like code but use python 2

* use ``class name(object):`` and not just ``class name:``

* use ``Console.error`` when printing errors if you develop a command
  for the commandline

* use ``Console.ok`` when printing something that confirms the action
  is ok. In many cases you may not want o use print, but
  Console.ok. Please note that Console.ok, takesa string argument.

* use ``ConfigDict`` when reading yaml files. It even allows you to
  read a yaml file in order, make changes to it and write it back

* use nosetests for testing your programs

  An example is provided in ``tests/test_sample.py``::

    nosetests -v --nocapture tests/test_sample.py

  you can copy this to ``tests/test_yourfile.py`` and then replace in
  that file the occurrence of ``_sample`` with ``_yourfile``

  make sure to create meaningful tests.

* the documentation is write in RST http://sphinx-doc.org/rest.html

* look at http://python-future.org/compatible_idioms.html for tips to
  make python 2 look more like python 3.  Be careful with dicts to
  make them not inefficient.

* we are using https://pypi.python.org/pypi/gitchangelog for creating
  changelogs automatically.  Thus you need to use a prefix in any
  commit. It includes the type and the user for which the commit is
  relevant.  Examples are::

     chg: usr:    simple changes relevant for users (spelling, ...)
     fix: usr:    major changes for users
     new: usr:    new feature for users

     chg: dev:    simple changes relevant for developers (spelling, ...)
     fix: dev:    major changes for developers
     new: dev:    new feature for developers