# How to contribute

Dotenv loves to welcome your contributions. There are several ways to help out:

* Create a ticket in GitHub, if you have found a bug
* Write testcases for open bug tickets
* Write patches for open bug/feature tickets, preferably with testcases included
* Contribute to the [documentation](https://github.com/josegonzalez/php-dotenv/tree/gh-pages)

There are a few guidelines that we need contributors to follow so that we have a
chance of keeping on top of things.

## Getting Started

* Make sure you have a [GitHub account](https://github.com/signup/free)
* Submit a ticket for your issue, assuming one does not already exist.
  * Clearly describe the issue including steps to reproduce when it is a bug.
  * Make sure you fill in the earliest version that you know has the issue.
* Fork the repository on GitHub.

## Making Changes

* Create a topic branch from where you want to base your work.
  * This is usually the develop branch
  * To quickly create a topic branch based on master; `git branch
    master/my_contribution master` then checkout the new branch with `git
    checkout master/my_contribution`. Better avoid working directly on the
    `master` branch, to avoid conflicts if you pull in updates from origin.
* Make commits of logical units.
* Check for unnecessary whitespace with `git diff --check` before committing.
* Use descriptive commit messages and reference the #ticket number
* Core testcases should continue to pass. You can run tests locally or enable
  [travis-ci](https://travis-ci.org/) for your fork, so all tests and codesniffs
  will be executed.

## Which branch to base the work

* Bugfix branches will be based on develop branch.
* New features that are backwards compatible will be based on develop branch
* New features or other non-BC changes will go in the next major release branch.

## Submitting Changes

* Push your changes to a topic branch in your fork of the repository.
* Submit a pull request to the repository with the correct target branch.

## Testcases and codesniffer

Dotenv tests requires [PHPUnit](http://www.phpunit.de/manual/current/en/installation.html)
3.5 or higher. To run the testcases locally use the following command:

    phpunit --coverage-text

To run the sniffs for PSR2 coding standards

    phpcs --standard=psr2 src/

# Additional Resources

* [Bug tracker](https://github.com/josegonzalez/php-dotenv/issues)
* [General GitHub documentation](https://help.github.com/)
* [GitHub pull request documentation](https://help.github.com/send-pull-requests/)
