From 12461e5bf1ccc9886f95d58aac211c3e9404bcac Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001
From: Jordan Bayles <jophba@chromium.org>
Date: Mon, 24 Jun 2019 13:53:55 -0700
Subject: [PATCH] Create CONTRIBUTING.md

---
 CONTRIBUTING.md | 113 ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
 1 file changed, 113 insertions(+)
 create mode 100644 CONTRIBUTING.md

diff --git a/CONTRIBUTING.md b/CONTRIBUTING.md
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..40090df
--- /dev/null
+++ b/CONTRIBUTING.md
@@ -0,0 +1,113 @@
+# Contributing to JsonCpp
+
+## Building
+
+Both CMake and Meson tools are capable of generating a variety of build environments for you preferred development environment.
+Using cmake or meson you can generate an XCode, Visual Studio, Unix Makefile, Ninja, or other environment that fits your needs.
+
+An example of a common Meson/Ninja environment is described next.
+
+## Building and testing with Meson/Ninja
+Thanks to David Seifert (@SoapGentoo), we (the maintainers) now use
+[meson](http://mesonbuild.com/) and [ninja](https://ninja-build.org/) to build
+for debugging, as well as for continuous integration (see
+[`./travis_scripts/meson_builder.sh`](./travis_scripts/meson_builder.sh) ). Other systems may work, but minor
+things like version strings might break.
+
+First, install both meson (which requires Python3) and ninja.
+If you wish to install to a directory other than /usr/local, set an environment variable called DESTDIR with the desired path:
+    DESTDIR=/path/to/install/dir
+
+Then,
+
+    cd jsoncpp/
+    BUILD_TYPE=debug
+    #BUILD_TYPE=release
+    LIB_TYPE=shared
+    #LIB_TYPE=static
+    meson --buildtype ${BUILD_TYPE} --default-library ${LIB_TYPE} . build-${LIB_TYPE}
+    #ninja -v -C build-${LIB_TYPE} test # This stopped working on my Mac.
+    ninja -v -C build-${LIB_TYPE}
+    cd build-${LIB_TYPE}
+    meson test --no-rebuild --print-errorlogs
+    sudo ninja install
+
+## Building and testing with other build systems
+See https://github.com/open-source-parsers/jsoncpp/wiki/Building
+
+## Running the tests manually
+
+You need to run tests manually only if you are troubleshooting an issue.
+
+In the instructions below, replace `path/to/jsontest` with the path of the
+`jsontest` executable that was compiled on your platform.
+
+    cd test
+    # This will run the Reader/Writer tests
+    python runjsontests.py path/to/jsontest
+
+    # This will run the Reader/Writer tests, using JSONChecker test suite
+    # (http://www.json.org/JSON_checker/).
+    # Notes: not all tests pass: JsonCpp is too lenient (for example,
+    # it allows an integer to start with '0'). The goal is to improve
+    # strict mode parsing to get all tests to pass.
+    python runjsontests.py --with-json-checker path/to/jsontest
+
+    # This will run the unit tests (mostly Value)
+    python rununittests.py path/to/test_lib_json
+
+    # You can run the tests using valgrind:
+    python rununittests.py --valgrind path/to/test_lib_json
+
+## Building the documentation
+
+Run the Python script `doxybuild.py` from the top directory:
+
+    python doxybuild.py --doxygen=$(which doxygen) --open --with-dot
+
+See `doxybuild.py --help` for options.
+
+## Adding a reader/writer test
+
+To add a test, you need to create two files in test/data:
+
+* a `TESTNAME.json` file, that contains the input document in JSON format.
+* a `TESTNAME.expected` file, that contains a flatened representation of the
+  input document.
+
+The `TESTNAME.expected` file format is as follows:
+
+* Each line represents a JSON element of the element tree represented by the
+  input document.
+* Each line has two parts: the path to access the element separated from the
+  element value by `=`. Array and object values are always empty (i.e.
+  represented by either `[]` or `{}`).
+* Element path `.` represents the root element, and is used to separate object
+  members. `[N]` is used to specify the value of an array element at index `N`.
+
+See the examples `test_complex_01.json` and `test_complex_01.expected` to better understand element paths.
+
+## Understanding reader/writer test output
+
+When a test is run, output files are generated beside the input test files. Below is a short description of the content of each file:
+
+* `test_complex_01.json`: input JSON document.
+* `test_complex_01.expected`: flattened JSON element tree used to check if
+  parsing was corrected.
+* `test_complex_01.actual`: flattened JSON element tree produced by `jsontest`
+  from reading `test_complex_01.json`.
+* `test_complex_01.rewrite`: JSON document written by `jsontest` using the
+  `Json::Value` parsed from `test_complex_01.json` and serialized using
+  `Json::StyledWritter`.
+* `test_complex_01.actual-rewrite`: flattened JSON element tree produced by
+  `jsontest` from reading `test_complex_01.rewrite`.
+* `test_complex_01.process-output`: `jsontest` output, typically useful for
+  understanding parsing errors.
+
+## Versioning rules
+
+Consumers of this library require a strict approach to incrementing versioning of the JsonCpp library. Currently, we follow the below set of rules:
+
+* Any new public symbols require a minor version bump.
+* Any alteration or removal of public symbols requires a major version bump, including changing the size of a class. This is necessary for
+consumers to do dependency injection properly.