Want to hack on Kubernetes? Yay!
We have a Developer's Guide that outlines everything you need to know from setting up your dev environment to how to get faster Pull Request reviews. If you find something undocumented or incorrect along the way, please feel free to send a Pull Request.
If you have a question about Kubernetes or have a problem using it, please start with the troubleshooting guide. If that doesn't answer your questions, or if you think you found a bug, please file an issue.
We'd love to accept your patches! Before we can take them, we have to jump a couple of legal hurdles.
Please fill out either the individual or corporate Contributor License Agreement (CLA). As of Q4 2016, we're transitioning from Google's CLA to the Cloud Native Computing Foundation (CNCF) CLA.
Google:
- If you are an individual writing original source code and you're sure you own the intellectual property, then you'll need to sign an individual CLA.
- If you work for a company that wants to allow you to contribute your work, then you'll need to sign a corporate CLA.
CNCF:
- To contribute as an individual or as am employee of a signed organization, go here.
- To sign up as an organization, go here.
Once you are CLA'ed, we'll be able to accept your pull requests.
NOTE: Only original source code from you and other people that have signed the CLA can be accepted into the repository. This policy does not apply to third_party and vendor.
If you're new to the project and want to help, but don't know where to start, we have a semi-curated list of issues that have should not need deep knowledge of the system. Have a look and see if anything sounds interesting.
Alternatively, read some of the many docs on the system, for example the
architecture, and pick a component that seems
interesting. Start with main() (look in the cmd directory) and read
until you find something you want to fix. The best way to learn is to hack!
There's always code that can be clarified and variables or functions that can
be renamed or commented.
If you're working on an existing issue, such as one of the help-wanted ones
above, simply respond to the issue and express interest in working on it. This
helps other people know that the issue is active, and hopefully prevents
duplicated efforts.
If you want to work on a new idea of relatively small scope:
- Submit an issue describing your proposed change to the repo in question.
- The repo owners will respond to your issue promptly.
- If your proposed change is accepted, and you haven't already done so, sign a Contributor License Agreement (see details above).
- Fork the repo, develop, and test your changes.
- Submit a pull request.
If you want to work on a bigger idea, we STRONGLY recommend that you start with some bugs or smaller features. We have a feature development process, but navigating the Kubernetes system as a newcomer can be very challenging.
Please read this doc for information on how we're running development for the project. Also take a look at the development guide for information on how to set up your environment, run tests, manage dependencies, etc.
If your patch depends on new packages, add that package with
godep. Follow the instructions to add a
dependency.
Please see our expectations for members of the Kubernetes community.