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CONTRIBUTING.md

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Contributing to EEGLAB

There are several ways in which you can contribute to the ongoing development of EEGLAB:

Bug reporting

  1. Please search on both the EEGLAB discussion list archive (to search the list Google "eeglablist your question") and the GitHub issue list to see if anybody else has lodged a similar observation.

  2. How confident are you that the behavior you have observed is in fact a genuine bug, and not a misunderstanding?

    • Confident: Please open a new GitHub issue; select the "bug report" issue template to get started.

    • Not so confident: That's fine! Consider instead creating a new topic on the EEGLAB discussion list; others can then comment on your observation and determine the appropriate level of escalation.

Requesting a new feature

Please search the GitHub issue list to see if anybody else has made a comparable request:

  • If a corresponding issue already exists, please add a comment to that issue to escalate the request. Additionally, describe any aspect of that feature not yet described in the existing issue.

  • If no such listing exists, then you are welcome to create a new issue outlining the request. Be sure to select the "feature request" option to get started with writing the issue.

Asking questions

General questions regarding EEGLAB download, usage, or any other aspect that is not specific to the EEGLAB code, should be directed to the EEGLAB discussion list. Also check the online documentation.

Making direct contributions

Thanks for your interest in making direct contributions to EEGLAB! We are excited to expand the breadth of researchers involved in improving and expanding this software, and to ensure that all who make such contributions receive appropriate acknowledgment through Git.

The instructions below give a short overview of how to go about generating a proposed change to EEGLAB. A more detailed tutorial on using Git and contributing to the code (or website) is presented as online tutorial on the EEGLAB website.

  1. You will need to create a fork of the EEGLAB repository into your GitHub account, where unlike the main EEGLAB repository, you will have full write access to make the requisite changes.

  2. Create a Git branch that is named appropriately according to the modifications that are being made. The existing code branch on which this new derived branch should be based depends on the nature of the proposed change (described later below).

  3. Generate one or more Git commits that apply your proposed changes to the repository:

    • Individual commits should ideally have a clear singular purpose, and not incorporate multiple unrelated changes. If your proposed changes involve multiple disparate components, consider breaking those changes up into individual commits.

      Conversely, if multiple code changes are logically grouped with / linked to one another, these should ideally be integrated into a single commit.

    • Commits should contain an appropriate message that adequately describes the change encapsulated within.

      If the change demands a longer description, then the commit message should be broken into a synopsis (less than 80 characters) and message body, separated by two newline characters (as this enables GitHub to parse them appropriately).

      This can be achieved at the command-line as follows:

      $ git commit -m $'Commit synopsis\n\nHere is a much longer and wordier description of my proposed changes that doesn\'t fit into 80 characters.\nI can even spread the message body across multiple lines.'

      (Note also the escape character "\" necessary for including an apostrophe in the message text)

    • Where relevant, commit messages can also contain references to GitHub issues or pull requests (type the "#" character followed by the issue / PR number), and/or other individual commits (copy and paste the first 8-10 characters of the commit hash).

    • If multiple persons have contributed to the proposed changes, it is possible to modify individual Git commits to have multiple authors, to ensure that all contributors receive appropriate acknowledgement.

    As a general rule: Git commits and commit messages should be constructed in such a way that, at some time in the future, when one is navigating through the contribution history, the evolution of the code is as clear as possible.

  4. Identify the appropriate classification of the change that you propose to make, and read the relevant instructions there:

    • "Fix": If the current code behaviour is clearly incorrect.

    • "Enhancement": If the proposed change improves the performance or extends the functionality of a particular command or process.

    • "Documentation": If you made some changes to the function description in the help section of the function.

  5. Check that your modified code does not prevent EEGLAB from passing existing tests, wherever possible (all test files are in the EEGLAB test directory).

  6. For code contributions, if possible, a unit test or reproducibility test should be added. This not only demonstrates the behavior of the proposed code, but will also preclude future regression of the behavior of that code.

  7. Once completed, a Pull Request should be generated that merges the corresponding branch in your forked version of the EEGLAB repository into the appropriate target branch of the main EEGLAB repository itself:

    • If your intended changes are complete, and you consider them ready to be reviewed by an EEGLAB team member and merged imminently, then create a standard Pull Request.

    • If your changes are ongoing, and you are seeking feedback from the EEGLAB developers before completing them, then also create a standard pull request. When you modify your code, the pull request will automatically be updated.

Fix

  1. If there does not already exist a GitHub issue describing the bug, consider reporting the bug as a standalone issue prior to progressing further; that way developers can confirm the issue, and possibly provide guidance if you intend to resolve the issue yourself. Later, the Pull Request incorporating the necessary changes should then reference the listed issue (simply add somewhere in the description section the "#" character followed by the issue number).

  2. Bug fixes are merged directly to master; as such, modifications to the code should be made in a branch that is derived from master, and the corresponding Pull Request should select master as the target branch for code merging.

  3. A unit test or reproducibility test should ideally be added: such a test should fail when executed using the current master code, but pass when executed with the proposed changes.

Enhancement

  1. New features, as well as any code changes that extend the functionality of EEGLAB, are merged to the develop branch, which contains all resolved changes since the most recent tag update. As such, any proposed changes that fall under this classification should be made in a branch that is based off of the develop branch, and the corresponding Pull Request should select develop as the target branch for code merging.

Documentation

If you want to contribute to the documentation on the EEGLAB website, please refer to the website's Github repository.

Coding conventions

Please follow the MATLAB style guidelines for guidelines on contributing to the EEGLAB code base.

Non-exhaustive summary of coding guidelines:

  • 2 space indents; indent using spaces and not tabs
  • No spaces between function name and opening parenthesis of argument list
  • One space after the comma that separates function arguments
  • Vertically align code with spaces in case it improves readability

References

This document is based on the excellent CONTRIBUTING.md document from the MRTRIX repository, and adjusted accordingly.