InvenTree/CONTRIBUTING.md

Hi there, thank you for your intrest in contributing! Please read the contribution guidelines below, before submitting your first pull request to the InvenTree codebase.

Quickstart

The following commands will get you quickly configure and run a development server, complete with a demo dataset to work with:

Bare Metal

git clone https://github.com/inventree/InvenTree.git && cd InvenTree
python3 -m venv env && source env/bin/activate
pip install invoke && invoke
pip install invoke && invoke setup-dev --tests

Docker

git clone https://github.com/inventree/InvenTree.git && cd InvenTree
docker compose run inventree-dev-server invoke install
docker compose run inventree-dev-server invoke setup-test
docker compose up -d

Read the InvenTree setup documentation for a complete installation reference guide.

Setup Devtools

Run the following command to set up all toolsets for development.

invoke setup-dev

We recommend you run this command before starting to contribute. This will install and set up pre-commit to run some checks before each commit and help reduce the style errors.

Branches and Versioning

InvenTree roughly follow the GitLab flow branching style, to allow simple management of multiple tagged releases, short-lived branches, and development on the main branch.

Version Numbering

InvenTree version numbering follows the semantic versioning specification.

Master Branch

The HEAD of the "main" or "master" branch of InvenTree represents the current "latest" state of code development.

• All feature branches are merged into master
• All bug fixes are merged into master

No pushing to master: New featues must be submitted as a pull request from a separate branch (one branch per feature).

Feature Branches

Feature branches should be branched from the master branch.

• One major feature per branch / pull request
• Feature pull requests are merged back into the master branch
• Features may also be merged into a release candidate branch

Stable Branch

The HEAD of the "stable" branch represents the latest stable release code.

• Versioned releases are merged into the "stable" branch
• Bug fix branches are made from the "stable" branch

Release Candidate Branches

• Release candidate branches are made from master, and merged into stable.
• RC branches are targetted at a major/minor version e.g. "0.5"
• When a release candidate branch is merged into stable, the release is tagged

Bugfix Branches

• If a bug is discovered in a tagged release version of InvenTree, a "bugfix" or "hotfix" branch should be made from that tagged release
• When approved, the branch is merged back into stable, with an incremented PATCH number (e.g. 0.4.1 -> 0.4.2)
• The bugfix must also be cherry picked into the master branch.

Environment

Target version

We are currently targeting:

Name	Minimum version
Python	3.9
Django	3.2

Auto creating updates

The following tools can be used to auto-upgrade syntax that was depreciated in new versions:

pip install pyupgrade
pip install django-upgrade

To update the codebase run the following script.

pyupgrade `find . -name "*.py"`
django-upgrade --target-version 3.2 `find . -name "*.py"`

Credits

If you add any new dependencies / libraries, they need to be added to the docs. Please try to do that as timely as possible.

Migration Files

Any required migration files must be included in the commit, or the pull-request will be rejected. If you change the underlying database schema, make sure you run invoke migrate and commit the migration files before submitting the PR.

Note: A github action checks for unstaged migration files and will reject the PR if it finds any!

Unit Testing

Any new code should be covered by unit tests - a submitted PR may not be accepted if the code coverage for any new features is insufficient, or the overall code coverage is decreased.

The InvenTree code base makes use of GitHub actions to run a suite of automated tests against the code base every time a new pull request is received. These actions include (but are not limited to):

• Checking Python and Javascript code against standard style guides
• Running unit test suite
• Automated building and pushing of docker images
• Generating translation files

The various github actions can be found in the ./github/workflows directory

Code Style

Sumbitted Python code is automatically checked against PEP style guidelines. Locally you can run invoke style to ensure the style checks will pass, before submitting the PR. Please write docstrings for each function and class - we follow the google doc-style for python. Docstrings for general javascript code is encouraged! Docstyles are checked by invoke style.

Documentation

New features or updates to existing features should be accompanied by user documentation. A PR with associated documentation should link to the matching PR at https://github.com/inventree/inventree-docs/

Translations

Any user-facing strings must be passed through the translation engine.

• InvenTree code is written in English
• User translatable strings are provided in English as the primary language
• Secondary language translations are provided via Crowdin

Note: Translation files are updated via GitHub actions - you do not need to compile translations files before submitting a pull request!

Python Code

For strings exposed via Python code, use the following format:

from django.utils.translation import gettext_lazy as _

user_facing_string = _('This string will be exposed to the translation engine!')

Templated Strings

HTML and javascript files are passed through the django templating engine. Translatable strings are implemented as follows:

{% load i18n %}

<span>{% trans "This string will be translated" %} - this string will not!</span>

Github use

Tags

The tags describe issues and PRs in multiple areas:

Area	Name	Description
Type Labels
	breaking	Indicates a major update or change which breaks compatibility
	bug	Identifies a bug which needs to be addressed
	dependency	Relates to a project dependency
	duplicate	Duplicate of another issue or PR
	enhancement	This is an suggested enhancement or new feature
	help wanted	Assistance required
	invalid	This issue or PR is considered invalid
	inactive	Indicates lack of activity
	question	This is a question
	roadmap	This is a roadmap feature with no immediate plans for implementation
	security	Relates to a security issue
	starter	Good issue for a developer new to the project
	wontfix	No work will be done against this issue or PR
Feature Labels
	API	Relates to the API
	barcode	Barcode scanning and integration
	build	Build orders
	importer	Data importing and processing
	order	Purchase order and sales orders
	part	Parts
	plugin	Plugin ecosystem
	pricing	Pricing functionality
	report	Report generation
	stock	Stock item management
	user interface	User interface
Ecosystem Labels
	demo	Relates to the InvenTree demo server or dataset
	docker	Docker / docker-compose
	CI	CI / unit testing ecosystem
	setup	Relates to the InvenTree setup / installation process