--- date: "2016-12-01T16:00:00+02:00" title: "Hacking on Gitea" slug: "hacking-on-gitea" sidebar_position: 10 toc: false draft: false aliases: - /en-us/hacking-on-gitea menu: sidebar: parent: "development" name: "Hacking on Gitea" sidebar_position: 10 identifier: "hacking-on-gitea" --- # Hacking on Gitea ## Quickstart To get a quick working development environment you could use Gitpod. [![Open in Gitpod](/open-in-gitpod.svg)](https://gitpod.io/#https://github.com/go-gitea/gitea) ## Installing go You should [install go](https://golang.org/doc/install) and set up your go environment correctly. Next, [install Node.js with npm](https://nodejs.org/en/download/) which is required to build the JavaScript and CSS files. The minimum supported Node.js version is @minNodeVersion@ and the latest LTS version is recommended. **Note**: When executing make tasks that require external tools, like `make watch-backend`, Gitea will automatically download and build these as necessary. To be able to use these you must have the `"$GOPATH"/bin` directory on the executable path. If you don't add the go bin directory to the executable path you will have to manage this yourself. **Note 2**: Go version @minGoVersion@ or higher is required. Gitea uses `gofmt` to format source code. However, the results of `gofmt` can differ by the version of `go`. Therefore it is recommended to install the version of Go that our continuous integration is running. As of last update, the Go version should be @goVersion@. To lint the template files, ensure [Python](https://www.python.org/) and [Poetry](https://python-poetry.org/) are installed. ## Installing Make Gitea makes heavy use of Make to automate tasks and improve development. This guide covers how to install Make. ### On Linux Install with the package manager. On Ubuntu/Debian: ```bash sudo apt-get install make ``` On Fedora/RHEL/CentOS: ```bash sudo yum install make ``` ### On Windows One of these three distributions of Make will run on Windows: - [Single binary build](http://www.equation.com/servlet/equation.cmd?fa=make). Copy somewhere and add to `PATH`. - [32-bits version](http://www.equation.com/ftpdir/make/32/make.exe) - [64-bits version](http://www.equation.com/ftpdir/make/64/make.exe) - [MinGW-w64](https://www.mingw-w64.org) / [MSYS2](https://www.msys2.org/). - MSYS2 is a collection of tools and libraries providing you with an easy-to-use environment for building, installing and running native Windows software, it includes MinGW-w64. - In MingGW-w64, the binary is called `mingw32-make.exe` instead of `make.exe`. Add the `bin` folder to `PATH`. - In MSYS2, you can use `make` directly. See [MSYS2 Porting](https://www.msys2.org/wiki/Porting/). - To compile Gitea with CGO_ENABLED (eg: SQLite3), you might need to use [tdm-gcc](https://jmeubank.github.io/tdm-gcc/) instead of MSYS2 gcc, because MSYS2 gcc headers lack some Windows-only CRT functions like `_beginthread`. - [Chocolatey package](https://chocolatey.org/packages/make). Run `choco install make` **Note**: If you are attempting to build using make with Windows Command Prompt, you may run into issues. The above prompts (Git bash, or MinGW) are recommended, however if you only have command prompt (or potentially PowerShell) you can set environment variables using the [set](https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-server/administration/windows-commands/set_1) command, e.g. `set TAGS=bindata`. ## Downloading and cloning the Gitea source code The recommended method of obtaining the source code is by using `git clone`. ```bash git clone https://github.com/go-gitea/gitea ``` (Since the advent of go modules, it is no longer necessary to build go projects from within the `$GOPATH`, hence the `go get` approach is no longer recommended.) ## Forking Gitea Download the main Gitea source code as above. Then, fork the [Gitea repository](https://github.com/go-gitea/gitea) on GitHub, and either switch the git remote origin for your fork or add your fork as another remote: ```bash # Rename original Gitea origin to upstream git remote rename origin upstream git remote add origin "git@github.com:$GITHUB_USERNAME/gitea.git" git fetch --all --prune ``` or: ```bash # Add new remote for our fork git remote add "$FORK_NAME" "git@github.com:$GITHUB_USERNAME/gitea.git" git fetch --all --prune ``` To be able to create pull requests, the forked repository should be added as a remote to the Gitea sources. Otherwise, changes can't be pushed. ## Building Gitea (Basic) Take a look at our [instructions](installation/from-source.md) for [building from source](installation/from-source.md). The simplest recommended way to build from source is: ```bash TAGS="bindata sqlite sqlite_unlock_notify" make build ``` The `build` target will execute both `frontend` and `backend` sub-targets. If the `bindata` tag is present, the frontend files will be compiled into the binary. It is recommended to leave out the tag when doing frontend development so that changes will be reflected. See `make help` for all available `make` targets. Also see [`.drone.yml`](https://github.com/go-gitea/gitea/blob/main/.drone.yml) to see how our continuous integration works. ## Building continuously To run and continuously rebuild when source files change: ```bash # for both frontend and backend make watch # or: watch frontend files (html/js/css) only make watch-frontend # or: watch backend files (go) only make watch-backend ``` On macOS, watching all backend source files may hit the default open files limit which can be increased via `ulimit -n 12288` for the current shell or in your shell startup file for all future shells. ### Formatting, code analysis and spell check Our continuous integration will reject PRs that fail the code linters (including format check, code analysis and spell check). You should format your code: ```bash make fmt ``` and lint the source code: ```bash # lint both frontend and backend code make lint # lint only backend code make lint-backend ``` **Note**: The results of `gofmt` are dependent on the version of `go` present. You should run the same version of go that is on the continuous integration server as mentioned above. ### Working on JS and CSS Frontend development should follow [Guidelines for Frontend Development](contributing/guidelines-frontend.md) To build with frontend resources, either use the `watch-frontend` target mentioned above or just build once: ```bash make build && ./gitea ``` Before committing, make sure the linters pass: ```bash make lint-frontend ``` ### Configuring local ElasticSearch instance Start local ElasticSearch instance using docker: ```sh mkdir -p $(pwd)/data/elasticsearch sudo chown -R 1000:1000 $(pwd)/data/elasticsearch docker run --rm --memory="4g" -p 127.0.0.1:9200:9200 -p 127.0.0.1:9300:9300 -e "discovery.type=single-node" -v "$(pwd)/data/elasticsearch:/usr/share/elasticsearch/data" docker.elastic.co/elasticsearch/elasticsearch:7.16.3 ``` Configure `app.ini`: ```ini [indexer] ISSUE_INDEXER_TYPE = elasticsearch ISSUE_INDEXER_CONN_STR = http://elastic:changeme@localhost:9200 REPO_INDEXER_ENABLED = true REPO_INDEXER_TYPE = elasticsearch REPO_INDEXER_CONN_STR = http://elastic:changeme@localhost:9200 ``` ### Building and adding SVGs SVG icons are built using the `make svg` target which compiles the icon sources defined in `build/generate-svg.js` into the output directory `public/assets/img/svg`. Custom icons can be added in the `web_src/svg` directory. ### Building the Logo The PNG and SVG versions of the Gitea logo are built from a single SVG source file `assets/logo.svg` using the `TAGS="gitea" make generate-images` target. To run it, Node.js and npm must be available. The same process can also be used to generate custom logo PNGs from a SVG source file by updating `assets/logo.svg` and running `make generate-images`. Omitting the `gitea` tag will update only the user-designated logo files. ### Updating the API When creating new API routes or modifying existing API routes, you **MUST** update and/or create [Swagger](https://swagger.io/docs/specification/2-0/what-is-swagger/) documentation for these using [go-swagger](https://goswagger.io/) comments. The structure of these comments is described in the [specification](https://goswagger.io/use/spec.html#annotation-syntax). If you want more information about the Swagger structure, you can look at the [Swagger 2.0 Documentation](https://swagger.io/docs/specification/2-0/basic-structure/) or compare with a previous PR adding a new API endpoint, e.g. [PR #5483](https://github.com/go-gitea/gitea/pull/5843/files#diff-2e0a7b644cf31e1c8ef7d76b444fe3aaR20) You should be careful not to break the API for downstream users which depend on a stable API. In general, this means additions are acceptable, but deletions or fundamental changes to the API will be rejected. Once you have created or changed an API endpoint, please regenerate the Swagger documentation using: ```bash make generate-swagger ``` You should validate your generated Swagger file: ```bash make swagger-validate ``` You should commit the changed swagger JSON file. The continuous integration server will check that this has been done using: ```bash make swagger-check ``` **Note**: Please note you should use the Swagger 2.0 documentation, not the OpenAPI 3 documentation. ### Creating new configuration options When creating new configuration options, it is not enough to add them to the `modules/setting` files. You should add information to `custom/conf/app.ini` and to the [configuration cheat sheet](administration/config-cheat-sheet.md) found in `docs/content/doc/administer/config-cheat-sheet.en-us.md` ### Changing the logo When changing the Gitea logo SVG, you will need to run and commit the results of: ```bash make generate-images ``` This will create the necessary Gitea favicon and others. ### Database Migrations If you make breaking changes to any of the database persisted structs in the `models/` directory, you will need to make a new migration. These can be found in `models/migrations/`. You can ensure that your migrations work for the main database types using: ```bash make test-sqlite-migration # with SQLite switched for the appropriate database ``` ## Testing There are two types of test run by Gitea: Unit tests and Integration Tests. ### Unit Tests Unit tests are covered by `*_test.go` in `go test` system. You can set the environment variable `GITEA_UNIT_TESTS_LOG_SQL=1` to display all SQL statements when running the tests in verbose mode (i.e. when `GOTESTFLAGS=-v` is set). ```bash TAGS="bindata sqlite sqlite_unlock_notify" make test # Runs the unit tests ``` ### Integration Tests Unit tests will not and cannot completely test Gitea alone. Therefore, we have written integration tests; however, these are database dependent. ```bash TAGS="bindata sqlite sqlite_unlock_notify" make build test-sqlite ``` will run the integration tests in an SQLite environment. Integration tests require `git lfs` to be installed. Other database tests are available but may need adjustment to the local environment. Take a look at [`tests/integration/README.md`](https://github.com/go-gitea/gitea/blob/main/tests/integration/README.md) for more information and how to run a single test. ### Testing for a PR Our continuous integration will test the code passes its unit tests and that all supported databases will pass integration test in a Docker environment. Migration from several recent versions of Gitea will also be tested. Please submit your PR with additional tests and integration tests as appropriate. ## Documentation for the website Documentation for the website is found in `docs/`. If you change this you can test your changes to ensure that they pass continuous integration using: ```bash # from the docs directory within Gitea make trans-copy clean build ``` You will require a copy of [Hugo](https://gohugo.io/) to run this task. Please note: this may generate a number of untracked Git objects, which will need to be cleaned up. ## Visual Studio Code A `launch.json` and `tasks.json` are provided within `contrib/ide/vscode` for Visual Studio Code. Look at [`contrib/ide/README.md`](https://github.com/go-gitea/gitea/blob/main/contrib/ide/README.md) for more information. ## GoLand Clicking the `Run Application` arrow on the function `func main()` in `/main.go` can quickly start a debuggable Gitea instance. The `Output Directory` in `Run/Debug Configuration` MUST be set to the gitea project directory (which contains `main.go` and `go.mod`), otherwise, the started instance's working directory is a GoLand's temporary directory and prevents Gitea from loading dynamic resources (eg: templates) in a development environment. To run unit tests with SQLite in GoLand, set `-tags sqlite,sqlite_unlock_notify` in `Go tool arguments` of `Run/Debug Configuration`. ## Submitting PRs Once you're happy with your changes, push them up and open a pull request. It is recommended that you allow Gitea Managers and Owners to modify your PR branches as we will need to update it to main before merging and/or may be able to help fix issues directly. Any PR requires two approvals from the Gitea maintainers and needs to pass the continuous integration. Take a look at our [`CONTRIBUTING.md`](https://github.com/go-gitea/gitea/blob/main/CONTRIBUTING.md) document. If you need more help pop on to [Discord](https://discord.gg/gitea) #Develop and chat there. That's it! You are ready to hack on Gitea.