CONTRIBUTING.md

Contributing guidelines

This document describes how to contribute to the project.

Sign the CLA

Kubernetes projects require that you sign a Contributor License Agreement (CLA) before we can accept your pull requests.

Please see https://git.k8s.io/community/CLA.md for more info.

Prerequisites

• go version v1.23+.
• docker version 17.03+.
• kubectl version v1.11.3+.
• kustomize v3.1.0+
• Access to a Kubernetes v1.11.3+ cluster.

Contributing steps

1. Submit an issue describing your proposed change to the repo in question.
2. The repo owners will respond to your issue promptly.
3. If your proposed change is accepted, and you haven't already done so, sign a Contributor License Agreement (see details above).
4. Fork the desired repo, develop and test your code changes.
5. Submit a pull request.

In addition to the above steps, we adhere to the following best practices to maintain consistency and efficiency in our project:

• Single Commit per PR: Each Pull Request (PR) should contain only one commit. This approach simplifies tracking changes and makes the history more readable.
• One Issue per PR: Each PR should address a single specific issue or need. This helps in streamlining our workflow and makes it easier to identify and resolve problems such as revert the changes if required.

For more detailed guidelines, refer to the Kubernetes Contributor Guide.

How to build kubebuilder locally

Note that, by building the kubebuilder from the source code we are allowed to test the changes made locally.

1. Run the following command to clone your fork of the project locally in the dir /src/sigs.k8s.io/kubebuilder

$ git clone git@github.com:<user>/kubebuilder.git $GOPATH/src/sigs.k8s.io/kubebuilder

1. Ensure you activate module support before continue ($ export GO111MODULE=on)
2. Run the command make install to create a bin with the source code

NOTE In order to check the local environment run make test-unit.

What to do before submitting a pull request

1. Run the script make generate to update/generate the mock data used in the e2e test in $GOPATH/src/sigs.k8s.io/kubebuilder/testdata/
2. Run make verify to run all verification checks (linting, testdata, docs, helm)
3. Run make test-unit test-e2e-local for full testing

• e2e tests use kind and setup-envtest. If you want to bring your own binaries, place them in $(go env GOPATH)/bin.

IMPORTANT: The make generate is very helpful. By using it, you can check if good part of the commands still working successfully after the changes. Also, note that its usage is a prerequisite to submit a PR.

TIP: You can run make verify to check all verification steps that the CI will run. This includes linting, testdata verification, documentation checks, and Helm chart validation.

Following the targets that can be used to test your changes locally.

Command	Description	Is called in the CI?
make verify	Run all verification checks	yes
make verify-lint	Run code linting (Go, YAML, linter config)	yes
make verify-license	Verify license headers	yes
make verify-sample-permissions	Verify sample file permissions	yes
make verify-testdata	Verify testdata is up to date	yes
make verify-docs	Verify documentation (generation, accessibility, trailing spaces)	yes
make verify-helm	Verify Helm charts (yamllint, helm lint)	yes
make fix-docs	Fix documentation note layout accessibility issues	no
make test-unit	Runs go tests	no
make test	Runs tests in shell (./test.sh)	yes
make lint-fix	Run golangci to automatically perform fixes	no
make test-coverage	Run coveralls to check the % of code covered by tests	yes
make test-e2e-local	Runs the CI e2e tests locally	no

NOTE make verify-lint requires a local installation of golangci-lint. More info: https://github.com/golangci/golangci-lint#install

Running e2e tests locally

See that you can run test-e2e-local to setup Kind and run e2e tests locally. Another option is by manually starting up Kind and configuring it and then, you can for example via your IDEA debug the e2e tests.

To manually setup run:

# To generate an Kubebuilder local binary with your changes
make install
# To create the cluster
kind create cluster --config ./test/e2e/kind-config.yaml

Now, you can for example, run in debug mode the test/e2e/all/e2e_suite_test.go:

Test Plugin

If your intended PR creates a new plugin, make sure the PR also provides test cases. Testing should include:

1. e2e tests to validate the behavior of the proposed plugin.
2. sample projects to verify the scaffolded output from the plugin.

1. Plugin E2E Tests

All the plugins provided by Kubebuilder should be validated through e2e-tests across multiple platforms.

Current Kubebuilder provides the testing framework that includes testing code based on ginkgo, Github Actions for unit tests, and multiple env tests driven by test-infra.

To fully test the proposed plugin:

1. Add test specs to test/e2e/plugin_<your-plugin>_test.go in the unified test suite.

2. Tests should use the shared e2e_suite_test.go BeforeSuite/AfterSuite hooks (cert-manager and Prometheus are already installed).

3. Each test should:

   • Initialize a TestContext using utils.NewTestContext
   • Trigger the plugin's bound subcommands. See Init, CreateAPI
   • Use PluginUtil to verify the scaffolded outputs

4. Test validation should:

   • 4.1. Setup testing environment, e.g:

     • Cleanup environment, create temp dir. See Prepare
     • If your test will cover the provided features then, ensure that you install prerequisites CRDs: See InstallCertManager, InstallPrometheusManager

   • 4.2. Run the function from generate_test.go.

   • 4.3. Further make sure the scaffolded output works, e.g:

     • Execute commands in your Makefile. See Make
     • Temporary load image of the testing controller. See LoadImageToKindCluster
     • Call Kubectl to validate running resources. See utils.Kubectl

   • 4.4. Delete temporary resources after testing exited, e.g:

     • Uninstall prerequisites CRDs: See UninstallPrometheusOperManager
     • Delete temp dir. See Destroy

5. Add the command in test/e2e/plugin to run your testing code:

go test $(dirname "$0")/<your-plugin-test-folder> $flags -timeout 30m

2. Sample Projects from the Plugin

It is also necessary to test consistency of the proposed plugin across different env and the integration with other plugins.

This is performed by generating sample projects based on the plugins. The CI workflow defined in Github Action would validate the availability and the consistency.

See:

• test/testdata/generated.sh
• make generate

PR Process

See VERSIONING.md for a full description. TL;DR:

PR Title Format

PR titles use emojis (appear in release notes). Format: :emoji: (plugin/version): Description

Emojis:

• ⚠️ (:warning:) - Breaking change
• ✨ (:sparkles:) - New feature
• 🐛 (:bug:) - Bug fix
• 📖 (:book:) - Documentation
• 🌱 (:seedling:) - Infrastructure/tests/refactor
• 👻 (:ghost:) - No release note (unreleased changes only)

Examples:

🐛 Resolve nil pointer panic in scaffold generator
✨ (helm/v2-alpha): Add cluster-scoped resource support
📖 (go/v4): Update deployment documentation
✨ Update dependencies to latest versions
🌱 Add new GitHub action to test out doc samples

Commit Message Format

Commit messages follow the Conventional Commits standard.

Format: <type>[optional scope]: <description>

The [optional scope] is typically the plugin/version (e.g., helm/v2-alpha, go/v4); omit it for repo-wide or non-plugin changes.

Types:

• feat: A new feature for the user or a plugin
• fix: A bug fix for the user or a plugin
• docs: Documentation changes only
• test: Adding or updating tests
• refactor: Code change that neither fixes a bug nor adds a feature
• chore: Changes to build process, dependencies, or maintenance tasks
• breaking: A breaking change (can be combined with other types)

Examples:

fix: Resolve nil pointer panic in scaffold generator
feat(helm/v2-alpha): Add cluster-scoped resource support
docs(go/v4): Update deployment documentation
chore: Update dependencies to latest versions

Where the CI Tests are configured

1. See the action files to check its tests, and the scripts used on it.
2. Note that the prow tests used in the CI are configured in kubernetes-sigs/kubebuilder/kubebuilder-presubmits.yaml.
3. Check that all scripts used by the CI are defined in the project.
4. Notice that our policy to test the project is to run against k8s version N-2. So that the old version should be removed when there is a new k8s version available.

How to contribute to docs

The docs are published off of three branches:

• book-v4: book.kubebuilder.io -- current docs
• book-v3: book-v3.book.kubebuilder.io -- legacy docs
• book-v2: book-v2.book.kubebuilder.io -- legacy docs
• book-v1: book-v1.book.kubebuilder.io -- legacy docs
• master: master.book.kubebuilder.io -- "nightly" docs

See VERSIONING.md for more information.

The documentation is rendered using mdBook with its advanced Markdown features.

There are certain writing style guidelines for Kubernetes documentation, checkout style guide for more information.

How to preview the changes performed in the docs

Check the CI job after to do the Pull Request and then, click on in the Details of netlify/kubebuilder/deploy-preview

Community, discussion and support

Learn how to engage with the Kubernetes community on the community page.

You can reach the maintainers of this project at:

• Slack
• Mailing List

Becoming a reviewer or approver

Contributors may eventually become official reviewers or approvers in Kubebuilder and the related repositories. See CONTRIBUTING-ROLES.md for more information.

Code of conduct

Participation in the Kubernetes community is governed by the Kubernetes Code of Conduct.