[docs] Interested in Contributing

will kahn-greene willg at bluesock.org
Sun Jul 4 14:59:04 CEST 2010


Hi!

I don't know if anyone responded to you individually, but I haven't seen
a response on the list yet.  I haven't contributed docs fixes before,
but this is how I think it works.

There's a page on the Python.org site that talks about how to get into
Python development.  The instructions there will help you for non-code
changes, too.

   http://python.org/dev/

Bugs are tracked in the Python bug tracker:

   http://bugs.python.org/

Docs bugs are all in the "Documentation" component:


http://bugs.python.org/issue?%40search_text=&title=&%40columns=title&id=&%40columns=id&stage=&creation=&creator=&activity=&%40columns=activity&%40sort=activity&actor=&nosy=&type=&components=4&versions=&dependencies=&assignee=&keywords=&priority=&%40group=priority&status=1&%40columns=status&resolution=&nosy_count=&message_count=&%40pagesize=50&%40startwith=0&%40action=search

Another way to look for issues that you might be interested in fixing is
through OpenHatch.org.  Their system polls the Python bugtracker for
bite-sized bugs.  I think in the Python bug-tracker, these are marked
with the "easy" keyword.  This includes both documentation and code bugs.

   http://openhatch.org/search/?project=Python

Any comments on and changes to docs bugs are cc:d to this list.  This is
the mailing list to discuss documentation issues.

Documentation fixes are best done through patches attached to the bugs
in question.  If there are things you want to fix that don't have bugs
for them already, you should create a new bug.

That's the best workflow.  The other workflow is to send docs problems
and fixes where the fixes are described in English to this list.  I see
Georg and some others periodically go through emails on this list, fix
things and check them in.  I shouldn't speak for these people, but I
suspect they prefer the patch workflow.

Documentation for Python is formatted in Restructured Text and uses Sphinx:

   http://docutils.sourceforge.net/rst.html

   http://sphinx.pocoo.org/

The Sphinx documentation is great.  In addition, there are a few
Sphinx-related videos on Python Miro Community:

   http://python.mirocommunity.org/search/?q=sphinx&x=0&y=0

I think that covers it.  I hope that:

1. I got this right (feel free to chime in where I'm mistaken)

2. that this helps you and anyone else looking to get more involved in
Python development

/will


On 07/02/2010 11:40 AM, Steven McGrew wrote:
> In the interest of making myself useful this summer, I would like to
> contribute to the Python documentation.  Having used many obscure Python
> libraries in my projects, I have noticed a distinct lack of good
> documentation and code examples for some modules (especially some of the
> XML parsers out there), and I want to make using Python easier for other
> people.  I have not written documentation before, but I am willing to
> learn ReStructuredText and I consider myself to be a competent programmer.
> 
> If you have any suggestions for how I could get started or could point
> me in the write direction of the python doc community, I would greatly
> appreciate it.
> 
> -Steven McGrew


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