How do I know where to start with contributing?

Schleckenmiester

I've been researching and learning how to use Godot over the past week and I think it's awesome and I want to be a part of this. I've never contributed to anything before, and I just don't understand how I can know what's going on. Like, what is the main script that's running it all? If I find a bug how do I even find the scripts that are causing the bug? All the code just looks like garble and somehow works, there's no descriptions on what folders do what and what scripts do what, can someone help me out here?

cybereality

Check this sticky thread: https://godotforums.org/discussion/15593/engine-suggestions-or-bugs-amp-how-to-contribute

Schleckenmiester

@cybereality said: Check this sticky thread: https://godotforums.org/discussion/15593/engine-suggestions-or-bugs-amp-how-to-contribute

Yes I read that already. That tells me what to do but I still don't know where to do it. For example if I reproduce a bug, where do I find the code to fix the bug? I don't understand how to navigate the source code to find out how to fix the bug.

cybereality

Maybe a good place to start would be to report bugs as you find them, with as much information as possible, and let people already familiar with the engine code fix it. Or you can download the source yourself and try to see what you can do. However, the source code is probably vast and it may take a while to get comfortable with it to that level. I've just started with Godot myself, so I don't know much else that would help.

Calinou

There's a bit of information about engine development here. Most people start contributing to Godot by tinkering around, so don't be afraid to build Godot from source and experiment from that.

siska

I've also been looking for information on how to do small bug fixes in the source code (just locally for now). I've set up a Visual Studio project, as described in the above link ('build G from source') and all is fine.

But now, I'm not sure how to proceed ; I feel this is missing from the documentation( for noobs) :) . I would like to fix the (mouse_over/_exit + drag) event for Controls (drag -off- a control should not register as a click -on- the control, but it does) ... So, I tried setting breakpoints in control.cpp on NOTIFICATION_MOUSE_ENTER/ NOTIFICATION_MOUSE_EXIT, but they don't seem to be triggered when I run my game from VS debug ...

At this point, I'm not even sure if I'm going about it in the right way. It would be great if someone could shed some light here ... B) Thanks !

Calinou

@siska Godot starts a child process when editing or running a project from the project manager. This may cause the debugger to not watch anything ongoing in the child process. To solve this, run the project directly using the command line:

path/to/godot.exe --path C:\path\to\project

siska

Thanks @Calinou ! I found running the Godot project, and then using 'attach to process' in VS also works.

I'm still having a hard time navigating around in a c++ project during debug though (I'm used to Java). When I step into a function call, I end up in the header file ... so, is there an easy way to get to the cpp ? ;)

Calinou

When I step into a function call, I end up in the header file ... so, is there an easy way to get to the cpp ?

Most IDEs feature a keyboard shortcut to go from the source file to the header file and vice versa (such as <kbd>Alt + O</kbd> in Visual Studio Code).

siska

Thanks !

Trying to find my way in a complex c++ project like the Godot Engine source code really shows me how little I know ! :p