moonwell-client-core/docs/CONTRIBUTING.md

# Contributing

benilla is a faithful 1.12.1 client. It is the foundation people build on, not the place to get
creative: a change is accepted when it makes benilla more like 1.12.1 or fixes a bug, with
evidence from the reference, in one small piece, with the gates green. Everything else lives on
top of benilla, in a crate of its own or a fork, and both are welcome.

## Where to start

The [issues](https://github.com/samwhosung/benilla/issues) the maintainers file are checked
against 1.12.1 first: each says what 1.12.1 does, what benilla does instead, and where in the
code, and any of them is a place to start. One labelled `in progress` is taken: someone is
working on it or a pull request is open for it, so pick another. Once you start one, open a draft
pull request that says `Fixes #N` as soon as you have a first commit, so the issue shows it is
taken.

## What gets in

- A fix for a bug, with how to see it before and after.
- A step closer to 1.12.1: a missing packet, verb, window, effect or behaviour, done the way
  the real client does it.
- A correction where benilla and the reference disagree, with the reference fact stated.
- Whatever the stock 1.12.1 client loads from a patch, benilla loads: models, textures or data
  rows that 1.12.1 shows and benilla does not are a bug.

## What does not

- Features 1.12.1 does not have, including what 1.12 client mods add (a new key binding, a spell
  queue, new Lua functions, graphics past 1.12's), and behaviour changed because it seems better.
  They live on top of benilla ("Building on top"), so that what benilla does is what 1.12.1 does,
  for everyone who builds on it. A deviation from the reference is the maintainer's call and is
  recorded where it lives; a pull request is not the place to propose one.
- Anything from a WoW install: art, models, sounds, maps, data, and interface code (FrameXML and
  GlueXML), which runs off the player's own install (`docs/METHOD.md`).
- Big or mixed changes. One change per pull request, small enough to read in one sitting.

## Building on top

A feature 1.12.1 does not have lives in a crate of its own that adds its Bevy plugins through
`benilla_app::run_with`, as `crates/benilla-app/examples/extended_launcher.rs` shows, or in a
fork. A client started through `run_with` says `extended` in its build line, so its reports read
apart from stock benilla's. The crate keeps its own settings, never rows in benilla's CVar table,
which every addon reads, and its files go under `benilla_app::config_dir()`, its own
`benilla-config/`: an addon it ships is written into that folder's `AddOns/` and loads as any
addon does.

Past `run_with` and that folder, benilla opens a piece of itself to such a crate only when its own
1.12.1 work creates that piece, never for the crate alone, and promises no stable API: a crate
pins the benilla revision it builds on. What a crate cannot reach stays a fork's.

## The reference

[benilla-re](https://github.com/samwhosung/benilla-re) is the reverse engineering of the 1.12.1
client that benilla is built against, read at its bytes, and the place to find what 1.12.1 does
before you change benilla. Every client address a comment here cites is backed there, by a row
or a finding.

- **Look it up.** The site, `https://samwhosung.github.io/benilla-re/`, has a page per function,
  global and struct, per system, and per Lua function, event, CVar and opcode;
  `?0x5e6853` goes to whatever holds an address. For an agent, a clone beside this repo is
  quicker: grep `symbols/functions.tsv` (a row per function: name, meaning, confidence, the
  finding behind it), `tables/` (opcodes, events, CVars, Lua bindings, messages) and the docs
  under `systems/`.
- **Weigh it.** A row says how sure it is: `inferred` is a lead to check before you rest on it,
  `verified` with proof `one` or `two` is one or two readings of the bytes.
- **When it has a gap or is wrong,** take that to benilla-re: an issue there with what you need to
  know, or a pull request that adds the finding (its `docs/CONTRIBUTING.md` says how a finding is
  written and checked). Then cite the client address here, as the comments do, and link that
  issue or pull request in yours while it is open.
- **The vendored tables.** `reference/` holds the benilla-re tables benilla's tests read, at the
  commit in `reference/PIN`; its README says how to move the pin. Move it only when your change
  needs a row benilla-re has after the pin, to a commit on benilla-re's main.

## How a change is judged

1. `scripts/gates.sh` is green: fmt, clippy with warnings denied, the workspace tests (once
   with the client data, once without, so a test that reads the install has to declare it), the
   doc-link and render-pass lints, the player build with its own tests, and the engine boot
   checks. A pull request from a fork runs the ones that need neither the install nor a display
   in CI, on Linux; the rest run on the maintainer's machine before it lands.
2. The reference fact is stated: what 1.12.1 does, and where that is known from (an entry in
   [benilla-re](https://github.com/samwhosung/benilla-re) by client address, the client's
   behaviour you observed, a DBC field, a FrameXML line, a packet capture). The names and shapes
   under `reference/` are the surface benilla tracks. A fact benilla-re does not have yet is
   added there first ("The reference").
3. A comment where it matters, one line, saying what the code does and the 1.12 fact behind it.
   No history.
4. The commit message says what changed, for a player or a developer, in one line.

## After you open it

A maintainer reads it, checks it against the reference, runs it and finishes it here: a rebase
onto main, a fix, a test or a comment, added as commits on top of yours on your branch, so leave
"Allow edits by maintainers" ticked. It lands as one squash-merged commit with you as its author.
When what would land is mostly ours, we land our own version with you as a co-author and close
yours with a note, and when main already has the fix, we close yours and say where. One that is
out of scope is closed with the reason.

## Setting up

- **The toolchain.** Stable Rust (`rust-toolchain.toml` adds clippy and rustfmt) and a C
  compiler, because the client's Lua is vendored and built from source. On macOS the Xcode
  command line tools, which also supply libclang for the audio bindings; on Linux the ALSA and
  udev development packages and pkg-config. `python3` runs two of the gates.
- **A 1.12.1 install of your own.** `WOW_DATA=<its Data folder>`, or a `WoW` link at the repo
  root, which only a dev build sees: the player build looks for `Data/` or `WoW/Data/` beside
  the binary. benilla reads the install and never writes into it. `WOW_DATA=` (set, empty)
  means "no install", which is how the no-install boot is tested on a machine that has one.
- **Without the install, green is hollow.** Well over a thousand tests read the install and skip
  when it is absent, and a few dozen more read a corpus of vanilla addons
  (`BENILLA_ADDON_CORPUS=<a folder of addons>`, or a `wow-addons-vanilla` link at the root),
  third-party content that is not in this repo. `scripts/gates.sh` and `scripts/check.sh` print
  how many tests skipped and why. Where the data is, `BENILLA_REQUIRE_DATA=1` turns a skip into a
  failure, and the gates set it themselves when the install and the corpus both resolve.
- **A server to test against.** Any 1.12.1 server; `WOW_HOST` names it (default
  `localhost:3724`). A scripted run has no default account: `WOW_USER`, `WOW_PASS` and
  `WOW_CHAR` name a test account on your server whose login kicks nobody, all three, either in
  the environment or in a `.probe-identity` file at the repo root (one per line, never
  committed), and `scripts/smoke.sh` (the live login gate) refuses without them. `WOW_CHAR`
  must already be on the account, since the client creates a character only when asked:
  `WOW_PROBE_CHARCREATE=<name> WOW_PROBE_CHARCREATE_KEEP=1`, run without `WOW_CHAR`, makes it.
  The probes drive the body with GM commands, so give that account the top GM level.
- **Running it unattended.** The rules are `docs/METHOD.md`, "The local server"; these are the
  switches.
  - `WOW_UNATTENDED=1` reconnects instead of waiting at a dialog, and exits non-zero on a login
    it cannot pass. `WOW_NOSOUND=1` runs silent. A capture (`WOW_CAPTURE`) is both, and a rig
    (`WOW_RIG`) is unattended. `WOW_ALLOW_ACCOUNT=1` overrides the account guard.
  - An unattended run starts from defaults in a fresh state folder of its own, printed at boot
    (`state:`), so it never reads or overwrites your settings, layout or addons. `BENILLA_HOME`
    pins a folder, for a run that needs addons, seeded files or state kept across runs.
  - On vmangos, `WOW_RIG="tauren druid 60 gear:heal-preraid-bis spec:heal-preraid-bis
    at:ThunderBluff"` finds or creates that character on the account and applies the server's
    premade sets (`WOW_RIG="gear:?"` lists them). `WOW_PROBE_CHAT="<command>"` sends one GM
    command and logs the reply as `net: server says`. An account named `probe` and digits is
    shielded: every world entry sends `.cheat god on`, `.die` clears it for a death test, and
    `WOW_GOD=off` leaves it off.
  - A trace is `WOW_MOVE_TRACE=<file>`, filtered with `WOW_MOVE_TRACE_TAGS` (`"move,snd,in"`) and
    ended by `WOW_PROBE_EXIT_AT=<seconds>`; grep it for the `rly` and `snd` lines.
  - To sniff the wire, trace the tags `in` and `out` (`WOW_MOVE_TRACE_TAGS="in,out"`): one line
    per world packet, with its opcode, name, `len=` and the body as `hex=`, the bytes after the
    packet header. An `in` line also has `ev=`, the events it decoded to; a server packet that
    failed to parse is a `skip` line with its bytes. Traces get attached to public issues, so two
    kinds of body are kept out. A client packet that carries a secret, the auth session, a channel
    password or any chat text starting with `.` or `!` (a server command), shows
    `hex=<redacted>` always, and so does a dropped command's log line. Chat in both directions
    and the bulk name lists (`SMSG_WHO`, the friend, ignore, guild roster and channel lists) show
    `hex=<withheld>`, with `len=` kept, unless `WOW_MOVE_TRACE_CHAT=1` is set, for a developer who
    needs those bodies and will read the file before sharing it.
  - A capture runs through `scripts/visual.sh`, whose recipe is the header of
    `crates/benilla-app/src/capture/mod.rs`. Pixel questions go through `benilla-visual crop`,
    `series` and `hotspot`.
- **The loop.** `cargo play` builds and runs the play profile. `cargo test -p <crate>` runs one
  crate's tests, the quickest loop. `scripts/check.sh` verifies a round of work: the crates your
  branch changed against main and their dependents, so on a clean clone it has nothing to check; `scripts/gates.sh` is the full chain, and it opens a window for the engine boot
  checks, so it needs a display. `WOW_STOCK_UI=1` boots a dev build on the stock interface
  alone, without benilla's layer. Work on a branch.

## Reporting a bug

Open an issue: what you did, what you saw and what 1.12.1 does instead, with the `benilla build`
line from the start of the terminal output, your platform and the server you ran on. Questions
and ideas are welcome there or on the Discord linked from the README.

Working with an AI agent is expected. The agent reads `AGENTS.md`, and the same rules bind it.