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Contributing

Contributions are welcome — bug reports, feature requests, documentation improvements, and pull requests are all appreciated.

Getting started

  1. Fork the repository on GitHub
  2. Clone your fork: git clone https://github.com/<you>/hornet
  3. Create a feature branch: git checkout -b feat/my-feature
  4. Make your changes
  5. Run the quality gate: make quality
  6. Push and open a pull request

Architecture decisions and roadmaps

hornet follows Architecture Driven Development (ADD): for architecturally significant changes the order is fixed,

ADR  →  TDD  →  implement  →  docs  →  threat model
  • ADRs live in docs/adr/ as NNNN-title.md. Write one before changing the public API or AST types, the parser's permissive/strict behaviour, the writer's output or WriteOptions, validator diagnostic semantics, the CLI contract, dependencies or feature flags, or the CI and release pipeline.
  • Roadmaps live in .github/community/, with their status board in ROADMAPS.md. A PR that completes a roadmap task ticks it in the detail doc and updates the ROADMAPS.md row.
  • The threat model gets a full pass, and a bumped stamp, once an ADR is implemented.

Small bug fixes, docs changes and adding one more typed option or record type following the existing pattern need tests, not an ADR.

Adding support for a new named.conf statement

Follow this checklist in order:

  • Add AST types to src/ast/named_conf.rs
  • Add a new arm to the Statement enum
  • Add a parser in src/parser/named_conf.rs
  • Add a writer arm in src/writer/named_conf.rs
  • Add validation rules in src/validator/mod.rs (if applicable)
  • Add integration tests in tests/named_conf.rs
  • Update the named.conf Constructs reference page

Adding support for a new zone file record type

Follow this checklist in order:

  • Add an RData variant to src/ast/zone_file.rs
  • Add a parser case in src/parser/zone_file.rs
  • Add a writer case in src/writer/zone_file.rs
  • Add validation rules if applicable
  • Add integration tests in tests/zone_file.rs
  • Update the Zone Record Types reference page

Code style

  • Rust edition 2021, MSRV 1.74
  • All public items must have /// doc comments
  • Use thiserror for error types
  • Use tracing for diagnostics (not println! or eprintln! in library code)
  • Prefer early returns over deeply nested if/else
  • No unwrap() in production code — use ? or explicit error handling
  • No magic numbers — define named constants
  • All new code must pass cargo clippy --all-targets --all-features -- -D warnings

Commit messages

Follow Conventional Commits:

feat(parser): add support for the 'server' statement
fix(validator): report duplicate zone names as Error not Warning
docs(cli): document --allow-warnings flag for check command
test(zone_file): add round-trip tests for TLSA records

Pull request guidelines

  • One concern per PR — keep PRs focused on a single feature or fix
  • Tests required — new parsers and writers must have integration tests
  • Documentation required — update the relevant reference pages
  • Green CI required — make quality must pass

Reporting bugs

Open an issue at https://github.com/firestoned/hornet/issues with:

  • The hornet version (hornet --version)
  • The BIND9 config or zone file fragment that causes the issue (minimised if possible)
  • What you expected to happen
  • What actually happened

License

By contributing to Hornet you agree that your contributions will be licensed under the Apache License, Version 2.0, consistent with the rest of the project.