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Contributing to autobrr

Thanks for taking interest in contribution! We welcome anyone who wants to contribute.

If you have an idea for a bigger feature or a change then we are happy to discuss it before you start working on it. It is usually a good idea to make sure it aligns with the project and is a good fit. Open an issue or post in #dev-general on Discord.

This document is a guide to help you through the process of contributing to autobrr.

Become a contributor​

Developer guide​

This guide helps you get started developing autobrr.

Dependencies​

Make sure you have the following dependencies installed before setting up your developer environment:

  • Git
  • Go (see go.mod for minimum required version)
  • Node.js (we usually use the latest Node LTS version - for further information see @types/node major version in package.json)
  • pnpm

How to contribute​

  • Fork and Clone: Fork the autobrr repository and clone it to start working on your changes.
  • Branching: Create a new branch for your changes. Use a descriptive name for easy understanding.
    • Checkout a new branch for your fix or feature git checkout -b fix/filters-issue
  • Coding: Ensure your code is well-commented for clarity. With go use go fmt
  • Commit Guidelines: We appreciate the use of Conventional Commit Guidelines when writing your commits.
    • Examples: fix(indexers): Mock improve parsing, feat(notifications): add NewService
    • There is no need for force pushing or rebasing. We squash commits on merge to keep the history clean and manageable.
  • Pull Requests: Submit a pull request from your Fork with a clear description of your changes. Reference any related issues.
    • Mark it as Draft if it's still in progress.
  • Code Review: Be open to feedback during the code review process.

Development environment​

The backend is written in Go and the frontend is written in TypeScript using React.

You need to have the Go toolchain installed and Node.js with pnpm as the package manager.

Clone the project and change dir:

git clone github.com/YOURNAME/autobrr && cd autobrr

Frontend​

First install the web dependencies:

cd web && pnpm install

Run the project:

pnpm dev

This should make the frontend available at http://localhost:3000. It's setup to communicate with the API at http://localhost:7474.

Build​

In order to build binaries of the full application you need to first build the frontend.

To build the frontend, run:

pnpm --dir web run build

Backend​

Install Go dependencies:

go mod tidy

Run the project:

go run cmd/autobrr/main.go

This uses the default config.toml and runs the API on http://localhost:7474.

Build​

To build the backend, run:

make build/app

This will output a binary in ./bin/autobrr

You can also build the frontend and the backend at once with:

make build

Build cross-platform binaries​

You can optionally build it with GoReleaser which makes it easy to build cross-platform binaries.

Install it with go install or check the docs for alternatives:

go install github.com/goreleaser/goreleaser@latest

Then to build binaries, run:

goreleaser build --snapshot --clean

Tests​

The test suite consists of only backend tests at this point. All tests run per commit with GitHub Actions.

Run backend tests​

We have a mix of unit and integration tests.

Run all non-integration tests:

go test -v ./...

Run SQLite and PostgreSQL integration tests​

The integration tests runs against an in memory SQLite database and currently requires Docker for the Postgres tests.

If you have docker setup then run the test_postgres container with:

docker compose up -d test_postgres

Then run all tests:

go test ./... -tags=integration

Build Docker image​

To build a Docker image, run:

make build/docker

The image will be tagged as autobrr:dev

Mock indexer​

We have a mock indexer you can run locally that features:

  • Built in IRC server that can send announces
  • Mock indexer for downloads
  • RSS feed mock
  • Webhook mock for External Filters

See the documentation here. Add the customDefinitions to the config.toml and then run it with:

go run test/mockindexer/main.go
  • Restart the backend API for it to load the new mock.yaml definition
  • Then add it via Settings -> Indexers -> Add, and select Mock Indexer in the list
  • Go to Settings -> IRC and toggle the IRC network Mock Indexer
  • Add a new Filter or add the indexer to an existing filter
  • Open a new tab and navigate to http://localhost:3999 and put the example announce in the input then hit enter