Merge pull request #42 from olin/newsch-add-contributing

Create CONTRIBUTING.md

CONTRIBUTING.md

@@ -0,0 +1,104 @@
+# How to Contribute
+
+So, you've found something you'd like to change about the Student Government
+Bylaws or Amendments. You've come to the right place!
+
+Any questions? Unsure of how to proceed? Reach out to any members of Student
+Government's Executive Board (the President, Vice President for Finance, and
+Vice President of Communications). As of the 2019-2020 school year, those
+members are [Anusha Datar](mailto:[email protected]),
+[Kyle Emmi](mailto:[email protected]),
+and [Sarah Deng](mailto:[email protected]).
+
+## General Formatting
+
+### Wrap Lines at 80 Characters
+
+Lines should be wrapped at 80 characters - this is a fairly common standard for
+code and plaintext files, dating back to the days of [punchcards](https://softwareengineering.stackexchange.com/questions/148677/why-is-80-characters-the-standard-limit-for-code-width#148678).
+
+An exception to this rule is hyperlinks - they might extend further than 80
+characters (the link above is an example).
+
+Here's a good prime number that's eighty digits long (you can use this in a
+pinch to check if your lines are too long):
+
+18532395500947174450709383384936679868383424444311405679463280782405796233163977
+
+A fair number of code/text editors can also help with checking line length:
+- [`vim`](https://www.vim.org/) has the `colorcolumn` setting](https://superuser.com/questions/249779/how-to-setup-a-line-length-marker-in-vim-gvim)
+  and shows the cursor's line and column in the lower right.
+- [`atom`](https://atom.io/) displays a line at 80 characters by default, and
+  shows the cursor's line and column in the lower left.
+- [`vscode`](https://code.visualstudio.com/) has [vertical rulers](https://stackoverflow.com/questions/29968499/vertical-rulers-in-visual-studio-code)
+  and shows the cursor's line and column in the lower right of the [status bar](https://code.visualstudio.com/docs/getstarted/userinterface#_basic-layout).
+
+Check out the [Linting section](#linting-the-governing-documents) for another
+way to check line length automatically.
+
+### Pull Request Titles
+
+Pull request titles should follow the format:  
+**[BA/CA]**-**[school year]**-**[amendment number]**: **[Summary of changes]**
+
+- Amendment numbers are iterated for each proposal regardless of success. Check
+  the [history of previous PRs](https://github.com/olin/studentgovernment/pulls?q=is%3Apr)
+  to determine what the next number is - note that we index at one (1).
+- Amendment numbers are counted independently for the [Bylaws](bylaws.md) and
+  [Constitution](constitution.md).
+
+For example, the first bylaw amendment of the 17-18 school year was about
+updating CCO procedures and was named
+[`BA-1718-001: CCO by-laws update to reflect current practices`](https://github.com/olin/studentgovernment/pull/30).
+
+### Logging Changes in the README
+
+A summary of changes should be added to the [README](README.md) in the
+appropriate location:
+- Bylaw Amendments: [Student Government By-Laws>Passed Amendments](https://github.com/olin/studentgovernment#passed-amendments)
+- Student Government Constitution: [Student Government Constitution Constitution>Passed Amendments](https://github.com/olin/studentgovernment#student-government-constitution).
+
+## Versioning the Governing Documents
+
+After approving amendments in a session of student government and merging the
+appropriate pull requests into the `master` branch, the repository should be
+"tagged" with a new version, and a release made on GitHub that covers the
+changes.
+
+> `vX.Y.Z`, where X is major overhauls of the documents, Y is modifications that
+> impact how SG operates, and Z is changes that don't impact how student
+> government operates.
+
+More information on the history of this can be found in [issue #40](https://github.com/olin/studentgovernment/issues/40).
+
+You can read more about tagging commits and making releases at the [GitHub documentation](https://help.github.com/en/articles/creating-releases).
+
+## Linting the Governing Documents
+
+Using the [`remark-lint`](https://github.com/remarkjs/remark-lint) project, the
+founding documents, README, and this file are checked for consistent:
+- line length
+- indentation
+- linebreaks
+- working links to headings
+- more!
+
+To use this yourself, you'll need to:
+- install [`npm`](https://www.npmjs.com/get-npm) on your machine
+- open up a terminal to this directory
+- run `npm install` and `npm run lint`
+
+The [`.travis.yml`](.travis.yml) file runs these tests for every commit in the
+repository, and will give a warning if a pull request doesn't pass the tests.
+
+## Generating PDFs and more
+
+To get a copy of the documents in `.pdf`, `.doc`, or other formats, you can use
+the [`pandoc`](https://pandoc.org/) program.
+
+The command `pandoc -f gfm constitution.md -t latex -o constution.pdf` converts
+the constitution into a pdf using a local Latex installation.
+
+Together, the [`.travis.yml`](.travis.yml) and [`Makefile`](Makefile) files
+are setup to do this for every [release](https://github.com/olin/studentgovernment/releases)
+of the repository. See [Versioning the Governing Documents](#versioning-the-governing-documents).

package.json

@@ -1,15 +1,14 @@
 {
   "name": "studentgovernment",
-  "version": "3.0.1",
   "description": "The governing documents of Olin College Student Government.",
+  "private": true,
   "scripts": {
-    "lint": "remark ."
+    "lint": "remark --frail ."
   },
   "repository": {
     "type": "git",
     "url": "git+https://github.com/olin/studentgovernment.git"
   },
-  "license": "ISC",
   "bugs": {
     "url": "https://github.com/olin/studentgovernment/issues"
   },