HACKING

If you are contributing code to the Subversion project, please read
this first.

We're using ANSI C, and following the GNU coding standards.  Emacs
users can just load svn-dev.el to get the right indentation behavior
(most source files here will load it automatically, if
`enable-local-eval' is set appropriately).

Read http://www.gnu.org/prep/standards.html for a full description of
the GNU coding standards; but here is a short example demonstrating
the most important formatting guidelines:

   char *                                     /* func type on own line */
   argblarg (char *arg1, int arg2)            /* func name on own line */
   {                                          /* first brace on own line */
     if ((some_very_long_condition && arg2)   /* indent 2 cols */
         || remaining_condition)              /* new line before operator */
       {                                      /* brace on own line, indent 2 */
         arg1 = some_func (arg1, arg2);       /* space before opening paren */
       }                                      /* close brace on own line */
     else
       {
         do                                   /* format do-while like this */
           {
             arg1 = another_func (arg1);
           }
           while (*arg1);
       }
   }

In general, be generous with parentheses even when you're sure about
the operator precedence, and be willing to add spaces and newlines to
avoid "code crunch".  Don't worry too much about vertical density;
it's more important to make code readable than to fit that extra line
on the screen.


Other Conventions:
==================

In addition to the GNU standards, Subversion uses these conventions:

   * Use only spaces for indenting code, never tabs.  Tab display
     width is not standardized enough, and anyway it's easier to
     manually adjust indentation that uses spaces.

   * Stay within 80 columns, the width of a minimal standard display
     window.

   * Signify internal variables by two underscores after the prefix.
     That is, when a symbol must (for technical reasons) reside in the
     global namespace despite not being part of a published interface,
     then use two underscores following the module prefix.  For
     example:

        svn_fs_get_ver_prop ()       /* Part of published API. */
        svn_fs__parse_props ()       /* For internal use only. */

   * Put this comment at the bottom of new source files to make Emacs
     automatically load svn-dev.el:

        /* 
         * local variables:
         * eval: (load-file "svn-dev.el")
         * end:
         */

     (This assumes the C file is located in subversion/subversion/,
     where svn-dev.el is.)