Hacking

For hacking fork it from github (if your really plan do develop, you should create your own fork in github and clone from that):

$ git clone git://github.com/senchalabs/jsduck.git

JsDuck depends on json, RDiscount, and parallel; plus Rake for building, RSpec for tests, compass for compiling the stylesheets, and Sencha SDK tools for combining JavaScript files. Everything besides the last one are easily obtained by using bundler (gem install bundler to get it) - go to jsduck directory and run bundle install to install both runtime and development dependencies of JSDuck:

$ cd jsduck
$ bundle install

First smoke test. Run the testsuite:

$ cd jsduck
$ rake

If everything is green continue with some configuration. Copy an ExtJS 4 download inside template/extjs directory (you might just create a symlink if you wish so):

$ cp -r path/to/extjs-4.1.0 template/extjs

Now create a file sdk-vars.rb inside the jsduck directory. Use the following template:

# path to Ext JS 4 build
EXT_BUILD='/path/to/extjs-4.1.0'
# path to Touch 2 build
TOUCH_BUILD='/path/to/touch-2.0.1'
# where to output the docs
OUT_DIR='/path/to/ouput/dir'
# path to SDK (for developers at Sencha)
SDK_DIR='/path/to/SDK'

These config options define the input and output directories for the ext4 rake task. Now run the task:

$ rake ext4

This will generate a development/debug version of the docs app into the output directory you specified in sdk-vars.rb file. Open up the directory in your web browser and see if everything looks fine. (This task only creates the class documentation, don't worry about guides, examples, etc being missing, and the index page of api docs blank).

This rake task is most suitable when developing the JavaScript side of the app, as it only symlinks the files in template/ directory, allowing you to modify the files there and see the results by just refreshing the browser window (and not having to run the rake task again and again).

If you are a Sencha developer, use the sdk and touch tasks instead to generate either extjs or touch docs from the corresponding branches in SDK repository.

Happy hacking.

Working on Windows

First get yourself some Ruby. For example visit rubyinstaller.org and grab the latest installer from the download page. Run it and make sure Ruby executable gets added to your PATH. You also need to install the development kit to be able to build native extensions - download it from the same site, then follow the installation instructions (be careful when using the self-extracting exe - if you don't give it a new directory name, it will unpack all files to the current directory, which you probably don't want).

If you don't yet have git, get Git for Windows first. Then continue with the main hacking guide at the top of the page.

Building the gem file

Update JSDuck version number and release date in jsduck.gemspec and version number in jsduck/lib/options.rb. Then simply run the gem task:

$ rake gem

Upload the gem to RubyGems.org or whatever you please.

Building Windows executable

You need a working Ruby installation on your Windows machine and the ocra gem which is used for creating the actual .exe.

Install latest JSDuck:

gem install jsduck

Locate the jsduck executable in gems directory and build it with ocra. Something like this:

ocra --gem-full C:\Ruby193\lib\ruby\gems\1.9.1\gems\jsduck-3.10.3\bin\jsduck

Test the executable.

jsduck.exe -o docs --verbose --builtin-classes

Rename to the correct version and upload to Github.

Contributing your changes

Please follow the coding style already established in existing Ruby, JavaScript and SCSS files.

Set your editor to trim trailing spaces or do it manually.

In JavaScript use Ext.Array.forEach instead of a for loop, unless you can demonstrate considerable performance benefit of the latter in particular case. Multiple var statements should be preferred to one long var at the beginning of a function. And use some linting tool to unsure you have no trailing commas or missing semicolons.

Each class and every public method in it must have a doc-comment /** */. A public method is any method that is called or meant to be called from outside the class itself. Other methods may be also commented, but if you comment them with doc-comment, include @private tag. Also, try to comment your CSS. In Ruby just make sure you document the public methods, use the private keyword to distinguish others.

Format your commit messages with a well established convention of short summary line + longer description. For example, follow this guide: A Note About Git Commit Messages. If you change multiple things, do multiple commits. In general more granular commits are preferred, but if it's just one large change, it's fine having it as one large commit.