Add contribution guidance

Signed-off-by: Anton Kachatkou <anton.kachatkou@arm.com>
Change-Id: Ie74d7f8e7a4df319b72b64dda85cc9b754769dc5

1 files changed, 98 insertions, 0 deletions

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+<!---
+SPDX-FileCopyrightText: Copyright 2023, Arm Limited and/or its affiliates.
+SPDX-License-Identifier: Apache-2.0
+--->
+# Contribution Guidelines
+
+The ML Inference Advisor (MLIA) project is open for external contributors and
+welcomes contributions. MLIA is licensed under the [Apache-2.0 license](https://spdx.org/licenses/Apache-2.0.html)
+and all accepted contributions must have the same license.
+Below is an overview on contributing code to MLIA.
+
+## Contributing code to MLIA
+
+- All code reviews are performed on [ML Platform Gerrit](https://review.mlplatform.org)
+- GitHub account credentials are required for creating an account on ML Platform
+- Configure your ML Platform account with your [e-mail](https://review.mlplatform.org/settings/#EmailAddresses)
+- Configure your ML Platform account for [SSH access](https://review.mlplatform.org/settings/#SSHKeys)
+- Set up MLIA git repo
+
+```bash
+    git clone "ssh://<your_github_username>@review.mlplatform.org:29418/ml/mlia"
+    # set up commit-msg hook to automatically add Gerrit Change-ID to each commit
+    scp -p -P 29418 \
+    <your_github_username>@review.mlplatform.org:hooks/commit-msg "mlia/.git/hooks/"
+    cd mlia
+    git checkout main
+    # git pull is not required upon initial clone but good practice before
+    # creating a patch
+    git pull
+    git config user.name "FIRST_NAME SECOND_NAME"
+    # use the same e-mail you set up your ML Platform account with
+    git config user.email your@email.address
+```
+
+- Commit using [sign-off](#developer-certificate-of-origin-dco)
+
+```bash
+    git commit -s
+```
+
+- Push patch for code review
+
+```bash
+    git push origin HEAD:refs/for/main
+```
+
+- Patch will appear on ML Platform Gerrit [here](https://review.mlplatform.org/q/is:open+project:ml/mlia+branch:main)
+- See below for details on copyright notice and developer certificate of origin
+
+## Developer Certificate of Origin (DCO)
+
+Before the MLIA project accepts your contribution, you need to certify its
+origin and give us your permission. To manage this process we use
+[Developer Certificate of Origin (DCO) V1.1](https://developercertificate.org/).
+
+To indicate that you agree to the the terms of the DCO, you "sign off" your contribution
+by adding a line with your name and e-mail address to every git commit message:
+
+```bash
+Signed-off-by: FIRST_NAME SECOND_NAME <your@email.address>
+```
+
+You must use your real name, no pseudonyms or anonymous contributions are accepted.
+
+## In File Copyright Notice
+
+In each source file, include the following copyright notice:
+
+```bash
+# SPDX-FileCopyrightText: Copyright <years changes were made> <copyright holder>.
+# SPDX-License-Identifier: Apache-2.0
+```
+
+Note: if an existing file does not conform, please update the license header
+as part of your contribution.
+
+## Releases
+
+Official MLIA releases are published through [PyPI](https://pypi.org/project/mlia).
+
+## Development repository
+
+The MLIA development repository is hosted on the [mlplatform.org](https://git.mlplatform.org/ml/mlia.git/).
+
+## Code reviews
+
+Contributions must go through code review. Code reviews are performed through
+the [mlplatform.org Gerrit server](https://review.mlplatform.org).
+Contributors need to signup to this Gerrit server with their GitHub account
+credentials.
+
+Only reviewed contributions can go to the main branch of MLIA.
+
+## Continuous integration
+
+Contributions to MLIA go through testing at the Arm CI system. All unit,
+integration and regression tests must pass before a contribution gets merged
+to the MLIA main branch.