Developing Persefone

Workflow

  1. Pull the current version from the master branch on Gitlab: https://git.idiv.de/xo30xoqa/persephone.

  2. If you are working on a new feature, create a new branch to avoid breaking the master branch. (The master branch on Github should always be in a runnable and error-free state.)

  3. Implement your changes.

  4. Run an example simulation and the test suite to make sure everything works without crashing (make run and make test on Linux, or execute run.jl and test/runtests.jl manually.)

  5. Commit your work frequently, and try to keep each commit small. Don't forget to add relevant tests to the test suite.

  6. Once your satisfied with your work, do another pull/merge from the master branch in case somebody else changed the branch in the meantime. Then merge your work into master and push to the Gitlab server.

  7. Repeat :-)

The Gitlab issue tracker can be used to create, discuss, and assign tasks, as well as to monitor progress towards milestones/releases. Once we have a first release, we will start using semantic versioning.

Libraries

Agents.jl

Our model uses Agents.jl as a framework. Their repository can be used to inspect the source code or submit bug reports (the authors are quick to respond). Questions can be asked at the Julia Discourse forum.

Tutorial on collaborating on Julia packages: https://www.matecdev.com/posts/julia-package-collaboration.html.

Revise.jl

Revise.jl allows one to reload code without restarting the Julia interpreter. Get it with Pkg.add("Revise"), then add using Revise to .julia/config/startup.jl to have it automatically available.

Test

Persefone uses the inbuilt Julia testing framework. All new functions should have appropriate tests written for them in the appropriate file in the test directory. (See test/runtests.jl for details.) There are three ways to run the test suite: in the terminal, executing make test or cd test; julia runtests.jl; or in the Julia REPL, Pkg.activate("."); Pkg.test().

Documenter.jl

The HTML documentation is generated using Documenter.jl. Therefore, all new functions should have docstrings attached. New files need to be integrated into the relevant documentation source files in docs/src, and if necessary into docs/builddocs.jl. To build the documentation, run make docs, or cd docs; julia builddocs.jl (if using the latter, don't forget to update the date and commit in docs/src/index.md).

Julia editors

Emacs

There are a couple of addons that make working with Julia much nicer in Emacs:

  1. julia-mode gives syntax highlighting. Install with M-x package-install julia-mode.

  2. julia-snail provides IDE-like features, especially a fully-functional REPL and the ability to evaluate code straight from inside a buffer. Note that the installation can be somewhat tricky. You first need to manually install all the dependencies of its dependency vterm, then install vterm itself with M-x package-install vterm, before you can do M-x package-install julia-snail. Then add it to your init.el with (require 'julia-snail) and (add-hook 'julia-mode-hook #'julia-snail-mode).

  3. company-mode integrates with Snail to give code completion. Install with M-x package-install company, then add (add-hook 'julia-mode-hook #'company-mode) and (global-set-key (kbd "C-<tab>") 'company-complete) to your init.el.

  4. magit is a great git interface for Emacs. Install with M-x package-install magit and add (global-set-key (kbd "C-x g") 'magit-status) to your init.el.

VSCode

See here.

TODO: add more detail.