Contributing

This guide covers how to set up a development environment for contributing to the Drift framework itself.

Getting the Source

Clone the repository and install dependencies:

git clone https://github.com/go-drift/drift.git
cd drift
go mod tidy

Building the CLI

The drift CLI is built from cmd/drift/. Templates for Android and iOS projects are embedded into the binary at compile time, so any changes to files in cmd/drift/internal/templates/ require rebuilding:

make cli

After rebuilding, use the locally built drift binary instead of the installed one.

Running Tests

go test ./...

To update snapshot tests:

DRIFT_UPDATE_SNAPSHOTS=1 go test ./pkg/...

Code Style

Format and lint before submitting changes:

gofmt -w .
go vet ./...

Generating Documentation

API reference docs are generated from Go source comments:

go run cmd/docgen/main.go

This copies hand-written guides from website-docs/ into website/docs/ and generates API docs using gomarkdoc. Preview with cd website && npm start.

Project Structure

Directory	Purpose
cmd/drift/	CLI tool (build, run, clean, init, devices, log)
cmd/docgen/	Documentation generator
pkg/	Core framework packages
showcase/	Demo application
scripts/	Skia build scripts
third_party/	Skia source and prebuilt binaries
website-docs/	Hand-written guides (source of truth)
website/	Docusaurus website config

Building Skia from Source

If your changes involve the Skia bridge or CGO layer, you may need to build Skia locally. See the Skia Build guide for instructions.

Platform Templates

When adding iOS or Android native code, ensure the templates in cmd/drift/internal/templates/ are updated:

• iOS: Update both ios/Info.plist.tmpl and xtool/Info.plist.tmpl (and corresponding xcodeproj/xtool templates) in the same change.
• Android: Update AndroidManifest.xml and project templates.

Template changes require rebuilding the CLI with make cli.