CONTRIBUTING Guide for a Small Project
Write a CONTRIBUTING guide covering setup, branching, tests, pull request etiquette and review expectations for a small repository.
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[VERIFY] is an editorial flag, not a blank to fill. Wherever the prompt shows [VERIFY], check that item against a reliable source before you use it.
Write a CONTRIBUTING.md for my project. Project name: [PROJECT_NAME]. How to set up a development environment: [SETUP_STEPS]. How to run tests: [TEST_COMMANDS]. Branch and commit conventions: [BRANCH_AND_COMMIT_RULES]. Typical response time from maintainers: [RESPONSE_TIME]. Code of conduct location, if any: [CONDUCT_LINK]. Kinds of contributions we want and do not want: [WANTED_AND_UNWANTED]. Structure it with these headings: Welcome (three sentences), Ways to contribute, Before you start (search existing issues, discuss large changes first), Setting up, Making a change, Tests and style, Opening a pull request, What happens next (honest review timeline and possible outcomes including "we may decline"), and Getting help. Use short numbered steps for anything a newcomer must do in order, and keep the whole guide under 600 words. After the guide, add a table of five common contributor mistakes with the columns Mistake, How the guide prevents it. Then give a short list of things only the maintainers can answer, such as licence or contributor agreement requirements, marked [VERIFY] so I fill them in rather than you guessing. Do not invent tooling, bots, commands or policies that I did not describe. Keep the tone welcoming and plain. Licence and legal terms need a human decision, and this is drafting help, not legal advice. Add a worked example with invented details of the Making a change section for a Python library that uses pytest and a main branch.
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