Merge pull request #87 from FintanH/fintan/add-setup-docs

Add Contributing Section to README

1 files changed, 56 insertions, 0 deletions

diff --git a/README.md b/README.md
index 66748dc..1fe59da 100644
--- a/README.md
+++ b/README.md
@@ -20,6 +20,62 @@ This is still quite unstable so use at your own risk. Documentation is severely
 
 You can see what's missing from the commented out tests in `dhall/src/normalize.rs` and `dhall/src/typecheck.rs`.
 
+# Contributing
+
+This section will cover how we can get started on contributing this project.
+
+## Setting up the repository
+
+To get a copy of this repository we can run:
+
+```bash
+$ git clone https://github.com/Nadrieril/dhall-rust.git
+```
+
+But we also might note that it's better practice to fork the repository to your own workspace.
+There you can make changes and submit pull requests against this repository.
+
+After the repositry has been cloned we need to update the [git submodule](https://git-scm.com/book/en/v2/Git-Tools-Submodules)
+in the project, i.e. `dhall-lang`. We can do this by running:
+
+```bash
+$ git submodule update --init --recursive
+```
+
+## Building and Testing
+
+A preferred method among the Rust community for developing is to use [`rustup`](https://rustup.rs/).
+
+It can be installed by running:
+
+```bash
+$ curl --proto '=https' --tlsv1.2 -sSf https://sh.rustup.rs | sh
+```
+
+or if [nix](https://nixos.org/) is your tool of choice:
+
+```bash
+$ nix-shell -p rustup
+```
+
+Once `rustup` is installed we can get it to manage our toolchain by running:
+
+```bash
+$ rustup toolchain install nightly
+```
+
+Then we can manage our building and testing with the [`cargo`](https://crates.io/) dependency manager:
+
+```bash
+$ cargo build
+```
+
+```bash
+$ cargo test
+```
+
+Now we can have fun and happy contributing!
+
 ## License
 
 Licensed under the terms of the 2-Clause BSD License ([LICENSE](LICENSE) or