OpenEarth developer in five easy steps

Request your username and password first

To join the OpenEarth community request a free username and password by sending an email to the OpenEarth team.

Follow this five step guideline to making your first contribution

1. Install TortoiseSVN to your computer
   • Download open source Subversion (SVN) client: TortoiseSVN (download win 32-bit version)
   • Install TortoiseSVN to your PC (you must reboot before proceeding).
2. Create local folder on your PC for (all) your repository checkouts
   • Create a sourcecode checkout directory on your PC (OpenEarthTools sourcecode requires app. 300 MB of diskspace). For instance :
     • F:\checkouts\OpenEarthTools\
   • In any file explorer (Total Commander recommended) rightclick (hold for 1 second) and select SVNCheckout
   • Enter the url of the (OpenEarth) repository you want to use. You can find the url you want by browsing the repository with a regular web-browser, and copying the url from the address bar. e.g.
     • https://repos.deltares.nl/repos/OpenEarthTools/trunk/
       • For checkout-depth choose 'fully recursive' for OpenEarthTools (not for OpenEarthRawData unless you have tens of Gb free).
       • By default only XBeach is added as external, so you can leave this box unticked.
       • Choose HEAD revision (this is the main OpenEarthTools trunk that is continously being improved, so please stay updated.)
3. Enter your subversion username and password
   • Deltares users can use their Deltares login (ask the OpenEarth or McTools developers team to be added to the user list, see above).
   • External users can mail the OpenEarth developers team with a request for external username and password, see #Request your username and password first

     If you use total commander, enable "Show overlay icons" in options to see which files were changed.

     If you get a question asking for the acceptance of SSL certificates select 'accept permanently'

     In some companies/institutes your PC may be behind a proxy server. In this case tick 'Enable Proxy Server' under Settings/Network in SubVersion and add the correct proxy Server address (ask your network administrator).

4. Perform an SVN update regularly to benefit from updates by co-developers.
   • Right-mouse click on the root directory of your check-out, and choose 'SVN Update' (Figure 1).
   • There is a separate tutorial for dealing with Subversion
5. Commit your updates to the repository regularly. Please indicate that you would like write access by sending an email to the OpenEarth team.
   • Right-mouse click on the root directory of your check-out, and choose 'SVN commit ...' (Figure 1).
   • Do not commit all your updates at once. Commit only one coherent subset at a time, and provide a concise one-line description, to make clear to co-developers what you did. You can see where commits are required where the file/dir icons display a red !-mark (as McTools directory in Figure 1), rather then a green v-mark (as OpenEarthData directory in Figure 1). Note: these handy icons only show up after enabling "Show overlay icons", see above.
   • Do not commit functions that are partly finished, only commit working stuff, because OpenEarthTools should always consists of working stuff.
   • Right-mouse click on the root directory of your check-out, and choose 'TortoiseSVN >' (Figure 1) and then choose from the sub-menu.
     
     Figure 1: After installing TortoiseSVN this menu pops up when clicking yout right-mosue button.

• For the Matlab toolbox run openearthtools/matlab/oetsettings.m every time you start Matlab. This will add relevant paths to your matlab path (excl. all hidden directores, and incl. a java path).
• For the Python toolbox run openearthtools/python/oetsettings.py (still under construction).

Other things you must know

• OpenEarth guidelines:
  • matlab coding style

    Adding/removing/deleting complete files or directories needs to be done via SVN and NOT via your file browser as TotalCommander.

    For Deltares users: as a developer do not use the read-only work-copy on p:\mctools to make changes. Only use your own local checkout, and fix all tiny bugs when you encounter them.