arcade-mcp/CONTRIBUTING.md

Contributing to arcade-mcp

Contributions are welcome, and they are greatly appreciated! Every little bit helps, and credit will always be given.

You can contribute in many ways:

Types of Contributions

Report Bugs

Report bugs at https://github.com/ArcadeAI/arcade-mcp/issues

If you are reporting a bug, please include:

• Your operating system name and version.
• Any details about your local setup that might be helpful in troubleshooting.
• Detailed steps to reproduce the bug.

Fix Bugs

Look through the GitHub issues for bugs. Anything tagged with "bug" and "help wanted" is open to whoever wants to implement a fix for it.

Implement Features

Look through the GitHub issues for features. Anything tagged with "enhancement" and "help wanted" is open to whoever wants to implement it.

Write Documentation

Arcade could always use more documentation, whether as part of the official docs, in docstrings, or even on the web in blog posts, articles, and such.

Submit Feedback

The best way to send feedback is to file an issue at https://github.com/ArcadeAI/arcade-mcp/issues.

If you are proposing a new feature:

• Explain in detail how it would work.
• Keep the scope as narrow as possible, to make it easier to implement.
• Remember that this is a volunteer-driven project, and that contributions are welcome :)

Get Started!

Ready to contribute? Here's how to set up arcade-mcp for local development. Please note this documentation assumes you already have uv and Git installed and ready to go.

1. Fork the arcade-mcp repo on GitHub.

2. Clone your fork locally:

cd <directory_in_which_repo_should_be_created>
git clone git@github.com:YOUR_GITHUB_USERNAME/arcade-mcp.git

3. Now we need to install the environment. Navigate into the directory

cd arcade-mcp

Create your virtual environment

uv venv --python 3.11.6

4. Install the development environment and dependencies:

# Install all packages and development dependencies via uv workspace
uv sync --extra all --extra dev

# Install pre-commit hooks for code quality
uv run pre-commit install

Or use the convenient Makefile command that does both:

make install

The uv workspace will automatically handle installing all lib packages in the correct dependency order.

5. Create a branch for local development:

git checkout -b name-of-your-bugfix-or-feature

Now you can make your changes locally.

6. Don't forget to add test cases for your added functionality to the libs/tests directory.

7. When you're done making changes, check that your changes pass the formatting tests.

make check

Now, validate that all unit tests are passing:

make test

8. You can also run tests for specific components:

# Test all lib packages
make test

9. The CI/CD pipeline will run additional checks across different Python versions, so local testing with a single version is usually sufficient.

10. Commit your changes and push your branch to GitHub:

git add .
git commit -m "Your detailed description of your changes."
git push origin name-of-your-bugfix-or-feature

11. Submit a pull request through the GitHub website.

Pull Request Guidelines

When you open a pull request, the PR template will populate the description with prompts for a summary, ticket link, test plan, and a self-review checklist. Fill it in — it's the bar for moving from Draft to Ready for Review.

In short: PRs should be small and focused, tested through the end-user path (not just unit tests), and self-reviewed before you mark them Ready. The reviewer is your customer — craft the PR so they can read, understand, and approve it on the first pass.

Before you submit a pull request, check that it meets these guidelines:

1. The pull request should include tests.

2. If the pull request adds functionality, the docs should be updated.

3. If making contributions to multiple servers (i.e. Google and Slack, etc.), submit a separate pull request for each. This helps us segregate the changes during the review process making it more efficient.