A crate built on top of benilla now adds its own Bevy plugins through `benilla_app::run_with(build, extend)`: `extend` gets the client fully built, after the game plugins, the asset loaders and the `ExtractSchedule` executor flip, and before the probe fleet, which sees what it adds. `run` is `run_with` with nothing added, so the stock client is unchanged. - A client started through `run_with` carries `extended` in its build id (`BuildId::summary`), so the startup banner, the crash report and the debug panel's footer all say so, and a report from an extended client reads apart from stock. The entry point sets the flag; a launcher leaves it to `..Default::default()`. - `crates/benilla-app/examples/extended_launcher.rs` is a launcher with a plugin of its own, compiled by the gates. Its header is the shape a crate of its own copies: the manifest (benilla-app without default features and `dev` forwarded, the workspace's bevy, and the root's `[patch]` and `[profile.dev]`, which cargo reads from the root manifest only), the build script's stamp, and a `Cargo.lock` started from benilla's. - `tests/launcher_shape.rs` holds that documented manifest to the root `Cargo.toml` and the `benilla` launcher's, so a patch or profile added later cannot leave the documented shape building a client that is not benilla's. - `docs/CONTRIBUTING.md`: a feature 1.12.1 does not have lives in its own crate on top of benilla, started through `run_with`. Fixes #483 🤖 Generated with [Claude Code](https://claude.com/claude-code) Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 5.5 (1M context) <noreply@anthropic.com>
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Contributing
benilla is a faithful 1.12.1 client. It is the foundation people build on, not the place to get creative: a change is accepted when it makes benilla more like 1.12.1 or fixes a bug, with evidence from the reference, in one small piece, with the gates green. Everything else is a fork, and forks are welcome.
Where to start
The issues the maintainers file are checked
against 1.12.1 first: each says what 1.12.1 does, what benilla does instead, and where in the
code, and any of them is a place to start. One labelled in progress is taken: someone is
working on it or a pull request is open for it, so pick another. Once you start one, open a draft
pull request that says Fixes #N as soon as you have a first commit, so the issue shows it is
taken.
What gets in
- A fix for a bug, with how to see it before and after.
- A step closer to 1.12.1: a missing packet, verb, window, effect or behaviour, done the way the real client does it.
- A correction where benilla and the reference disagree, with the reference fact stated.
What does not
- Features 1.12.1 does not have, and behaviour changed because it seems better. Such a feature
lives in its own crate on top of benilla, started through
benilla_app::run_withas incrates/benilla-app/examples/extended_launcher.rs. A deviation from the reference is the maintainer's call and is recorded where it lives; a pull request is not the place to propose one. - Anything from a WoW install: art, models, sounds, maps, data. The one exception is interface
code (FrameXML and GlueXML), and only through the migration recipe in
docs/METHOD.md. - Big or mixed changes. One change per pull request, small enough to read in one sitting.
How a change is judged
scripts/gates.shis green: fmt, clippy with warnings denied, the workspace tests (once with the client data, once without, so a test that reads the install has to declare it), the doc-link and render-pass lints, the player build with its own tests, and the engine boot checks. A pull request from a fork runs the ones that need neither the install nor a display in CI, on Linux; the rest run on the maintainer's machine before it lands.- The reference fact is stated: what 1.12.1 does, and where that is known from (the client's
behaviour you observed, a DBC field, a FrameXML line, a packet capture). The names and shapes
under
reference/are the surface benilla tracks. - A comment where it matters, one line, saying what the code does and the 1.12 fact behind it. No history.
- The commit message says what changed, for a player or a developer, in one line.
After you open it
A maintainer reads it, checks it against the reference, runs it and finishes it here: a rebase onto main, a fix, a test or a comment, added as commits on top of yours on your branch, so leave "Allow edits by maintainers" ticked. It lands as one squash-merged commit with you as its author. When what would land is mostly ours, we land our own version with you as a co-author and close yours with a note, and when main already has the fix, we close yours and say where. One that is out of scope is closed with the reason.
Setting up
- The toolchain. Stable Rust (
rust-toolchain.tomladds clippy and rustfmt) and a C compiler, because the client's Lua is vendored and built from source. On macOS the Xcode command line tools, which also supply libclang for the audio bindings; on Linux the ALSA and udev development packages and pkg-config.python3runs two of the gates. - A 1.12.1 install of your own.
WOW_DATA=<its Data folder>, or aWoWlink at the repo root, which only a dev build sees: the player build looks forData/orWoW/Data/beside the binary. benilla reads the install and never writes into it.WOW_DATA=(set, empty) means "no install", which is how the no-install boot is tested on a machine that has one. - Without the install, green is hollow. Well over a thousand tests read the install and skip
when it is absent, and a few dozen more read a corpus of vanilla addons
(
BENILLA_ADDON_CORPUS=<a folder of addons>, or awow-addons-vanillalink at the root), third-party content that is not in this repo.scripts/gates.shandscripts/check.shprint how many tests skipped and why. Where the data is,BENILLA_REQUIRE_DATA=1turns a skip into a failure, and the gates set it themselves when the install and the corpus both resolve. - A server to test against. Any 1.12.1 server;
WOW_HOSTnames it (defaultlocalhost:3724). A scripted run has no default account:WOW_USER,WOW_PASSandWOW_CHARname a test account on your server whose login kicks nobody, all three, either in the environment or in a.probe-identityfile at the repo root (one per line, never committed), andscripts/smoke.sh(the live login gate) refuses without them.WOW_CHARmust already be on the account, since the client creates a character only when asked:WOW_PROBE_CHARCREATE=<name> WOW_PROBE_CHARCREATE_KEEP=1, run withoutWOW_CHAR, makes it. The probes drive the body with GM commands, so give that account the top GM level. - Running it unattended. The rules are
docs/METHOD.md, "The local server"; these are the switches.WOW_UNATTENDED=1reconnects instead of waiting at a dialog, and exits non-zero on a login it cannot pass.WOW_NOSOUND=1runs silent. A capture (WOW_CAPTURE) is both, and a rig (WOW_RIG) is unattended.WOW_ALLOW_ACCOUNT=1overrides the account guard.- On vmangos,
WOW_RIG="tauren druid 60 gear:heal-preraid-bis spec:heal-preraid-bis at:ThunderBluff"finds or creates that character on the account and applies the server's premade sets (WOW_RIG="gear:?"lists them).WOW_PROBE_CHAT="<command>"sends one GM command and logs the reply asnet: server says. An account namedprobeand digits is shielded: every world entry sends.cheat god on,.dieclears it for a death test, andWOW_GOD=offleaves it off. - A trace is
WOW_MOVE_TRACE=<file>, filtered withWOW_MOVE_TRACE_TAGS("move,snd,in") and ended byWOW_PROBE_EXIT_AT=<seconds>; grep it for therlyandsndlines. - A capture runs through
scripts/visual.sh, whose recipe is the header ofcrates/benilla-app/src/capture/mod.rs. Pixel questions go throughbenilla-visual crop,seriesandhotspot.
- The loop.
cargo playbuilds and runs the play profile.scripts/check.shverifies a round of work;scripts/gates.shis the full chain, and it opens a window for the engine boot checks, so it needs a display. Work on a branch.
Reporting a bug
Open an issue: what you did, what you saw and what 1.12.1 does instead, with the benilla build
line from the start of the terminal output, your platform and the server you ran on. Questions
and ideas are welcome there or on the Discord linked from the README.
Working with an AI agent is expected. The agent reads AGENTS.md, and the same rules bind it.