Re: Outreachy internship

[zimoun <zimon.toutoune@gmail.com>]

Hi!

Welcome!
And thank you for your interest in Guix.

Are you currently running Guix?

If no, the easiest is to start with the package manager [1] using the
shell script installer (first Red note in [1] :-)).  The package manager
works on any GNU/linux distribution and is not in conflict with the
distro package manager.  Do not hesitate to ask on help-guix@gnu.org or
#guix if you hit any problem, the Guix folks are prompt for
answering. :-) Once you can run "guix <command>" [2], you can read how
to define a package [3].  BTW, give a look to the Perfect Setup [4] and
here [5] my config files if you need inspiration. ;-)

Well, if you have already used –– or currently using –– you can try
"guix import" or "guix refresh"; i.e., write your first package
contribution.  Therefore, you need to read [6].  Again, do not hesitate
to ask on help-guix@gnu.org or #guix if you hit any problem.

To be concrete, I suggest reading [3, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12] and try to
package something.  Easy and good candidates for first packages are CRAN
or BioConductor packages:

   guix import cran <pkg>
   guix import cran -a bioconductor <pkg>

You can pick unpackaged one from the list [12].  Do not hesitate to ask
if you do not find an obvious one –– it should a good occasion to show
you “guix repl”. :-)


[1] http://guix.gnu.org/manual/devel/en/html_node/Binary-Installation.html#Binary-Installation
[2] http://guix.gnu.org/manual/devel/en/html_node/Getting-Started.html#Getting-Started
[3] http://guix.gnu.org/cookbook/en/html_node/Packaging-Tutorial.html#Packaging-Tutorial
[4] http://guix.gnu.org/manual/devel/en/html_node/The-Perfect-Setup.html#The-Perfect-Setup
[5] https://github.com/zimoun/my-conf
[6] http://guix.gnu.org/manual/devel/en/html_node/Contributing.html

7 : https://guix.gnu.org/manual/devel/en/guix.html#Defining-Packages
8 : https://guix.gnu.org/manual/devel/en/guix.html#Packaging-Guidelines
9 : https://guix.gnu.org/manual/devel/en/guix.html#Invoking-guix-import
10: https://guix.gnu.org/manual/devel/en/guix.html#Invoking-guix-refresh
11: https://guix.gnu.org/manual/devel/en/guix.html#Building-from-Git
12: https://bioconductor.org/packages/release/bioc/


There are two other different possible next steps then packaging,
depending on your interest.  In random order:

 + See if you want to contribute to the translation effort.  If you
are native of one of these languages:

    <https://translationproject.org/domain/guix.html>

help is welcome!  For example, my first contribution to Guix was to read
cover-to-cover the Guix manual and proofread the French translation.
Doing so is an unusual way to be familiar with the Guix ecosystem but
really interesting.  Note that it would be part of this effort:

    <https://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/guix-devel/2020-10/msg00091.html>

 + Tweak the source of Guix.

  git clone https://git.savannah.gnu.org/git/guix.git
  cd guix
  guix environment guix --pure
  ./bootstrap
  ./configure --localstatedir=/var/
   make -j 8 # adapt
   make check
   ./pre-inst-env guix help # the fresh compiled 'guix' ;-)

You could be interested by
<https://guix.gnu.org/manual/devel/en/guix.html#Contributing>.

Well, then you can try to fix a bug <http://issues.guix.gnu.org> and I
recommend one with the tag easy:

    <http://issues.guix.gnu.org/search?query=is%3Aopen+tag%3Aeasy>


And in any case, feel free to ask _any_ question on help-guix@gnu.org or
IRC #guix.


Keep in touch.
Cheers,
simon