Contribute to the HugeGraph Community

Choose How to Contribute

You can report problems through GitHub Issues, or contribute code, tests, or documentation. Before starting a substantial change, consider opening an issue that explains its scope to avoid duplicated work.

The following example uses apache/hugegraph. The same process applies to other HugeGraph repositories, but follow each repository’s README.md, AGENTS.md, and CI configuration for its build and test commands.

Prepare the Repository

Fork apache/hugegraph on GitHub, then clone your fork:

git clone https://github.com/<your-name>/hugegraph.git
cd hugegraph
git remote add upstream https://github.com/apache/hugegraph.git
git fetch upstream master

Do not develop directly on master. Use a separate branch for each change:

git switch master
git merge --ff-only upstream/master
git switch -c fix/<short-description>

Make and Verify Changes

HugeGraph Server code is under hugegraph-server/. For example, the core module is located at:

hugegraph-server/hugegraph-core/src/main/java/org/apache/hugegraph/

Run the tests directly related to your change first. Common Server test commands include:

# Core tests with the in-memory backend
mvn test -pl hugegraph-server/hugegraph-test -am -P core-test,memory

# API tests with the RocksDB backend
mvn test -pl hugegraph-server/hugegraph-test -am -P api-test,rocksdb

# Format files and verify compilation
mvn editorconfig:format
mvn clean compile -Dmaven.javadoc.skip=true

GitHub requires a username and token for Git authentication instead of a username and password. Create a personal access token at https://github.com/settings/tokens:

When adding a third-party dependency, also update the license information included in the distribution:

1. Add the dependency’s license file to hugegraph-server/hugegraph-dist/release-docs/licenses/.
2. Update hugegraph-server/hugegraph-dist/release-docs/LICENSE. If the dependency includes a NOTICE file, update NOTICE as well.
3. Run hugegraph-server/hugegraph-dist/scripts/dependency/regenerate_known_dependencies.sh to update the known-dependency list.

Submit a Pull Request

Make sure the email address used for your commits is associated with your GitHub account. See https://github.com/settings/emails for instructions:

Use the type(module): message format for commit messages, for example:

git add <changed-files>
git commit -m "fix(core): handle empty vertex query"
git push -u origin fix/<short-description>

Then open a pull request from your fork branch to apache/hugegraph:master. Explain the problem, the implementation, and the validation commands you actually ran. Include screenshots for UI changes.

Address Review Feedback

If CI fails or a reviewer requests changes, continue committing and pushing to the same branch. Rebase when you need to synchronize with upstream:

git fetch upstream master
git rebase upstream/master
git push --force-with-lease

Do not overwrite the remote branch with plain --force. After all CI and review requirements are satisfied, a project maintainer will merge the pull request.

Contributor agreements follow the official ASF process. See the Contributor Agreement.