Contributing

This guide is intended to give new contributors the knowledge they need to become productive and fix issues or implement new features in Scala 3. It also documents the inner workings of the Scala 3 compiler, dotc.

This is a living document

Keep in mind that the code for dotc is continually changing, so the ideas discussed in this guide may fall out of date. This is a living document, so please consider contributing to it on GitHub if you notice anything out of date, or report any issues here.

Get the most from This Guide

dotc is built with Scala 3, fully utilising its new features. It is recommended that you first have some familiarity with Scala 3 to get the most out of this guide. You can learn more in the language reference.

Many code snippets in this guide make use of shell commands (a line beginning with $), and in this case a bash compatible shell is assumed. You may have to look up how to translate commands to your shell.

What is a Compiler?

Let's start at the beginning and first look at the question of "what is a compiler?". A compiler is a program that takes as input text, representing a program in one language and produces as output the same program, written in another programming language.

The Scala Compiler

As an example, dotc takes text input, verifies that it is a valid Scala program and then produces as output the same program, but written in Java bytecode, and optionally in SJSIR when producing Scala.js output.