Guides

Development Guide

Welcome to the Arches development guide! This document covers everything you need to know to set up your development environment and contribute to the project.

Prerequisites

• Go 1.21 or later
• Node.js 18 or later
• PostgreSQL 15 or later (for development)
• Redis (for caching and sessions)
• Docker and Docker Compose (for containerized development)

Quick Setup

1. Clone the repository:

   Code
    
   git clone https://github.com/archesai/archesai.git
   cd archesai

2. Install dependencies:

   Code
    
   make deps

3. Generate code:

   Code
    
   make generate

4. Set up the database:

   Code
    
   make db-migrate-up

5. Start development servers:

   Code
    
   make dev          # Start backend
   pnpm dev:platform # Start frontend (in another terminal)

Essential Commands

Code
 
make generate     # Run after API/SQL/x-codegen changes
make lint         # Check code quality
make dev          # Start backend server
pnpm dev:platform # Start frontend
make format       # Format code
make test         # Run tests

For a complete list of commands, see Makefile Commands.

Project Structure

For a detailed overview of the project organization, see Project Layout.

Development Workflow

1. Define First, Generate Second:
   • Add x-codegen annotations to OpenAPI schemas
   • Define database queries in SQL files
   • Run make generate to create all boilerplate code
2. Implement Business Logic: Write your custom logic in service.go files
3. Test with Generated Mocks: Use the generated mocks_test.gen.go files for testing
4. Follow the testing strategy outlined in Testing Documentation
5. Use the TUI for configuration as described in the TUI Guide

For detailed code generation instructions, see the Code Generation Guide.

Contributing

See our Contributing Guide for detailed information about:

• Code style and conventions
• Pull request process
• Issue reporting
• Development best practices

Architecture

Learn about the system design and patterns in our Architecture Documentation.

Need Help?

• Check the Troubleshooting Guide
• Open an issue on GitHub