---
layout: page
title: Contributing
permalink: /development/
categories: [ _nav, _9 ]
---

h3. Development sources

To get started with Irssi development, first check out the git repository:

bc. git clone https://github.com/irssi/irssi
  
After check-out, you *must* run @./autogen.sh@. It may be necessary to install additional packages. More information can be found on "(rel-external)the wiki.":https://github.com/shabble/irssi-docs/wiki/Irssi-0.8.17#compiling-from-git

*Note*, the @INSTALL@ document is **not** valid for Git clones, only for release tarballs (even though it is also included in the Git checkout)

h2. Helping Development

Hey you! Irssi is desperately looking for developers. No groundbreaking development has occured since ten years. Apart from fixing "(rel-external)bugs"://github.com/irssi/irssi/issues and reviewing "(rel-external)patches"://github/com/irssi/irssi/pulls, there are also many huge issues which noone is tackling at the moment. Some of those are:

* Rewrite the fe-text front-end to include vertical splits, flexible and multi-line status bars, vertical bars, zoom, layout pre-sets, dynamic themes, message tags, time-stamped messages, etc.
* Rewrite the core to optionally work in a distributed manner (where you can run the server connections on one server and connect to it with multiple fe-text front-ends)
* Revamp the API to better integrate multiple scripting languages (like Javascript, Lua) and require less (Perl-specific) glue code
* Fix and improve network Proxy support (SSL-enabled proxies, SSL connections over proxies, native SOCKS proxies in Irssi, better TOR support, per network proxies) ("#148"://github.com/irssi/irssi/pull/148)
* Extend the IRC code to work better with any IRCv3 features, finish integration of SASL ("(rel-external)#222"://github.com/irssi/irssi/pull/222)
* XMPP improvements
* Website improvements

Also review the "(rel-external)Unofficial Roadmap"://github.com/shabble/irssi-docs/wiki/Roadmap for a further source of TODOs.

h3. Scripts

Perl scripts can be submitted to the "(rel-external)Irssi Script Repository":http://scripts.irssi.org/ by following the instructions and sending a Pull Request on Github. Next to the perl and signals "documentation":/documentation/, the "(rel-external)Unofficial Irssi Scripting Documentation Wiki"://github.com/shabble/irssi-docs/wiki may have additional helpful resources about writing scripts.

h3. Themes

Most of the existing documentation regarding themes can be found in the @default.theme@ file created by Irssi when you @/save@, or @/save -formats@. Much of themeing is artistic skills combined with trial and error. Nice themes can be submitted to the "(rel-external)Irssi Themes Collection"://irssi-import.github.io/themes/ through a Github Pull Request.

