StatusNet has both good writeup of legalcode descriptions of external libraries: https://gitorious.org/statusnet/mainline/blobs/master/README#line90

And also has a good policy for external libraries: https://gitorious.org/statusnet/mainline/blobs/master/extlib/README

Evan has made clear that it's cool (even a good idea) for us to just copy that extlib/README file and adapt it to mediagoblin, and that's what we should do.

We should also find a nice directory to keep these all in, and just use symlinks to move them around to appropriate places (eg, bootstrap.py from zc.buildout can be symlinked to the toplevel of the package, jquery can be symlinked to the mediagoblin static app media directory).

New users should be requested email verification.

Steps to make happen:

• user['status'] should default to 'needs_email_verification'
• After registering, a property should be set with a unique random verification key
• Link embedding verification key and username should be emailed to user
• Clicking the link should activate the user's account, setting user['status'] to active

This is kind of a hand-wavy issue in that it's hard to discern when it's "completed". I vote we can use a gut feeling to decide one way or the other.

Thus this bug is for helping to figure out what goes into the Hacking HOWTO and making sure it gets there.

For April 30th, we want a Hacking HOWTO chapter in the documentation that covers the following:

1. how to build a working development environment for GNU MediaGoblin
2. how to run GNU MediaGoblin in a development environment (the deployment howto covers how to run it in a production environment)
3. how to contribute patches
4. where to look for things to work on
5. where to look for help when you're stuck

The document is in the mediagoblin repository in docs/hackinghowto.rst .