Development and Maintenance

Relevant source files

• .github/workflows/ci.yml

This document covers the development infrastructure, build processes, and maintenance procedures for the flatten_objects crate. It provides guidance for contributors working on the codebase and maintainers responsible for releases and quality assurance.

For detailed API usage information, see Overview. For implementation specifics, see Implementation Details.

Development Workflow Overview

The flatten_objects crate follows a standard Rust development workflow with automated CI/CD pipelines and multi-target support for embedded and kernel environments.

Development Workflow

flowchart TD
Dev["Developer"]
LocalDev["Local Development"]
Format["cargo fmt"]
Clippy["cargo clippy"]
Build["cargo build"]
Test["cargo test"]
Push["git push"]
CI["GitHub Actions CI"]
FormatCheck["Format Check"]
ClippyCheck["Clippy Analysis"]
MultiTarget["Multi-Target Build"]
UnitTest["Unit Tests"]
DocBuild["Documentation Build"]
Linux["x86_64-unknown-linux-gnu"]
BareMetal["x86_64-unknown-none"]
RISCV["riscv64gc-unknown-none-elf"]
ARM["aarch64-unknown-none-softfloat"]
DocDeploy["GitHub Pages"]
Success["✓ All Checks Pass"]
Merge["Ready for Merge"]

CI --> ClippyCheck
CI --> DocBuild
CI --> FormatCheck
CI --> MultiTarget
CI --> UnitTest
Dev --> LocalDev
DocBuild --> DocDeploy
LocalDev --> Build
LocalDev --> Clippy
LocalDev --> Format
LocalDev --> Push
LocalDev --> Test
MultiTarget --> ARM
MultiTarget --> BareMetal
MultiTarget --> Linux
MultiTarget --> RISCV
Push --> CI
Success --> Merge
UnitTest --> Success

Sources: .github/workflows/ci.yml(L1 - L56) 

Continuous Integration Pipeline

The CI system runs on every push and pull request, performing comprehensive validation across multiple target platforms.

CI Job Configuration

CI Pipeline Stages

flowchart TD
subgraph Documentation["Documentation"]
    DocGen["cargo doc"]
    PagesDeploy["GitHub Pages Deploy"]
end
subgraph Testing["Testing"]
    UnitTests["cargo test"]
    LinuxOnly["Linux target only"]
end
subgraph subGraph1["Quality Assurance"]
    FmtCheck["cargo fmt --check"]
    ClippyRun["cargo clippy"]
    BuildStep["cargo build"]
end
subgraph subGraph0["Setup Phase"]
    Checkout["actions/checkout@v4"]
    Toolchain["dtolnay/rust-toolchain@nightly"]
    Version["rustc --version"]
end

BuildStep --> DocGen
BuildStep --> UnitTests
Checkout --> Toolchain
ClippyRun --> BuildStep
DocGen --> PagesDeploy
FmtCheck --> ClippyRun
Toolchain --> Version
UnitTests --> LinuxOnly
Version --> FmtCheck

Sources: .github/workflows/ci.yml(L5 - L31) 

Multi-Target Build Support

The crate supports multiple target architectures to accommodate different embedded and kernel environments.

Supported Target Platforms

Build Matrix Execution

flowchart TD
subgraph subGraph2["Target-Specific Logic"]
    LinuxTest["Unit tests: Linux only"]
    BareMetalBuild["Bare metal: Build only"]
end
subgraph subGraph1["Per-Target Operations"]
    ClippyTarget["cargo clippy --target TARGET"]
    BuildTarget["cargo build --target TARGET"]
    TestTarget["cargo test --target TARGET"]
end
subgraph subGraph0["Matrix Strategy"]
    Toolchain["nightly toolchain"]
    Targets["4 target platforms"]
end

BuildTarget --> TestTarget
ClippyTarget --> BuildTarget
Targets --> ClippyTarget
TestTarget --> BareMetalBuild
TestTarget --> LinuxTest
Toolchain --> ClippyTarget

Sources: .github/workflows/ci.yml(L8 - L30) 

Code Quality Assurance

The CI pipeline enforces code quality through multiple automated checks.

Quality Check Commands

Clippy Configuration

The CI pipeline includes specific clippy configuration to suppress certain warnings:

• Suppressed: clippy::new_without_default - Allows new() methods without Default trait
• Features: --all-features - Enables all crate features during analysis

Sources: .github/workflows/ci.yml(L22 - L30) 

Documentation System

The crate maintains automatically generated and deployed documentation.

Documentation Pipeline

flowchart TD
subgraph Configuration["Configuration"]
    RustDocFlags["RUSTDOCFLAGS environment"]
    BrokenLinks["-D rustdoc::broken_intra_doc_links"]
    MissingDocs["-D missing-docs"]
end
subgraph subGraph1["Deployment Logic"]
    BranchCheck["Check if default branch"]
    Deploy["JamesIves/github-pages-deploy-action@v4"]
    PagesUpdate["Update gh-pages branch"]
end
subgraph subGraph0["Documentation Generation"]
    DocBuild["cargo doc --no-deps"]
    IndexGen["Generate index.html redirect"]
    TreeParse["cargo tree | head -1"]
end

BranchCheck --> Deploy
BrokenLinks --> DocBuild
Deploy --> PagesUpdate
DocBuild --> IndexGen
IndexGen --> BranchCheck
MissingDocs --> DocBuild
RustDocFlags --> BrokenLinks
RustDocFlags --> MissingDocs
TreeParse --> IndexGen

Documentation Configuration

Sources: .github/workflows/ci.yml(L32 - L56) 

Development Environment Requirements

Required Rust Components

Target Installation

To set up a complete development environment:

# Install nightly toolchain with required components
rustup toolchain install nightly --component rust-src clippy rustfmt

# Add target platforms
rustup target add x86_64-unknown-none
rustup target add riscv64gc-unknown-none-elf  
rustup target add aarch64-unknown-none-softfloat

Local Development Commands

Sources: .github/workflows/ci.yml(L15 - L19)