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+# Contributing
+
+Thanks for considering making an addition to this project! These contributing guidelines should help make your life easier. 
+
+Before starting, some things to consider:
+* For larger features, it would be helpful to get in touch first (through issue/email)
+* A lot of the logic is in `docdeid`, please consider making a PR there for things that are not specific to `deduce`.
+* `deduce` is a rule-based de-identifier
+* In case you would like to see any rules added/removed/changed, a decent substantiation (with examples) of the potential improvement is useful
+
+## Setting up the environment
+
+* This project uses poetry for package management. Install it with ```pip install poetry```
+* Set up the environment is easy, just use ```poetry install```
+* The makefile contains some useful commands when developing:
+  * `make format` formats the package code
+  * `make lint` runs the linters (check the output)
+  * `make clean` removes build/test artifacts, etc
+* And for docs:
+  * `make build-docs` builds the docs
+
+## Runing the tests
+
+```bash
+pytest .
+```
+
+## PR checlist
+
+* Verify that tests are passing
+* Verify that tests are updated/added according to changes
+* Run the formatters (`make format`)
+* Run the linters (`make lint`)
+* Add a section to the changelog
+* Add a description to your PR
+
+If all the steps above are followed, this ensures a quick review and release of your contribution. 
+
+## Releasing
+* Readthedocs has a webhook connected to pushes on the main branch. It will trigger and update automatically. 
+* Create a [release on github](https://github.com/vmenger/docdeid/releases/new), create a tag with the right version, manually copy and paste from the changelog
+* Build pipeline and release to PyPi trigger automatically on release
+
+Any other questions/issues not covered here? Please just get in touch!
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