Add a document with contribution guidelines

This gives us a place to point new contributors, as well as to document
our project practices.

Author: kamalmarhubi

CONTRIBUTING.md

@@ -0,0 +1,97 @@
+# Contributing to nix
+
+We're really glad you're interested in contributing to nix! This
+document has a few pointers and guidelines to help get you started.
+
+To have a welcoming and inclusive project, nix uses the Rust project's
+[Code of Conduct][conduct]. All contributors are expected to follow it.
+
+[conduct]: https://www.rust-lang.org/conduct.html
+
+
+# Issues
+
+We use GitHub's [issue tracker][issues].
+
+[issues]: https://github.com/nix-rust/nix/issues
+
+
+## Bug reports
+
+Before submitting a new bug report, please [search existing
+issues][issue-search] to see if there's something related. If not, just
+[open a new issue][new-issue]!
+
+As a reminder, the more information you can give in your issue, the
+easier it is to figure out how to fix it. For nix, this will likely
+include the OS and version, and the architecture.
+
+[issue-search]: https://github.com/nix-rust/nix/search?utf8=%E2%9C%93&q=is%3Aissue&type=Issues
+[new-issue]: https://github.com/nix-rust/nix/issues/new
+
+
+## Feature / API requests
+
+If you'd like a new API or feature added, please [open a new
+issue][new-issue] requesting it. As with reporting a bug, the more
+information you can provide, the better.
+
+
+## Labels
+
+We use labels to help manage issues. The structure is modeled after
+[Rust's issue labeling scheme][rust-labels]:
+- **A-**prefixed labels state which area of the project the issue
+  relates to
+- **O-**prefixed labels specify the OS for issues that are OS-specific
+
+[rust-labels]: https://github.com/rust-lang/rust/blob/master/CONTRIBUTING.md#issue-triage
+
+
+# Pull requests
+
+GitHub pull requests are the primary mechanism we use to change nix. GitHub itself has
+some [great documentation][pr-docs] on using the Pull Request feature. We use the 'fork and
+pull' model described there.
+
+Please make pull requests against the `master` branch.
+
+[pr-docs]: https://help.github.com/articles/using-pull-requests/
+
+
+## Testing
+
+nix has a test suite that you can run with `cargo test`. Ideally, we'd like pull
+requests to include tests where they make sense. For example, when fixing a bug,
+add a test that would have failed without the fix.
+
+After you've made your change, make sure the tests pass in your development
+environment. We also have [continuous integration set up on
+Travis-CI][travis-ci], which might find some issues on other platforms. The CI
+will run once you open a pull request.
+
+[travis-ci]: https://travis-ci.org/nix-rust/nix
+
+
+## Homu, the bot who merges all the PRs
+
+All pull requests are merged via [homu], an integration bot. After the
+pull request has been reviewed, the reviewer will leave a comment like
+
+> @homu r+
+
+to let @homu know that it was approved. Then @homu will check that it passes
+tests when merged with the latest changes in the `master` branch, and merge if
+the tests succeed. You can check out the [nix queue on homu][queue] to see the
+status of PRs and their tests.
+
+[homu]: http://homu.io/
+[queue]: http://homu.io/q/nix-rust/nix
+
+
+## API conventions
+
+If you're adding a new API, we have a [document with
+conventions][conventions] to use throughout the nix project.
+
+[conventions]: https://github.com/nix-rust/nix/blob/master/CONVENTIONS.md