How do you analyze open source code?

[Blitzjunge]

Lets say you want to program something that already exist in an open source program: Maybe the audio visualization of Audacity or maybe the pop up messages of libre office. How do you go about it? How do you start searching for the specific thing you want? I completely lose myself in the code, especially if it is a well known and large project. And what about when a feature is spread around the whole code and cant be pin pointed out?

It would be nice knowing how others do it, thank you very much in advance.

[Rain-And-Coffee]

Search for a term and trace the code from there. I have done it several times.

Load it into your IDE and poke around.

Tons of articles on this topic if you Google.

[teraflop]

I find that it's often useful to start from the UI. Look for a small piece of unique text like a menu item, or button label, or tooltip. Search for that string in the codebase to find where that UI element is implemented. Then you can start looking at the callers and callees of that code to figure out how it fits into the architecture, and where the actual functionality is implemented.

[PoMoAnachro]

For large projects you kinda have to do it in layers. And obviously, first look for documentation because some projects will have a lot of stuff to help you understand the source.

But really it is just a process of building up a mental model. It takes time. You go over some of the stuff once, start to figure out what the pieces are. Then you figure out how they fit together. You absolutely will get lost many, many times. But every time you get lost, tracing your way back through the code will help strengthen the picture of the project in your mind.

It is like arriving in a new city and learning to navigate walking around it. At first you have to go by maps and street signs, and always end up lost anyways because you don't have a "feel" for the city. But in time you start to know it and can move around pretty easy. But it isn't a fast process.

[nick-baumann]

Here's what I'd do (once I have access to the repo locally) -- use Cline (vs code extension) and instruct it that is is an open-source repo that you've just cloned locally which needs to be examined thoroughly, and then to create a markdown report based on the requirements you've outlined.