Development

Contribute to the NorthBuilt RAG System - testing, code standards, and PR workflow.

Overview

This section covers development workflows, testing strategies, and contribution guidelines. Note: This system is designed for AWS-native deployment - there is no traditional “local” environment.

Documents

1. Testing Guide

Test components in AWS with unit tests and integration tests.

Unit testing with mocked AWS services
AWS integration testing
End-to-end API testing
Load testing
Terraform testing

Audience: Engineers Time: 25 minutes

2. Contributing

Branch strategy, PR process, and code standards.

Development workflow
Coding standards (Python, Terraform, JavaScript)
Testing requirements
Pull request process
Commit message conventions
Release process

Audience: All contributors Time: 20 minutes

Development Philosophy

AWS-Native Testing

This system is designed for AWS deployment only. We don’t have a “local development” environment because the system depends on AWS managed services:

Bedrock: AI inference (cannot run locally)
Bedrock Knowledge Base: RAG retrieval with S3 Vectors
Secrets Manager: API key storage
DynamoDB: Classification results

Instead, we use:

Unit tests with mocked AWS services (moto library)
Integration tests deployed Lambda functions in AWS
Test AWS account for safe experimentation

Code Quality Standards

Python: PEP 8, type hints, docstrings
Terraform: terraform fmt, modules, least-privilege IAM
JavaScript: ES6+, JSDoc comments
Testing: 80%+ coverage for critical paths
Documentation: Update docs with code changes

Quick Start

Prerequisites

# Install development tools
pip3 install pytest pytest-cov black flake8 moto
brew install terraform

Running Tests

# Unit tests
cd lambda/chat
pytest --cov=handler

# Terraform validation
cd terraform
terraform validate
terraform fmt -check -recursive

Making Changes

# 1. Create feature branch
git checkout -b feature/your-feature

# 2. Make changes and test
pytest

# 3. Commit using conventional commits
git commit -m "feat(lambda): add new integration"

# 4. Push and create PR
git push origin feature/your-feature
gh pr create