Merge the CONTRIBUTING.md files

docs/contributing.md

@@ -1,17 +1,31 @@
 # Contributing
 
-We're excited to work on Wasmtime together with you! This guide should help you
-get up and running with Wasmtime development. But first, make sure you've read
-the [Code of Conduct](./contributing-coc.html)!
+We're excited to work on Wasmtime and/or Cranelift together with you! This guide
+should help you get up and running with Wasmtime and Cranelift development. But
+first, make sure you've read the [Code of Conduct](./contributing-coc.html)!
+
+Wasmtime and Cranelift are very ambitious projects with many goals, and while
+we're confident we can achieve some of them, we see many opportunities for
+people to get involved and help us achieve even more.
 
 ## Join Our Chat
 
-We chat about Wasmtime development on Zulip — [join
-us!](https://bytecodealliance.zulipchat.com/#narrow/stream/217126-wasmtime)
+We chat about Wasmtime and Cranelift development on Zulip — [join
+us!](https://bytecodealliance.zulipchat.com/). You can also join specific
+streams:
 
-If you're having trouble building Wasmtime, aren't sure why a test is failing,
-or have any other questions, feel free to ask here. You can also [open an
-issue](https://github.com/bytecodealliance/wasmtime/issues/new)!
+* [#wasmtime](https://bytecodealliance.zulipchat.com/#narrow/stream/217126-wasmtime)
+* [#cranelift](https://bytecodealliance.zulipchat.com/#narrow/stream/217117-cranelift)
+
+If you're having trouble building Wasmtime or Cranelift, aren't sure why a test
+is failing, or have any other questions, feel free to ask on Zulip. Not
+everything we hope to do with these projects is reflected in the code or
+documentation yet, so if you see things that seem missing or that don't make
+sense, or even that just don't work the way you expect them to, we're also
+interested to hear about that!
+
+As always, you're more than welcome to [open an
+issue](https://github.com/bytecodealliance/wasmtime/issues/new) too!
 
 ## Finding Something to Hack On
 
@@ -29,3 +43,28 @@ If you're looking for something to do, these are great places to start:
 
 If you're unsure if an issue is a good fit for you or not, feel free to ask in a
 comment on the issue, or in chat.
+
+### Mentoring
+
+We're happy to mentor people, whether you're learning Rust, learning about
+compiler backends, learning about machine code, learning about wasm, learning
+about how Cranelift does things, or all together at once.
+
+We categorize issues in the issue tracker using a tag scheme inspired by
+[Rust's issue tags]. For example, the [E-easy] marks good beginner issues,
+and [E-rust] marks issues which likely require some familiarity with Rust,
+though not necessarily Cranelift-specific or even compiler-specific
+experience. [E-compiler-easy] marks issues good for beginners who have
+some familiarity with compilers, or are interested in gaining some :-).
+
+See also the [full list of labels].
+
+Also, we encourage people to just look around and find things they're
+interested in. This a good time to get involved, as there aren't a lot of
+things set in stone yet.
+
+[Rust's issue tags]: https://github.com/rust-lang/rust/blob/master/CONTRIBUTING.md#issue-triage
+[E-easy]: https://github.com/bytecodealliance/cranelift/labels/E-easy
+[E-rust]: https://github.com/bytecodealliance/cranelift/labels/E-rust
+[E-compiler-easy]: https://github.com/bytecodealliance/cranelift/labels/E-compiler-easy
+[full list of labels]: https://github.com/bytecodealliance/cranelift/labels