Issue #526: Adding a development environment

[arejula27]

Description

This pull request introduces an automated, isolated development environment for the Qbeast Spark project as the #526 issue explains.

Type of change

This update is non-intrusive and does not modify any existing code or configurations. It simply provides an optional way to set up the development environment using nix-shell. Developers can continue using their existing setup if preferred while benefiting from this new option if desired.

Checklist:

Here is the list of things you should do before submitting this pull request:

• New feature/bug fix has been committed following the Contribution guide.
• Add logging to the code following the Contribution guide.
• Add comments to the code (make it easier for the community!).
• Change the documentation.
• Add tests.
• Your branch is updated to the main branch (dependent changes have been merged).

How Has This Been Tested? (Optional)

This development environment has been tested on Windows (WSL2) and Linux systems. It has been verified to work with the project's build and test commands. Because I don't have access to a MacOS machine, I could not test it on MacOS. However, the nix-shell file should work on macOS as well, given that Nix is supported on macOS. However, I would appreciate it if someone could test it on macOS to confirm this. If it doesn't work on MacOS this PR would not make any sense so I would try to fix it and in case it's not possible the PR should be closed.
Please describe the tests that you ran to verify your changes.

Additional verification by current maintainers/contributors would be appreciated. For checking the new development environment, you can do the following steps(also updated in the CONTRIBUTING.md file):

1. Install Nix package manager (if not already installed):
2. In the project directory, run nix-shell to enter the development environment.
3. Run the project's build and test commands to ensure they work as expected.

[osopardo1]

hello @arejula27 and thank you for the proposal! Before stepping into review.. could you please create a ticket for it in the issues tab and reference the issue number in the title of the PR?

When developing on Qbeast Spark, we should follow the next steps:

• Open an issue about the problem you have experienced when building the environment.
• The number of the issue would appear once is created.
• Open a PR with the issue number in the title. (Like Feat #<issue_number>: Adding.-...)
• Select one or two reviewers among the maintainers.

Read more about the development process on our docs for Contributing.

Aside from that, we have a Slack Channel to open direct conversations with anyone from the community: https://join.slack.com/t/qbeast-users/shared_invite/zt-1rzf4ss8g-l1cKrqDkofOSuNOOWpCFDw
It would be a pleasure to have you there so we can talk more about how you find Qbeast and your current usage of the library!

thanks 😄

[arejula27]

Hi, for sure, I will copy the explanation on the ticket