Launchpad Help > Code > Quick-start

Hosting your project's code on Launchpad

You can host your project's source code using Launchpad and Bazaar. If you're new to Bazaar, or distributed version control in general, take a look at the Bazaar mini-tutorial first.

When you push a Bazaar branch to Launchpad, it's usually associated with a project that's also registered in Launchpad. Other people can then get hold of your Bazaar branch, modify it, and push their own version back up to Launchpad for everyone to see.

This guide shows you how to:

• tell the world your project uses Launchpad to host its source code
• push your first Bazaar branch up to Launchpad

• set that branch as your project's development focus -- i.e. trunk

• hand the branch over to a team, so several people can commit code to it.

If you need more detail, see our full guide to hosting code in Launchpad.

Enable code hosting for your project

Step 1: First, add your project to Launchpad. On your project's overview page, click Change details towards the top-right of the page.

Step 2: Scroll down the Change details page and select the check-box marked Code for this project is published in Bazaar branches on Launchpad.

Step 3: Save your changes by clicking the Change button at the bottom of the page.

Your project overview page now has a message that reads Uses Launchpad for: Code.

Push a Bazaar branch to your project

Bazaar comes with a plug-in that lets you push to and pull from Launchpad directly from within Bazaar.

If you haven't already, you need to perform a couple of one-time setup tasks:

1. add your SSH key to Launchpad

2. and then log in to Launchpad from Bazaar by typing bzr launchpad-login in your terminal.

To push your branch up to Launchpad, open your terminal and go to your Bazaar branch. Next up, type:

bzr push lp:~your-id/project-id/branch-name

• ~your-id: this is your Launchpad id, which is the portion of your profile page's URL that begins with the tilde

• project-id: the id of the project in Launchpad, which you can find at the end of your project's overview page URL

• branch-name: whatever name you want to give to your branch, such as trunk, main or experimental

Replace project-name with your project's Launchpad id. The id is the final part of your project overview page's URL: e.g. bzr in https://launchpad.net/bzr

See your branch in place

Once Bazaar has pushed your branch to Launchpad, Launchpad will scan the revisions in your branch and:

• list the branch on both your own code overview page and that of the project

• enable other people to download the branch and create their own version of it
• make the full revision history available in the source-code tab.

Set your project's trunk branch

You can tell Launchpad which of your project's branches is the current focus of development; i.e. which is the trunk.

Setting a trunk branch is useful to:

• tell people which branch they should download

• define which branch Launchpad should provide when someone enters bzr branch lp:your-project

• act as the default target when someone proposes a merge

• act as the basis for stacked branches.

Visit your project's code overview page and follow the link inviting you to set a development focus.

Let several people commit to the branch

If you want to enable several people to push code to the branch, you'll need to create a team and make that the branch's owner.

On the branch's overview page, you'll see an information box on the right-hand side of the page. Click the pencil icon next to your name in the Owner section and then select the team that you want to own the branch.

Next steps

You're now hosting your project's code in Launchpad. Anyone can download your code, make their changes and upload their branch for listing on your project's code page. Other people can also propose there branches for merging into your trunk, or any other branch associated with your project.

Read our full guide to Launchpad Code Hosting >