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📚 the "own service" example in docs/services/index.rst cannot be registered

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@chrisjsewell is already working on this.

Since Oct 19, 2026.

  • #2329 by @chrisjsewell — open

Assessment

Difficulty
2/5
Estimated time
1-3 hours
Newbie friendliness
85/100
Issue type
Bug
Clarity
Clearly specified
Activity status
Active
Tech stack
python
Domain
documentation, testing

Research direction

Read the own-service example in docs/services/index.rst around lines 116–171, then inspect service registration and the existing service tests to see how examples are built. Update the example’s options, fields, and super().__init__(...) call, and add a test that builds it. Done when the example registers and its my_config datum is available to the need.

Written by the indexing model from the issue text.

Description

documentation pkg: sphinx-needs

What happens

The example of a service of your own in docs/services/index.rst (around lines 116-171 at master 9feaba74) does not work when copied:

  • The class declares no options, so registration refuses it: needs_services entry 'my-service' is not registered: its 'class' 'MyService' has no 'options' [needs.config].
  • Its __init__ calls super(GithubService, self) in a class that does not derive from GithubService, which would raise a NameError (or TypeError) once registered.
  • The datum key it returns (my_config) reaches the need only if it is a registered field.

What to do

Make the example runnable: declare options (and, once services declare their data fields separately, fields), call super().__init__(...), and add a test that builds it.

Dominant language
Python
Stars
309
Forks
103
Avg merge
4h 40m
Merged PRs (30d)
154

Getting set up

This project ships no dev container, Dockerfile or contributing guide, so setting up is up to you: start from its README, and see our first-contribution guide for the general steps.

First steps

  1. Read the whole issue, then the project's contributing guide.
  2. Comment on the issue to say you are picking it up — it saves two people doing the same work.
  3. Fork the repository and make your change on a branch.
  4. Open a pull request that references the issue number.

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