guides/developer/Developer-guide.md

+Version 0.4
+-----------
+
+Welcome to the Developer’s guide.
+
+This document will guide you through the stages of Module and Report
+development and teach you how to develop your own Modules and Reports in
+just a few minutes.
+
+[Coding guidelines](http://arachni.github.com/arachni/file.HACKING.html)
+------------------------------------------------------------------------
+
+This should be your first stop for module development, it will give you
+the skinny on hacking around with the framework.
+If that’s not enough to get you started there’s no need to worry, the
+next chapters will explain the process in detail.
+
+Component development
+---------------------
+
+Every modular aspect of Arachni is abstracted in the form of
+*components* .
+As long as components lie within their root directories (*/modules* for
+modules, */reports* for reports and */plugins* for plugins)\
+there is no limitation as to how they can be grouped together.
+
+Arachni scans these directories recursively and loads all Ruby (\*.rb)
+files as components.
+However, since there will often be a need to include helper Ruby files
+(like classes, modules, etc) components are allowed to include such files under
+a directory with the same name as the component that utilizes them.
+
+For example, the *Proxy* plugin which has a filename of *proxy.rb* holds its
+helper classes in the *proxy/* directory.
+
+Ruby files identified as helpers will not be loaded by the framework.
+
+The easiest way to start developing your own component is to pick an
+existing one which is closer to your needs and modify it to fit your
+requirements.
+
+### Modules
+
+Modules are the most important type of component in the framework.<br/>
+They assess and log vulnerabilities or other entities of interest during
+the scanning process.
+
+### Reports
+
+Reports are used to export the results of the audit in a desired format or fashion.
+
+Report components are currently used to generate files (html, txt, xml,etc) however
+there are no restrictions as to their exact behavior; meaning that anyone can
+develop a report component that saves the scan results to a database, transmits
+them over the wire, etc.
+
+### Plugins
+
+Unlike the two previous types of components plug-ins are demi-gods.<br/>
+Each plug-in is passed the instance of the running framework to do with
+it what it pleases.
+
+Via the framework they have access to all Arachni subsystems and can
+alter or extend Arachni’s behavior on the fly.
+Plug-ins run in parallel to the framework and are executed right before
+the scan process starts.
+
+[Core API](http://arachni.github.com/arachni/_index.html)
+---------------------------------------------------------
+
+Automatically generated documentation.
+
+[[Scripted scans | Scripted-scans ]]
+------------------------------------
+
+A series of articles demonstrating how to use the Arachni core API to
+perform scripted or highly-customizable scans/audits.
+
+[[RPC API | RPC API]]
+---------------------
+
+Detailed documentation on using the RPC API to interact with the Arachni
+servers (Dispatcher/Instance) or write your own client.