deen's tweaks in CONTRIBUTING.md

Co-authored-by: Dennis Felsing <dennis@felsing.org>

CONTRIBUTING.md

@@ -1,23 +1,23 @@
-# Contributing code to ddnet
+# Contributing code to DDNet
 
 ## General
 
-Please open issues first discussing the idea before starting to write code.
-It would be unfortunate if you spend time working on a contribution that does not align with the ideals of the ddnet project.
+Please open an issue first discussing the idea before starting to write code.
+It would be unfortunate if you spend time working on a contribution that does not align with the ideals of the DDNet project.
 
-A non exhaustive list of things that usually get rejected would be:
-- Extending the dummy with new gameplay affecting features.
+A non-exhaustive list of things that usually get rejected:
+- Extending dummy with new gameplay-affecting features.
   https://github.com/ddnet/ddnet/pull/8275
   https://github.com/ddnet/ddnet/pull/5443#issuecomment-1158437505
 - Breaking backwards compatibility in the network protocol or file formats such as skins and demos.
-- Breaking backwards compatibility in gameplay.
+- Breaking backwards compatibility in gameplay:
     + Existing ranks should not be made impossible.
     + Existing maps should not break.
     + New gameplay should not make runs easier on already completed maps.
 
 ## Code style
 
-There are a few style rules. Some of them are enforced by the github actions CI and some of them are manually checked by reviewers.
+There are a few style rules. Some of them are enforced by CI and some of them are manually checked by reviewers.
 If your github pipeline shows some errors please have a look at the logs and try to fix them.
 
 Such fix commits should ideally be squashed into one big commit using ``git commit --amend`` or ``git rebase -i``.
@@ -74,7 +74,7 @@ More examples can be found [here](https://github.com/ddnet/ddnet/pull/8288#issue
 
 ### Teeworlds interpretation of the hungarian notation
 
-DDNet inherited the hungarian notation like prefixes from [teeworlds](https://www.teeworlds.com/?page=docs&wiki=nomenclature)
+DDNet inherited the hungarian notation like prefixes from [Teeworlds](https://www.teeworlds.com/?page=docs&wiki=nomenclature)
 
 `m_`
 
@@ -125,9 +125,9 @@ class CFoo
 };
 ```
 
-### The usage of `goto` is strictly forbidden
+### The usage of `goto` is not encouraged
 
-Do not use the `goto` keyword.
+Do not use the `goto` keyword in new code, there are better control flow constructs in C++.
 
 ### Assignments in if statements should be avoided
 
@@ -151,7 +151,7 @@ Unless the alternative code is more complex and harder to read.
 
 ### Methods with default arguments should be avoided
 
-Default arguments tend to break soon, if you have multiple you have to specify each even if you only want to change the last one.
+Default arguments tend to break quickly, if you have multiple you have to specify each even if you only want to change the last one.
 
 ### Method overloading should be avoided
 
@@ -198,7 +198,8 @@ class CFoo
 ### Modern C++ should be used instead of old C styled code
 
 DDNet balances in being portable (easy to compile on all common distributions) and using modern features.
-So you are encouraged to use all modern C++ features as long as their age is older than the newest supported C++ version of ddnet.
+So you are encouraged to use all modern C++ features as long as they are supported by the C++ version we use.
+Still be aware that in game loop code you should avoid allocations, so static buffers on the stack can be preferable.
 
 Examples:
 - Use `nullptr` instead of `0` or `NULL`.
@@ -228,4 +229,4 @@ src/game/foo_bar.cpp
 
 ## Commit messages
 
-There are no strict rules for commit messages. But it would be nicer to say "Add new feature xyz" instead of "added new feature xyz".
+Describe the change your contribution is making for the player/user instead of talking about what you did in a technical sense. Your PR messages will ideally be in a format that can directly be used in the [change log](https://ddnet.org/downloads/).