Updating docs for adding packages using poetry (#481)

* updating docs around adding dependencies

* updating the description

* Updating poetry docs & adding poetry extension to devcontainer

* poetry docs

* Moving it back to Contributing.md

* code review suggestion

---------

Co-authored-by: Ross Smith <[email protected]>

.devcontainer/devcontainer.json

@@ -27,7 +27,8 @@
  "ms-python.black-formatter",
  "ms-python.vscode-pylance",
  "ms-vscode.vscode-node-azure-pack",
- "TeamsDevApp.ms-teams-vscode-extension"
+ "TeamsDevApp.ms-teams-vscode-extension",
+ "zeshuaro.vscode-python-poetry"
  ],
  "settings": {
  "azureFunctions.projectSubpath": "code/backend/batch",

CONTRIBUTING.md

@@ -32,6 +32,43 @@ a proposal for your work first, to be sure that we can use it.
 
 * **Small Features** can be crafted and directly [submitted as a Pull Request](#submit-pr).
 
+## Managing Dependencies Using Poetry
+
+Poetry is a package manager for Python that allows developers to manage dependencies, create virtual environments, and package their projects for distribution, all using a single command-line tool.
+
+Poetry is setup for you in the devcontainer, but should you need to set this up manually you can 
+```sh
+sh ./.devcontainer/postCreate.sh
+```
+
+The following manual steps can also be followed to setup poetry:
+- Poetry can be installed using `pip install poetry`. 
+- Using `poetry init` poetry creates a `pyproject.toml` file with all the main dependencies required to run the application. 
+- Executing `poetry install` from the root folder which has the `pyproject.toml` file, installs all the dependencies and creates a virtual environment which is used to run the application. `poetry install` also generates a `poetry.lock` file which locks the dependency versions so that any user who installs the application get the same package version.
+- Executing `pip install .` from the root folder only installs the main dependencies.
+- Dependencies for different environments (dev, test etc.) can be managed by creating groups in the `pyproject.toml` file.
+- Installing dependencies for different groups can be done using `poetry install --with <group_name>`
+
+* Adding new package to [pyproject.toml](#pyproject.toml) :
+
+ To add a new package execute the below command:
+ ```shell
+ poetry add <package-name>
+ ``` 
+ To add a package to specific group:
+ ``` shell
+ poetry add <package-name> --group <group-name>
+ ```
+
+ `poetry add <package-name>` updates the `poetry.lock` file.
+
+ **Note**: In case the pyproject.toml file is manually updated, the following command should be executed to update the `poetry.lock` file.
+
+ ``` shell 
+ poetry lock --no-update
+ ``` 
+ `--no-update` Locks the packages without updating the locked versions.
+
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