diff --git a/CODE_OF_CONDUCT.md b/CODE_OF_CONDUCT.md
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+303 See Other
+
+Location: https://www.elastic.co/community/codeofconduct
diff --git a/CONTRIBUTING.md b/CONTRIBUTING.md
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+# Contributing to the Elasticsearch Node.js client
+
+The Elasticsearch Node.js client is open source and we love to receive contributions from our community — you!
+
+There are many ways to contribute,
+from writing tutorials or blog posts,
+improving the documentation,
+submitting bug reports and feature requests or writing code.
+
+## Repository structure
+The `master` branch is considered unstable, and it's compatible with Elasticsearch master. Unless you are patching an issue, new features should always be sent to the `master` branch, in case of a bugfix, it depends if the bug affects all the release lines.
+There is a branch for every supported release line, such as `7.x` or `6.x`. We release bugfixes as soon as possible, while minor and major releases are published at the same time of the Elastic Stack.
+
+Usually for every release line there will be a *published* version and a *next* version. Eg: the `7.x` branch contains the version published on npm, and bugfixes should be sent there, while `7.2` *(assuming that 7.1.x is released)* contains the next version, and new features should be sent there.
+
+## Code contributions
+
+If you have a bugfix or new feature that you would like to contribute,
+please find or open an issue about it first.
+Talk about what you would like to do.
+It may be that somebody is already working on it,
+or that there are particular issues that you should know about before implementing the change.
+
+Note that we strictly follow the [Elastic EOL schedule](https://www.elastic.co/support/eol).
+
+### Submitting your changes
+
+Generally, we require that you test any code you are adding or modifying.
+Once your changes are ready to submit for review:
+
+1. Test your changes
+
+ Run the test suite to make sure that nothing is broken.
+ Usually run `npm test` is enough, our CI will take care of running the integration test.
+ If you want to run them on your own, you should spin up and Elasticsearch instance via the scripts that you
+ can find inside the `scripts` folder, and then run `npm run test:integration`.
+ If you want to run the integration test for the Elastic licensed APIs, you should run the `platinum` script, and
+ then run `TEST_ES_SERVER=https://elastic:changeme@localhost:9200 npm run test:integration`.
+
+2. Submit a pull request
+
+ Push your local changes to your forked copy of the repository and [submit a pull request](https://help.github.com/articles/using-pull-requests).
+ In the pull request,
+ choose a title which sums up the changes that you have made,
+ and in the body provide more details about what your changes do.
+ Also mention the number of the issue where discussion has taken place,
+ eg "Closes #123".
+
+3. Sign the Contributor License Agreement
+
+ Please make sure you have signed our [Contributor License Agreement](https://www.elastic.co/contributor-agreement/).
+ We are not asking you to assign copyright to us,
+ but to give us the right to distribute your code without restriction.
+ We ask this of all contributors in order to assure our users of the origin and continuing existence of the code.
+ You only need to sign the CLA once.
+
+4. Be patient
+
+ We might not be able to review your code as fast as we would like to,
+ but we'll do our best to dedicate it the attention it deserves.
+ Your effort is much appreciated!
+
+### Releasing
+
+If you have access to make releases, the process is as follows:
+
+1. Update the version in `package.json` according to the scale of the change. (major, minor or patch)
+1. Commit changes with message `Bumped vx.y.z` where `x.y.z` is the version in `package.json`
+1. Create a release via the GitHub UI.
+1. Wait for CI to finish running the test.
+1. Publish to npm with `npm publish` *(see [publish](https://docs.npmjs.com/cli/publish) and [dist-tag](https://docs.npmjs.com/cli/dist-tag) docs)*