diff --git a/.gitignore b/.gitignore
index dd66d1329f..93fe42cb52 100644
--- a/.gitignore
+++ b/.gitignore
@@ -1,20 +1,22 @@
+*#
+*.[568ao]
+*.a[568o]
+*.cgo*.c
+*.cgo*.go
+*.conf
+*.exe
+*.orig
+*.pyc
+*.rej
+*.rules
+*.so
+*~
+.*.swp
+._*
 .DS_Store
 .git
 .gitignore
-*.[568ao]
-*.a[568o]
-*.so
-*.pyc
-._*
 .nfs.*
 [568a].out
-*~
-*.orig
-*.rej
-*.exe
-.*.swp
-core
-*.cgo*.go
-*.cgo*.c
 _cgo_*
-*#
+core
diff --git a/README.md b/README.md
index 22270b889e..35578d99b9 100644
--- a/README.md
+++ b/README.md
@@ -13,6 +13,12 @@ Bedecke deinen Himmel, Zeus!  A new kid is in town.
   6. GoRest, a RESTful style web-services framework: (http://code.google.com/p/gorest/).
   7. Prometheus Client, Prometheus in Prometheus (https://github.com/matttproud/golang_instrumentation).
 
+## Getting started
+
+For basic help how to get started:
+
+  * [Getting started on Mac OSX](guides/getting-started-osx.md)
+
 
 ## Initial Hurdles
 
diff --git a/guides/getting-started-osx.md b/guides/getting-started-osx.md
new file mode 100644
index 0000000000..9ea1292449
--- /dev/null
+++ b/guides/getting-started-osx.md
@@ -0,0 +1,47 @@
+# Getting started
+
+## Installation
+
+### Go
+
+First, create a `$HOME/mygo` directory and its src subdirectory:
+
+    mkdir -p $HOME/mygo/src # create a place to put source code
+
+Next, set it as the GOPATH. You should also add the bin subdirectory to your PATH environment variable so that you can run the commands therein without specifying their full path. To do this, add the following lines to `$HOME/.profile` (or equivalent):
+
+    export GOPATH=$HOME/mygo
+    export PATH=$PATH:$HOME/mygo/bin
+
+Now you can install Go:
+
+    brew install go
+
+
+### Dependencies
+
+Install leveldb and protobuf dependencies:
+
+    brew install leveldb protobuf
+
+
+### Libraries
+
+    go get code.google.com/p/goprotobuf/{proto,protoc-gen-go}
+    go get github.com/jmhodges/levigo
+    go get code.google.com/p/gorest
+    go get github.com/matttproud/{prometheus,golang_instrumentation}
+
+
+## Build
+
+    cd ${GOPATH}/src/github.com/matttproud/prometheus
+    make build
+
+## Configure
+
+    cp prometheus.conf.example prometheus.conf
+
+## Run
+
+    ./prometheus
diff --git a/prometheus.conf.example b/prometheus.conf.example
new file mode 100644
index 0000000000..0ed17b439f
--- /dev/null
+++ b/prometheus.conf.example
@@ -0,0 +1,24 @@
+global {
+  scrape_interval = "1s"
+  evaluation_interval = "1s"
+  labels {
+    monitor = "test"
+  }
+  rule_files = [
+    "prometheus.rules"
+  ]
+}
+
+job {
+  name = "prometheus"
+  scrape_interval = "5s"
+
+  targets {
+    endpoints = [
+      "http://localhost:9090/metrics.json"
+    ]
+    labels {
+      group = "canary"
+    }
+  }
+}