You might also cast a gander at the patch I added to INFRA-2715.
On Mon, May 31, 2010 at 6:17 AM, Bertrand Delacretaz <bdelacre...@apache.org> wrote: > Hi everybody, > > Thanks very much for all your comments and additions - here's my final > draft for review. > I plan to post it on Thursday as I'm offline tomorrow and Wednesday. > > I haven't taken all your suggestions into account, tried to keep the > post short, and found a way to not speak about "rules" as this is > really just information at this point. > > This thread seems to contain enough material for a few other comdev > blog post, so don't by shy ;-) > > -Bertrand > > Final draft: > > DRAFT: What makes Apache projects different? > > Sharing a code repository with some other programmers might seem > enough to create an open source project, but the Apache Software > Foundation focuses on making projects sustainable in the long term, > and ensuring that our code is legally clean. > > This means that our projects have to follow a (small) number of rules, > and a number of best practices have been established over the years. > > Here's a quick description of how Apache projects are born and live on > - some of the items below are derived from the ASF's bylaws > (http://www.apache.org/foundation/bylaws.html), others are just best > practices that evolved over time. > > Projects enter the ASF via the Incubator, anyone can suggest a new > project as described on the Incubator website > (http://incubator.apache.org). > > A Project Management Committee (PMC) oversees each project on behalf > of its users, contributors, committers and the foundation itself. > > New committers and PMC members are elected by the PMC based on merit. > > Committers and PMC members are not necessarily ASF members, to be > members they have to be elected separately (see "roles" in > http://www.apache.org/foundation/how-it-works.html). > > Each project has at least one private and one public > (development,"dev") mailing list which are the only official > communication channels for the PMC members and committers. > > Discussions and decisions about people (such as the elections > mentioned above) usually happen on the project's private list, but > that's not a hard rule, each PMC can decide. > > All other decisions happen on the dev list, discussions on the private > list are kept to a minimum. > > "If it didn't happen on the dev list, it didn't happen" - which leads to: > > a) Elections of committers and PMC members are published on the dev > list once finalized. > > b) Out-of-band discussions (IRC etc.) are summarized on the dev list > as soon as they have impact on the project, code or community. > > Where possible, decisions are made by consensus. The ASF has voting > procedures that projects can use to determine whether consensus has > been reached (http://www.apache.org/foundation/voting.html). > > Releases are created according to the ASF's release rules > (http://www.apache.org/dev/release.html), and all released software > uses the Apache License (http://www.apache.org/licenses/). > > A formal PMC vote is required to publish a release. By voting to > accept the release, the PMC makes the release one of the foundation, > rather than simply one of the release manager. > > Each PMC reports to the ASF's board of directors, usually quarterly. > The PMC's report mentions progress made, and any problems encountered. > Items of particular relevance to the board include community, > releases, development work and compliance with the ASF's rules and > best practices. > > Trademarks and logos used by ASF projects belong to the ASF. > > Don't hesitate to ask on the community development mailing list > (http://community.apache.org/) if you have questions about this - and > in the meantime, have fun at the ASF, commit early and communicate > often! >
