Hi all, I've committed a new version of the charter with "deactivation wording". Please check to see that I captured the essence of what was being discussed.
xml.apache.org is a collaborative software development project dedicated to providing robust, full-featured, commercial-quality, and freely available XML support on a wide variety of platforms. This project is managed in cooperation with various individuals worldwide (both independent and company-affiliated experts), who use the Internet to communicate, plan, and develop XML software and related documentation. This charter briefly describes the mission, history, organization, and processes of the project. MISSION ======= xml.apache.org exists to promote the use of XML. We view XML as a compelling paradigm that structures data as information, thereby facilitating the exchange, transformation, and presentation of knowledge. The ability to transform raw data into usable information has great potential to improve the functionality and use of information systems. We intend to build freely available XML processing components in order to engender such improvements. xml.apache.org defines a set of components that exchange or deal with XML information sets. These components plug into each other using standard APIs (formal, de facto, or proposed). The components must be high performance, reliable, and easy to use. The components must be part of an underlying architectural orchestration that will allow them to work together without major negotiations or breakage. We believe that the best way to define this XML information exchange architecture is by having both individuals and corporations collaborate on the best possible infrastructure, APIs, code, testing, and release cycles. Components must be vendor neutral and usable as core components for all. In order to achieve a coherent architecture between xml.apache.org components and other components and applications, standards (formal or de facto) will be used as much as possible for both protocols and APIs. Where appropriate, experiences and lessons learned will be fed back to standards bodies in an effort to assist in the development of those standards. We will also encourage the innovation of new protocols, APIs, and components in order to seed new concepts not yet defined by standards. HISTORY ======= This project was established under the direction of the newly-formed Apache Software Foundation in August 1999 to facilitate joint open-source development. THE PROJECT MANAGEMENT COMMITTEE ================================ The xml.apache.org project is managed by a small, core group of contributors known as the Project Management Committee [PMC]. The PMC must have at least one officer from the Apache Board, who will be the Chairperson and report to the Apache Board. See http://www.apache.org/foundation/bylaws.html for reference. The Chairperson will serve a term of one calendar year The PMC has the following responsibilities: 1) Accepting new subproject proposals, formally submitting these proposals for xml.apache.org committer vote, and creating the subproject (see SUBPROJECTS below). This is done in collaboration with the Incubator. 2) Facilitating code or other donations by individuals or companies, in collaboration with the Incubator. 3) Resolving license issues and other legal issues in conjunction with the ASF board 4) Ensuring that administrative and infrastructure work is completed. 5) Facilitating relationships among projects and subprojects. 6) Facilitating relationships between xml.apache.org and the external world. 7) Overseeing xml.apache.org to ensure that the mission defined in this document is being fulfilled. 8) Resolving conflicts within the project. To become a member of the PMC, an individual must be nominated by a contributor, unanimously approved by all PMC members, and approved by a two-thirds majority of xml.apache.org active committers. In most cases, developers will have actively contributed to development for at least six months before being considered for membership on the PMC. In the unlikely event that a member of the PMC becomes disruptive to the process or ceases to make codebase contributions for an extended period, said member may be removed by unanimous vote of remaining PMC members. The PMC is responsible for maintaining and updating this charter. Development must follow the process outlined below, so any change to the development process necessitates a change to the charter. Changes must be unanimously approved by all members of the PMC. A contributor may challenge a change to the charter at any time and ask for a vote of all xml.apache.org active committers, in which case a two-thirds majority must approve the change. SUBPROJECTS =========== xml.apache.org is comprised of subprojects; a subproject is responsible for component or application whose scope is well defined. Each subproject has its own set of developers, and is responsible for approving its own committers. A new subproject proposal is submitted to the PMC, and then accepted by a majority xml.apache.org active committer vote. A subproject may be removed by unanimous vote of the PMC, subject to the approval of the ASF board. A contributor may challenge the removal of a subproject at any time and ask for a vote of all active committers, in which case a two-thirds majority must approve the change. COMMITTERS ========== Each subproject has a set of committers. Committers are developers who have read/write access to the source code repository. New committers are added when a developer is nominated by a committer and approved by at least 50 percent of the committers for that subproject with no opposing votes. In most cases, new committers will already be participating in the development process by submitting suggestions and/or fixes via the bug report page or mailing lists. Committers remain active as long as they are contributing code or posting to the subproject mailing lists. If a committers has neither contributed code nor posted to the subproject mailing lists in 3 months, the PMC reps for that subproject will e-mail the committer, the subproject development list, and the PMC mailing list notifying the committer that they are going to be moved to inactive status. If there is no response in 72 hours, the committer will become inactive. CONTRIBUTORS ============ Like all Apache projects, the XML project is a meritocracy -- the more work you do, the more you are allowed to do. Occasional contributors will be able to report bugs and participate in the mailing lists. Specific changes to a product proposed for discussion or voting on the appropriate development mailing list should be presented in the form of input to the patch command. When sent to the mailing list, the message should contain a subject beginning with [PATCH] and including a distinctive one-line summary that corresponds to the action item for that patch. Large patches may be submitted as bugzilla attachments. Use the diff -u command from the original software file(s) to the modified software file(s) to create the patch. Patches should be submitted against the latest CVS versions of the software to avoid conflicts and ensure that you are not submitting a patch for a problem that has already been resolved. Developers who make regular and substantial contributions may become committers as described above. INFRASTRUCTURE ============== The xml.apache.org project site must provide the following: Bug Database -- This is a system for tracking bugs and feature requests. Subproject Source Repositories -- These are several CVS repositories containing both the source code and documentation for the subprojects. Each subproject will have a set of committers to its repository. Website -- An xml.apache.org website will contain information about the xml.apache.org project, including documentation, downloads of releases, and this charter. Each subproject will have its own website with subproject information. PMC Mailing List -- This list is for PMC business requiring confidentiality, particularly when an individual or company requests discretion. All other PMC business should be done on the general mailing list. General Mailing List -- This mailing list is open to the public. It is intended for discussions that cross subprojects. Subproject Mailing Lists -- Each subproject should have a devoted mailing list. Many subprojects may wish to have both user and development lists. The individual subprojects may decide on the exact structure of their mailing lists. LICENSING ========= All contributions to the xml.apache.org project adhere to the "ASF Source Code License." All further contributions must be made under the same terms. All contributed files must contain the full text of the ASF Source Code License. THE DEVELOPMENT PROCESS ======================= The development process is intentionally lightweight; like other Apache projects, the committers decide which changes may be committed to the repository. Three +1 ('yes' votes) with no -1 ('no' votes or vetoes) are needed to approve a code change. For efficiency, some code changes from some contributors (e.g. feature additions, bug fixes) may be approved in advance, in which case they may be committed first and changed as needed, with conflicts resolved by majority vote of the committers. SUBPROJECT REQUIREMENTS ======================= Each subproject must have a set of requirements as well as an up-to-date release plan and design document on its dedicated web page. It must be possible for each subproject to plug into the Gump nightly build system (see http://jakarta.apache.org/builds/gump). It is recommended that each subproject have a smoke-test system that works at least as a basic integration test. RELATIONSHIP TO OTHER APACHE PROJECTS ===================================== The xml.apache.org project should work closely with other Apache projects, such as Jakarta and the Apache Server, to avoid redundancy and achieve a coherent architecture among xml.apache.org and these projects.
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