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The commons proper is governed by the same membership rules as any other jakarta subproject. That means committers are elected. Unlike the sandbox, there are no automatic rights for existing Jakarta Apache committers.
On the other hand, the barrier to entry for existing Apache committers has traditionally been pretty low. If you express an interest, show willing by creating a few patches and you're known to existing committers, there's usually no problem. VOTEs proposed by commons committers for existing jakarta Apache committers listing their achievements have (in the past) been passed very quickly.
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Every commons committer has karma to every component. But a point of etiquette (enforced by the charter) is that each committer who commits to a component must add their name to the STATUS file for that component. It's also good form to post a message saying 'hi, i'd like to get involved with component foo' before you dive in. Traditionally, adding your name to the STATUS file is a committers first commit on a component.
There is one important point about the list on the STATUS file. It is used to work out whose VOTEs are binding. (Since there are a lot of commons committers, this is more useful than it might first seem.) If you're name isn't on the list, your vote won't count 
For components that use Maven as their build tool (and that is most of them now), you should add your name to the developers list in the project.xml file rather than the STATUS file if you intend to work on a component.
VOTEs and POLLS
A VOTE is an official decision thread. Anyone can express a preference (by indicating +1, +0, -0 or -1 in the traditional manner) but only some votes are binding. All are encouraged to VOTE but traditionally (to ease the work required to tally the vote) (non-binding) is added by those who know their votes are non-binding. Only votes from Jakarta PMC members are binding.
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The commons-dev mailing list is a busy place. Very much a bazaar rather than a Cathedral. This means that VOTE threads have a habit of petering out. It a good idea to post a {{\[VOTE\]\[RESULT\]}} which counts the binding VOTEs and tells people the result. The tally should separate binding from non-binding VOTES. It is also good to place a time limit on \[VOTE\] threads. Finally, VOTE threads often digress into interesting discussions not directly related to the VOTE iteslf. In these cases, it is better to start new threads with appropriate subject headers for the side discussions. This makes it easier to navigate the list archives and also keeps the VOTE thread on track (or leads to it being stopped, where appropriate). |
A POLL is an unofficial decision thread. These are useful for gauging the general feeling of the broader user community. Again, preferences should be expressed in the usual fashion. In this case, there is no need to indicate non-binding (since none are!).
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Promotion
Promotion is the process by which components move from the sandbox into the commons proper.
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- Discuss and try to formulate a consensus first. Promotion votes can (and do) get messy unless this happens. Create a discussion thread on the list and try to find out any reasons people might have for voting against. You might need to alter your charter, add missing files or resolve dependency issues. It's easy for everyone if all main issues are sorted before you propose the proper VOTE. If revisions to the proposal are required, the VOTEing can get very messy.
Wiki Markup Post a promotion email whose subject and body make it clear that this is a formal promotion VOTE. The subject should be prefixed by {{\[VOTE\]}} and should be something like {{\[VOTE\] Promote commons-foo}}. The body should be clear and fairly formal. \\- Proposal - always include a copy of the PROPOSAL that's being VOTE'd on in the VOTE email. This is important since it is clear to everyone what they are VOTEing on. It also prevents being put in the embarasing position of the PROPOSAL being VOTE'd on being modifed in CVS half way through a VOTE thread.
Wiki Markup Please give the proposal enough time to give everything the chance to VOTE. I leave promotion VOTEs several days - maybe up to a week. When VOTEs have stopped coming in then please the proposer should post a {{\[VOTE\]\[RESULT\]}} giving counts. Only the VOTEs of commons committers are binding so please make sure that these are tallied separately. The reason why a result email is good is that VOTE thread tend to peter out and so without a final email, it's hard to look back through the archives and find out what's happened. Another reason is that it's a good way to let everyone know what the result was. If there are any disagreements about the result, they can be resolved then. \\
Ettiquette - VOTEs (binding and non-binding) and POLLS
A VOTE is an official decision thread. Anyone can express a preference (by indicating +1, +0, -0 or -1 in the traditional manner) but only some votes are binding. All are encouraged to VOTE but traditionally (to ease the work required to tally the vote) (non-binding) is added by those who know their votes are non-binding.
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