ASF Project Roles
SpamAssassin, as an Apache top-level project, follows the Apache development model which [http://www.apache.org/foundation/how-it-works.html#roles defines the various roles] in the project:
- users: someone that uses our software
[http://www.apache.org/dev/contributors.html contributors]: anyone can provide feedback, submit bug reports, or submit patches (WeLoveVolunteers)
[http://www.apache.org/dev/committers.html committers]: a committer is simply an individual who was given write access to the codebase
[http://www.apache.org/dev/pmc.html PMC members]: the project management committee is responsible for managing a project
SpamAssassin specifics
The SpamAssassin project management committee (pmc at spamassassin.apache.org), like most other PMCs, is responsible for:
- adding new committers (and potentially removing)
- creating and destroying subprojects
- setting project direction
- handling public relations
- setting policy and procedures
In addition, there are some actions that are purely development-related, so they do not fall under the PMC mantle. Of course, people who happen to be on the PMC tend to do these, but committers could as well. Then again, a committer who was this active and responsible for the project would frequently end up being a project management committee member.
- proposing and cutting releases
- scheduling
Advancement
Developers and contributors who contribute too much good code and not enough bad code usually become committers.
Committers with a long history of significant involvement in the advancement of the project and project development (ideally in more than one way), a strong ability to work with others in the ASF way, and who are not jerkwads are generally nominated to be on the PMC. After the PMC has voted to add a new PMC member, the ASF board has to approve new PMC members.
There are no hard criteria for either of these roles: not lines of code nor number of patches. If you're interested, you can always send a message to the PMC to ask where you are on the radar.
Current roles
See the [http://cvs.apache.org/viewcvs.cgi/spamassassin/trunk/CREDITS?root=Apache-SVN&view=markup CREDITS page].
Changes to make during Advancement
(this part is still under construction)
When a contributor becomes a committer, they should check out the svn repository using the HTTPS url instead of the HTTP one, so that they have read/write access to the repo. To check out from scratch:
svn checkout https://svn.apache.org/repos/asf/spamassassin/trunk
or to switch an existing checkout to HTTPS:
cd /path/to/checkedout/tree svn switch https://svn.apache.org/repos/asf/spamassassin/trunk
Changes to the SVN tree can now be checked in directly using svn commit.
The first time a file is checked in using svn commit, the committer will be prompted for their username and password. This will then be cached for all further commits.
If you want to do a test commit, something like adding a single newline to the end of an inoffensive file in a subdirectory, or removing it again, will do the trick.
They should also ensure that their checkout has the svn:eol-style property set to native throughout, as (apparently) this policy cannot be set server-wide. Do this by editing the file ~/.subversion/config and adding these lines to the end:
enable-auto-props = yes *.pm = svn:eol-style=native *.pl = svn:eol-style=native *.PL = svn:eol-style=native *.in = svn:eol-style=native *.t = svn:eol-style=native *.c = svn:eol-style=native *.h = svn:eol-style=native *.xml = svn:eol-style=native *.html = svn:eol-style=native *.css = svn:eol-style=native *.bat = svn:eol-style=native
The PMC members should grant their Bugzilla account 'EditBugs' status. I'm not sure how this is done, but Theo knows 
Going from committer to PMC: Granted all permissions in Bugzilla. Given option for account on bugzilla server. Given option for spamassassin.org email forwarder (jm: does this still exist?). Apache email address added to pmc email list (jm: is it supposed to be the apache.org one? mine isn't).