ASF Project Roles
SpamAssassin, as an Apache top-level project, follows the Apache development model which defines the various roles in the project:
- users: someone that uses our software
- contributors: anyone can provide feedback, submit bug reports, or submit patches (WeLoveVolunteers)
- committers: a committer is simply an individual who was given write access to the codebase
- PMC members: the project management committee is responsible for managing a project
SpamAssassin specifics
The SpamAssassin project management committee 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:
- proposing and cutting releases
- scheduling
There's a private 'PMC list', called 'private at spamassassin.apache.org', but it's not to be used as a private mailing list of general discussions for PMC members only, as this is contrary to ASF policy. Instead, it's there to discuss sensitive stuff that needs to be moderately secret. Non-sensitive PMC discussions are held on the dev list. The ASF definition of what lives on the private list is: 'issues that cannot be discussed in public, such as discussion of pre-disclosure security problems, pre-agreement discussions with third parties that require confidentiality, discussion of nominees for project or Foundation membership, and personal conflicts among project personnel.'
Advancement
Developers and contributors who contribute too much good code and not enough bad code usually become committers.
Committers should probably ensure they're subscribed to the 'committers' and 'community' ASF mailing lists.
We have adopted a policy whereby virtually all active committers are on the PMC. Here's how this works:
Any committer who (a) is not already on the PMC, (b) has been a committer for at least 6 months, and (c) has made a commit in the previous 3 months, may be offered an invitation to join the PMC. After a committer becomes eligible, a notice will be sent to the private@ mailing list, and allowed the usual 24hrs lazy consensus vote. Assuming that vote passes, the offer should stress what it means to be part of the PMC and that acceptance is an indication that they want to be involved. If they accept the offer, the inviter mails the board informing them of the addition as described here, waits for the necessary 72 hours after the ACK, and assuming no board member objects, they are moved onto the PMC.
Any PMC member who has become inactive for a period of 6 months (ie. no commits or participation in the PMC/Development community) may be marked as an "emeritus" member of the PMC. At any time, an emeritus member can declare that they are active again, and the emeritus status will be revoked.
Any committers who have not been active or committed anything for a period of 6 months may be considered to have retired from active duty and moved to inactive status. We wish them well and hope to see them return someday.
Current roles
See the CREDITS page.
Changes to make during Advancement
Going from contributor to committer: See BecomingCommitter.
Going from committer to PMC: See BecomingPmc.
More Details
Be sure to read how-it-works.html – there's lots of useful stuff about ASF processes there.