This document is an annotated review of the Geode Maturity Level Assessment following the Apache Project Maturity Model [a]. It provides supporting details meant to inform the community, Incubator PMC, and ASF Board of DIrectors as to the state of the Geode podling’s readiness for graduation.
| Description | Status | |
|---|---|---|
Code | ||
| CD10 | The project produces Open Source software, for distribution to the public at no charge. 1 | YES. The project source is licensed under the Apache License, version 2.0. |
CD20 | The project's code is easily discoverable and publicly accessible. | YES. The project source is available on [b]. In addition, the project homepage [c] provides a link to the GitHub mirror [d]. |
| CD30 | The code can be built in a reproducible way using widely available standard tools. | YES. The project provides build instructions [e] for running gradle scripts. |
| CD40 | The full history of the project's code is available via a source code control system, in a way that allows any released version to be recreated. | YES. The project uses a git repository [f] and releases are tagged (e.g. [g]). |
| CD50 | The provenance of each line of code is established via the source code control system, in a reliable way based on strong authentication of the committer. When third-party contributions are committed, commit messages provide reliable information about the code provenance. 2 | YES. See CD40. Also, the project defines a process for handling code contributions [h]. |
Licenses and Copyright | ||
| LC10 | The code is released under the Apache License, version 2.0. | YES. The LICENSE files for source [i] and binary convenience [j] distributions have been reviewed and accepted in release votes. |
| LC20 | Libraries that are mandatory dependencies of the project's code do not create more restrictions than the Apache License does. 3 4 | YES. The list of dependencies have been reviewed and solely include licenses from Category A or Category B [k]. |
| LC30 | The libraries mentioned in LC20 are available as Open Source software. | YES. See LC20. |
| LC40 | Committers are bound by an Individual Contributor Agreement (the "Apache iCLA") that defines which code they are allowed to commit and how they need to identify code that is not their own. | YES. All committers have filed ICLA’s. |
| LC50 | The copyright ownership of everything that the project produces is clearly defined and documented. 5 | YES. All code donations have an SGA on file. |
Releases | ||
| RE10 | Releases consist of source code, distributed using standard and open archive formats that are expected to stay readable in the long term. 6 | YES. The project community verified this during release votes. |
| RE20 | Releases are approved by the project's PMC (see CS10), in order to make them an act of the Foundation. | YES. The Incubator PMC has voted and approved releases. |
| RE30 | Releases are signed and/or distributed along with digests that can be reliably used to validate the downloaded archives. | YES. The project community verified this during release votes. |
| RE40 | Convenience binaries can be distributed alongside source code but they are not Apache Releases -- they are just a convenience provided with no guarantee. | YES. See [l] for a release that contains binary convenience artifacts. |
| RE50 | The release process is documented and repeatable to the extent that someone new to the project is able to independently generate the complete set of artifacts required for a release. | YES. The release process has been documented at [u] and a different release manager has followed the process for each of the project's releases. |
Quality | ||
| QU10 | The project is open and honest about the quality of its code. Various levels of quality and maturity for various modules are natural and acceptable as long as they are clearly communicated. | YES. The project records all bugs using JIRA [m]. |
| QU20 | The project puts a very high priority on producing secure software. 7 | YES. The project has devoted considerable effort to securing communication channels as well as improving the authentication and authorization features. |
| QU30 | The project provides a well-documented channel to report security issues, along with a documented way of responding to them. 8 | YES. The project website [c] provides a link to ASF security information [n]. |
| QU40 | The project puts a high priority on backwards compatibility and aims to document any incompatible changes and provide tools and documentation to help users transition to new features. | YES. The project defines a policy on backwards compatibility for communications [o] as well as public API signatures [p]. |
| QU50 | The project strives to respond to documented bug reports in a timely manner. | YES. The project fixed more than 1200 issues during incubation [q]. |
Community | ||
| CO10 | The project has a well-known homepage that points to all the information required to operate according to this maturity model. | YES. The project website [c] provides links to JIRA, mailing lists, source code, wiki, etc. |
| CO20 | The community welcomes contributions from anyone who acts in good faith and in a respectful manner and adds value to the project. | YES. New users and contributors are welcomed on the mailing lists. |
| CO30 | Contributions include not only source code, but also documentation, constructive bug reports, constructive discussions, marketing and generally anything that adds value to the project. | YES. The project has elected serveral committers based on their documentation contributions. |
| CO40 | The community is meritocratic and over time aims to give more rights and responsibilities to contributors who add value to the project. | YES. The project has added at least 6 new committers during incubation. |
| CO50 | The way in which contributors can be granted more rights such as commit access or decision power is clearly documented and is the same for all contributors. | YES. The project has defined critieria for adding committers [r]. |
| CO60 | The community operates based on consensus of its members (see CS10) who have decision power. Dictators, benevolent or not, are not welcome in Apache projects. | YES. The project works to build consensus among the community and follows ASF voting rules for important decisions such as releasing and adding committers. |
| CO70 | The project strives to answer user questions in a timely manner. | YES. The project typically provides detailed answers to user questions within a few hours. |
Consensus Building | ||
| CS10 | The project maintains a public list of its contributors who have decision power -- the project's PMC (Project Management Committee) consists of those contributors. | YES. The PMC members will be listed at [s] once the project graduates. |
| CS20 | Decisions are made by consensus among PMC members 9 and are documented on the project's main communications channel. Community opinions are taken into account but the PMC has the final word if needed. | YES. The project has been making decisions on the project mailing lists during incubation. |
| CS30 | Documented voting rules are used to build consensus when discussion is not sufficient. 10 | YES. The project uses the standard ASF voting rules [t]. |
| CS40 | In Apache projects, vetoes are only valid for code commits and are justified by a technical explanation, as per the Apache voting rules defined in CS30. | YES. The project rarely uses vetoes and relies on robust code reviews. |
| CS50 | All "important" discussions happen asynchronously in written form on the project's main communications channel. Offline, face-to-face or private discussions 11 that affect the project are also documented on that channel. | YES. See CS20. |
Independence | ||
| IN10 | The project is independent from any corporate or organizational influence. 12 | YES |
| IN20 | Contributors act as themselves as opposed to representatives of a corporation or organization. | YES |
References:
Footnotes
- "For distribution to the public at no charge" is straight from the from the ASF Bylaws at http://apache.org/foundation/bylaws.html. (1)
- See also LC40. (2)
- It's ok for platforms (like a runtime used to execute our code) to have different licenses as long as they don't impose reciprocal licensing on what we are distributing. (3)
- http://apache.org/legal/resolved.html has information about acceptable licenses for third-party dependencies (4)
- In Apache projects, the ASF owns the copyright for the collective work, i.e. the project's releases. Contributors retain copyright on their contributions but grant the ASF a perpetual copyright license for them. (5)
- See http://www.apache.org/dev/release.html for more info on Apache releases (6)
- The required level of security depends on the software's intended uses, of course. Expectations should be clearly documented. (7)
- Apache projects can just point to http://www.apache.org/security/ or use their own security contacts page, which should also point to that. (8)
- In Apache projects, "consensus" means widespread agreement among people who have decision power. It does not necessarily mean "unanimity". (9)
- For Apache projects, http://www.apache.org/foundation/voting.html defines the voting rules. (10)
- Apache projects have a private mailing list that their PMC is expected to use only when really needed. The private list is typically used for discussions about people, for example to discuss and to vote on PMC candidates privately. (11)
- Independence can be understood as basing the project's decisions on the open discussions that happen on the project's main communications channel, with no hidden agendas. (12)