github.com/opencontainers/runtime-tools@v0.9.0/MAINTAINERS_GUIDE.md (about) 1 ## Introduction 2 3 Dear maintainer. Thank you for investing the time and energy to help 4 make this project as useful as possible. Maintaining a project is difficult, 5 sometimes unrewarding work. Sure, you will get to contribute cool 6 features to the project. But most of your time will be spent reviewing, 7 cleaning up, documenting, answering questions, justifying design 8 decisions - while everyone has all the fun! But remember - the quality 9 of the maintainers work is what distinguishes the good projects from the 10 great. So please be proud of your work, even the unglamorous parts, 11 and encourage a culture of appreciation and respect for *every* aspect 12 of improving the project - not just the hot new features. 13 14 This document is a manual for maintainers old and new. It explains what 15 is expected of maintainers, how they should work, and what tools are 16 available to them. 17 18 This is a living document - if you see something out of date or missing, 19 speak up! 20 21 ## What are a maintainer's responsibility? 22 23 It is every maintainer's responsibility to: 24 25 * 1) Expose a clear roadmap for improving their component. 26 * 2) Deliver prompt feedback and decisions on pull requests. 27 * 3) Be available to anyone with questions, bug reports, criticism etc. 28 on their component. This includes IRC and GitHub issues and pull requests. 29 * 4) Make sure their component respects the philosophy, design and 30 roadmap of the project. 31 32 ## How are decisions made? 33 34 Short answer: with pull requests to the project repository. 35 36 This project is an open-source project with an open design philosophy. This 37 means that the repository is the source of truth for EVERY aspect of the 38 project, including its philosophy, design, roadmap and APIs. *If it's 39 part of the project, it's in the repo. It's in the repo, it's part of 40 the project.* 41 42 As a result, all decisions can be expressed as changes to the 43 repository. An implementation change is a change to the source code. An 44 API change is a change to the API specification. A philosophy change is 45 a change to the philosophy manifesto. And so on. 46 47 All decisions affecting this project, big and small, follow the same 3 steps: 48 49 * Step 1: Open a pull request. Anyone can do this. 50 51 * Step 2: Discuss the pull request. Anyone can do this. 52 53 * Step 3: Accept (`LGTM`) or refuse a pull request. The relevant maintainers do 54 this (see below "Who decides what?") 55 56 ### I'm a maintainer, should I make pull requests too? 57 58 Yes. Nobody should ever push to master directly. All changes should be 59 made through a pull request. 60 61 ## Who decides what? 62 63 All decisions are pull requests, and the relevant maintainers make 64 decisions by accepting or refusing the pull request. Review and acceptance 65 by anyone is denoted by adding a comment in the pull request: `LGTM`. 66 However, only currently listed `MAINTAINERS` are counted towards the required 67 one LGTM. 68 69 Overall the maintainer system works because of mutual respect across the 70 maintainers of the project. The maintainers trust one another to make decisions 71 in the best interests of the project. Sometimes maintainers can disagree and 72 this is part of a healthy project to represent the point of views of various people. 73 In the case where maintainers cannot find agreement on a specific change the 74 role of a Chief Maintainer comes into play. 75 76 The Chief Maintainer for the project is responsible for overall architecture 77 of the project to maintain conceptual integrity. Large decisions and 78 architecture changes should be reviewed by the chief maintainer. 79 The current chief maintainer for the project is the first person listed 80 in the MAINTAINERS file. 81 82 Even though the maintainer system is built on trust, if there is a conflict 83 with the chief maintainer on a decision, their decision can be challenged 84 and brought to the technical oversight board if two-thirds of the 85 maintainers vote for an appeal. It is expected that this would be a 86 very exceptional event. 87 88 89 ### How are maintainers added? 90 91 The best maintainers have a vested interest in the project. Maintainers 92 are first and foremost contributors that have shown they are committed to 93 the long term success of the project. Contributors wanting to become 94 maintainers are expected to be deeply involved in contributing code, 95 pull request review, and triage of issues in the project for more than two months. 96 97 Just contributing does not make you a maintainer, it is about building trust 98 with the current maintainers of the project and being a person that they can 99 depend on and trust to make decisions in the best interest of the project. The 100 final vote to add a new maintainer should be approved by over 66% of the current 101 maintainers with the chief maintainer having veto power. In case of a veto, 102 conflict resolution rules expressed above apply. The voting period is 103 five business days on the Pull Request to add the new maintainer. 104 105 106 ### What is expected of maintainers? 107 108 Part of a healthy project is to have active maintainers to support the community 109 in contributions and perform tasks to keep the project running. Maintainers are 110 expected to be able to respond in a timely manner if their help is required on specific 111 issues where they are pinged. Being a maintainer is a time consuming commitment and should 112 not be taken lightly. 113 114 When a maintainer is unable to perform the required duties they can be removed with 115 a vote by 66% of the current maintainers with the chief maintainer having veto power. 116 The voting period is ten business days. Issues related to a maintainer's performance should 117 be discussed with them among the other maintainers so that they are not surprised by 118 a pull request removing them. 119 120 121