Project Retiring Process

Document Status

Version: 1.0

Status: Approved

Last Edited: March 21, 2010

Purpose

Eventually, some OSGeo projects will reach their end-of-life. This is often a good thing as new approaches or technologies have developed which reduce the need for the project. When a project retires, it is best to clean up loose ends to make sure outstanding users still have access to the code, and the valuable project history is captured for future researchers.

The purpose of the Project Retiring Process provides guidelines for gracefully retiring OSGeo projects which have reached incubation or graduation status.

Retiring Steps

1. Either the Project's Steering Committee, or OSGeo board (in absence of the former PSC) decide that the project is no longer viable.
2. The Project Steering Committee recommends retirement to the OSGeo board, and the board accepts the proposal.
3. Announce the project's retirement to relevant email lists and news sources. Here is an Example.
   1. Announce on project's main web page, ensuring it is obvious to future visitors that the project has retired.
   2. Announce to project announcement, developer and user email lists.
   3. Announce to OSGeo Discuss.
   4. Announce to OSGeo News.
4. Move the project's status to "retired". Update all the locations where the project is referenced, as per the Project Mentions page.
5. If the domain name of your project has the potential of lapsing, hand over the ownership of your domain to OSGeo by raising a SAC ticket. Example.
6. If project infrastructure (like svn and issue tracker) is in threat of lapsing, then move to OSGeo so that history can be retained for legacy support and future research.