Proposed Project Submission Process

1. Projects submits a writeup answering the "Project Submission Questions".
2. The "incubation committee" reviews available projects, and selects one, or a few based on the Project Evaluation Criteria, and the willingness of a committee member to act as project mentor.
3. The board of directors accepts or defers projects proposed by the incubation committee for incubation.
4. Projects remain in incubation until the mentor, and the incubation committee agree the project is ready for full status based on the Incubation Completion Criteria.
5. The board of directors accepts or defers the projects from the incubation committee for full status.
6. Once accepted, a PMC member is selected to report to the foundation board periodically on project status.

Project Evaluation Criteria

Criteria for prioritizing projects for the incubation process.

Requirements:

• the code is under an OSI approved license.
• project willing to keep code clear of encumberances (committer agreements, etc).
• the project is "geospatial", or directly in support of geospatial applications.

Desirable:

• already reasonably mature (working quality code).
• already has a substantial user community.
• already has a substantial developer community.
• adheres to standards (ie. OGC, etc) where appropriate.
• has linkages with existing foundation projects.
• fills a gap in the foundation software stack.
• prepared to develop in an open and collaborative fashion.
• has contributions and interest from more than just one company/organization.
• willing to migrate to foundation support infrastructure, and adopt website style consistant with the foundation.

Project Submission Questions

Questions to ask of project teams wishing to enter incubation and project approval. The submitter would fill out as many as possible and enter "none" if there is no answer.

• Name, location, affiliations (eg. corporate), etc.
• Short description of the submitter
• Project Name
• Open source license selection
• One line description
• Detail description
• Status (no code, alpha, beta, released)
• Why is this project important to this community?
• Which are the important project in the foundation you are linking to?
• Which are the important project outside the foundation you are linking to?
• Are there others involved in the development of the project?
• How many active committers there are, and how many are employed by the project submitter?
• How many users do you currently have?
• If you have users, can you describe a few and how your code has helped them?
• Are there other open source projects related to this one or compete with it?
• What libraries do you use or plan to use?
• Are there any patents or possible ownership issues?
• Use of open (or defacto) standards for data or communication?
• Please feel free to add other information that we have not asked that would help ensure that we know enough about your project to accept it into our community.

Incubation Completion Criteria

• Has the code been adequately vetted to assure it is all properly licensed?
• Have all code committers signed appropriate agreements.
• Does the project have a governance policy and a project management committee established that ensures decisions can be made, documented and adhered to?
• Is the developer community working in a reasonably healthy way? Open to input, new members and reaching consensus on decisions?