Evolving the OpenSource contribution and governance model
Involving software engineers in shaping the future of Clean ABAP and the Style Guide repository
The latest blog on clean code has more than 140k views and shows how relevant the topic is. As the style guide project grows and evolves, Florian Hoffmann and myself have realized some time ago that we can no longer lead it effectively in the founder-lead way. Therefore, there is the need to share responsibilities and authority with other contributors and maintainers who have proven their dedication and expertise. And we need to establish a more formal and transparent governance process that allows for more participation and feedback from our diverse and distributed community.
The blog Involving software engineers in shaping the future of Clean ABAP and the Style Guide repository explains why a clear contribution and governance process is important for a successful OpenSource project, the challenges with a found-lead model and the need to move towards a more structured sustainable model over time. Besides, it shall help newcomer to understand how to participate and seek approval for their contributions.
The Style Guide repository is different from other open-source repositories because it is focused on aligned good practices and not about code. Ensuring rules are based on a shared understanding and oriented towards Agile Software Engineering principles requires more alignment compared to typical OpenSource projects. With this in mind the contribution and governance model has been evolved to be able to come up with decisions in a more effective way. Based on the improved model 9 pull request have been closed and 13 issues have been closed in the last month.
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