My Slides from #ATO2017 on Introduction to the Apache Software Foundation

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APACHE: 101
Jim Jagielski || @jimjag
CODE, COMMUNITY AND OPEN SOURCE

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AGENDA
• Introduction
• Overview of the ASF
• The What and Why of “Open Source”
• The Lessons Learned by the ASF - The Apache Way

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ABOUT ME
• Apache Software Foundation
• Co-founder, Director, Vice Chairman, Member and Developer
• Director
• Outercurve, MARSEC-XL, OSSI, OSI (ex)…
• Developer
• Much FOSS projects
• Sr. Director: Tech Fellows: Capital One

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THE ASF
• ASF == The Apache Software Foundation
• Before the ASF there was “The Apache Group”
• The ASF was incorporated in 1999

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THE ASF
• Non-profit corporation founded in 1999
• 501( c )3 public charity
• Volunteer organization (The ASF doesn’t pay anyone to
work on Apache projects)
• Virtual world-wide organization - Membership of Individuals
• Exists to provide the organizational, legal, and financial
support for various OSS projects - let the developers
develop

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STRUCTURE OF THE ASF -
LEGAL
• Member-based corporation - individuals only
• Members nominate and elect new members
• Members elect a board - 9 seats
• Semi-annual meetings via IRC
• Each PMC has a Chair - eyes and ears of the board
(oversight only)

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ASF “ORG CHART”
Development Administrative
Users
Patchers/Buggers
Contributors
Committers
PMC Members
Members
Officers
Board
~400
9
~160
~4500
~2000
Technical Oversight Organizational Oversight
PMCs
(TLPs)
~150
Elects
ReportsAppoints
Creates
&
Updates

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ISSUES WITH DUAL
STACKS
• Despite clear differentiation, sometimes there are leaks
• eg: PMC chair seen as “lead” developer
• Sometimes officers are assumed to have too much power if
they venture into development issues
• “hats”

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THE ASF’S MISSION
• Provide open source software to the public free of charge
• Provide a foundation for open, collaborative software
development projects by supplying hardware,
communication, and business infrastructure
• Create an independent legal entity to which companies and
individuals can donate resources and be assured that those
resources will be used for the public benefit

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THE ASF’S MISSION
•Provide a means for individual volunteers to be sheltered from
legal suits directed at the Foundation’s projects
•Protect the ‘Apache’ brand, as applied to its software products,
from being abused by other organizations
•Provide legal and technical infrastructure for open source
software development and to perform appropriate oversight of
such software

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VISION STATEMENT
• The Apache Software Foundation provides support for the
Apache community of open-source software projects. The
Apache projects are characterized by a collaborative,
consensus based development process, an open and
pragmatic software license, and a desire to create high
quality software that leads the way in its field. We consider
ourselves not simply a group of projects sharing a server,
but rather a community of developers and users.

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VISION STATEMENT,
TAKE 2
• Community created code
• Our code should be exceptional

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WHY OPEN SOURCE?
• Access to the source code
• Avoid vendor lock-in (or worse!)
• Much better software
• Better security record (more eyes)
• Much more nimble development - frequent releases
• Direct user input

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THE DRAW OF OPEN
SOURCE
• Having a real impact in the development and direction of IT
• Personal satisfaction: I wrote that!
• Sense of membership in a community
• Sense of accomplishment - very quick turnaround times
• Developers and engineers love to tinker - huge opportunity
to do so

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OPEN SOURCE FUD
• No quality or quality control
• Prevents or slows development
• Have to “give it away for free”
• No real innovation

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THE APACHE WAY
• Although the term is deprecated, “The Apache Way”
relates to how the ASF (and its projects) work and operate
• Basically, the least common denominators on how PMCs
operate

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WHY FOCUS ON ASF ?
http://webmink.com/essays/#OBR
http://www.zdnet.com/blog/open-source/
oracle-gives-openoffice-to-apache/9035

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CORE TENETS
• Meritocracy
• Transparency
• open
• public
• Community
• healthy
• active

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BASIC MEMES
• Meritocracy
• Peer-based
• Consensus decision making
• Collaborative development
• Responsible oversight
• Individual Participation

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MERITOCRACY
• “Govern by Merit”
• Merit is based on what you do
• Merit never expires
• Those with more merit, get more responsibility
• Provides incentive to Do More
• It’s NOT a dirty word
• aka “do-acracy”

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PEER-BASED
• Developers represent themselves - individuals
• Mutual trust and respect
• All votes hold the same weight (no BDFL)
• Community created code
• Healthy communities create healthy code
• Poisonous communities don’t
• Feel as part of a community

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WHY COMMUNITY -> CODE
• Since we are all volunteers, people’s time and interests
change
• A healthy community is “warm and inviting” and encourages
a continued influx of developers
• Poisonous people/communities turn people off, and the
project will die
• Diversity ensures survival
• End result - better code, long-term code

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CONSENSUS DECISION
MAKING
• Key is the idea of voting
• +1 - yes
• +0 - no real comment
• -1 - veto
• Sometimes you’ll also see stuff like -0, -0.5, etc...

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VOTING
• The main intent is to gauge developer acceptance
• Vetos must be justifiable and have sound technical merit
• If valid, Vetos cannot be overruled
• Vetos are very rare

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COLLABORATIVE
DEVELOPMENT
• Code is developed by the community
• Voting ensures at least 3 active developers
• Development done online and on-list
• If it didn’t happen on-list, it didn’t happen

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COLLABORATIVE
DEVELOPMENT
• Mailing lists are the preferred method
• Archived
• Asynchronous
• Available to anyone - public list

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COLLABORATIVE
DEVELOPMENT
• Other methods are OK, if not primary
• Wikis
• IRC
• F2F
• Always bring back to the list

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THE APACHE INCUBATOR
• Entry point for all new projects and codebases
• Indoctrinates the Apache Way to the podling
• Ensures and tracks IP

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CONTRIBUTOR LICENSE
AGREEMENT
• aka: iCLA (for individual)
• Required of all committers
• Guarantees:
• The person has the authority to commit the code
• That the ASF can relicense the code
• Does NOT assign copyright

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DEVELOPMENT
• The ASF never pays for development of projects
• Some contributors are corporate sponsored, some aren’t
but as far as the ASF is concerned it makes no difference!
• Diversity == Independence
• git-like mega merges are counter-productive
• Code is one form of contributing, not the only form.

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THE ASF IS VITAL
• Foundations (independent) are critical for widespread
adoption of s/w
• ASF: totally vendor neutral - Sponsors don’t control/
manage/direct the foundation nor projects
• “There are other ways of doing things, what we’ve been
doing has simply be proven to be one of the best.”

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CURRENT STATUS

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CURRENT STATUS

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CURRENT STATUS

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CURRENT STATUS

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THAT’S IT
• Support the ASF!
• Any questions?
• @jimjag
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• www.linkedin.com/in/jimjag/