This document is work in progress.
This page tracks the state of the FreeMarker project regarding the Apache Project Maturity Model.
CODE
| CODE | DESCRIPTION | STATUS |
|---|---|---|
CD10 | The project produces Open Source software, for distribution to the public at no charge. | YES. The project source is licensed under the Apache License, version 2.0. |
CD20 | The project's code is easily discoverable and publicly accessible. | YES. Apache FreeMarker source is available on [1]. In addition, the FreeMarker Incubator Status page [2] and the FreeMarker website 6 provide links to the source code on Github [3] |
CD30 | The code can be built in a reproducible way using widely available standard tools. | YES. Apache FreeMarker can be easily built by following the build notes in the README file; the build procedure leverages Apache Ant and Apache Ivy. |
CD40 | The full history of the project's code is available via a source code control system, in a way that allows any released version to be recreated. | YES. The project uses a git repository [4] and releases are tagged [5] |
CD50 | The provenance of each line of code is established via the source code control system, in a reliable way based on strong authentication of the committer. When third-party contributions are committed, commit messages provide reliable information about the code provenance. | YES. See CD40. The process for the acceptance of code contributions is clearly defined and documented in the FreeMarker Committers How-To document [7]. |
Licenses and Copyright
| CODE | DESCRIPTION | STATUS |
|---|---|---|
LC10 | The code is released under the Apache License, version 2.0. | YES |
LC20 | Libraries that are mandatory dependencies of the project's code do not create more restrictions than the Apache License does. | YES. FreeMarker 2 has no mandatory runtime dependencies. FreeMarker 3 requires slf4j-api (MIT license). |
LC30 | The libraries mentioned in LC20 are available as Open Source software. | YES |
LC40 | Committers are bound by an Individual Contributor Agreement (the "Apache iCLA") that defines which code they are allowed to commit and how they need to identify code that is not their own. | YES. An iCLA is filed for every contributor as clearly documented in [6] |
| LC50 | The copyright ownership of everything that the project produces is clearly defined and documented. | YES. The copyright ownership is published in the footer of every page of the website and documentation and it is included in the NOTICE file of the FreeMarker product. |
Releases
| CODE | DESCRIPTION | STATUS |
|---|---|---|
RE10 | Releases consist of source code, distributed using standard and open archive formats that are expected to stay readable in the long term. | YES. Releases consist of source code that is archived and compressed (tar.gz) |
| RE20 | Releases are approved by the project's PMC (see CS10), in order to make them an act of the Foundation. | YES. |
RE30 | Releases are signed and/or distributed along with digests that can be reliably used to validate the downloaded archives. | YES. MD5 and SHA512 hashes are provided; a detached PGP signature is also provided. |
RE40 | Convenience binaries can be distributed alongside source code but they are not Apache Releases -- they are just a convenience provided with no guarantee. | YES. A convenience binary package and Maven package are also distributed. |
RE50 | The release process is documented and repeatable to the extent that someone new to the project is able to independently generate the complete set of artifacts required for a release. | YES. The release process is documented in a specific section [8] of the Committer How-To document. |
Quality
| CODE | DESCRIPTION | STATUS |
|---|---|---|
| QU10 | The project is open and honest about the quality of its code. Various levels of quality and maturity for various modules are natural and acceptable as long as they are clearly communicated. | YES. The project produces at least one "release candidate" release in order to gather feedback from the users before producing the "production release". |
| QU20 | The project puts a very high priority on producing secure software. | YES. The project, considering the large user base, treats fixes to security vulnerabilities as high priority tasks. |
QU30 | The project provides a well-documented channel to report security issues, along with a documented way of responding to them. | YES. The project has a dedicated page in the website to describe how to report and handle a vulnerability [14] |
QU40 | The project puts a high priority on backwards compatibility and aims to document any incompatible changes and provide tools and documentation to help users transition to new features. | YES. The project is aware of the large user base and strives to provide backward compatibility and/or document incompatible changes. The project maintains a page dedicated to changes per version [9] |
QU50 | The project strives to respond to documented bug reports in a timely manner. | YES. All bug reports are reviewed promptly and traditionally most of them are addressed in a timely manner. |
Community
| CODE | DESCRIPTION | STATUS |
|---|---|---|
CO10 | The project has a well-known homepage that points to all the information required to operate according to this maturity model. | YES. The FreeMarker project's homepage [10] provides all the relevant information related to the project and product, including the license and copyright disclaimers, download information [11], user manuals [12] and prominent links that explain how to contribute [6] and how to operate as committers [7]. |
CO20 | The community welcomes contributions from anyone who acts in good faith and in a respectful manner and adds value to the project. | YES. This is also clearly stated in [6] |
CO30 | Contributions include not only source code, but also documentation, constructive bug reports, constructive discussions, marketing and generally anything that adds value to the project. | YES. This is also clearly stated in [6] |
CO40 | The community is meritocratic and over time aims to give more rights and responsibilities to contributors who add value to the project. | YES. This is also clearly stated in [6] |
CO50 | The way in which contributors can be granted more rights such as commit access or decision power is clearly documented and is the same for all contributors. | YES. This is stated in [7] even if the process may be better described in that document. |
CO60 | The community operates based on consensus of its members (see CS10) who have decision power. Dictators, benevolent or not, are not welcome in Apache projects. | YES. |
CO70 | The project strives to answer user questions in a timely manner | YES. This is also documented in [13] |
Consensus Building
| CODE | DESCRIPTION | STATUS |
|---|---|---|
CS10 | The project maintains a public list of its contributors who have decision power -- the project's PMC (Project Management Committee) consists of those contributors. | YES. The list of contributors is maintained in the project incubation status page. |
CS20 | Decisions are made by consensus among PMC members and are documented on the project's main communications channel. Community opinions are taken into account but the PMC has the final word if needed. | YES. The decisions are made on the project's mailing list (dev@freemarker.incubator.apache.org); the vote tally contains the number of binding votes from PMC members. |
CS30 | Documented voting rules are used to build consensus when discussion is not sufficient. | YES. Most of the discussions are positively resolved informally without a vote. |
CS40 | In Apache projects, vetoes are only valid for code commits and are justified by a technical explanation, as per the Apache voting rules defined in CS30. | YES. However so far no one had to exercise the veto. |
CS50 | All "important" discussions happen asynchronously in written form on the project's main communications channel. Offline, face-to-face or private discussions that affect the project are also documented on that channel. | YES. All the discussions actually happen on the project's mailing list. |
Independence
| CODE | DESCRIPTION | STATUS |
|---|---|---|
IN10 | The project is independent from any corporate or organizational influence. | YES. There is no corporation behind FreeMarker. This is also clearly stated in [6] |
IN20 | Contributors act as themselves as opposed to representatives of a corporation or organization. | YES. This is also clearly stated in [6] |
References: