Code of Conduct

Community and Collaboration are core values of the OSCELOT community. Members of the OSCELOT community need to work together effectively, and this code of conduct lays down the "ground rules" for our cooperation.

In the Free Software world, we collaborate freely on a volunteer basis to build software for everyone's benefit. We improve on the work of others, which we have been given freely, and then share our improvements on the same basis.

That collaboration depends on good relationships between developers. To this end, we've agreed on the following code of conduct to help define the ways that we think collaboration and cooperation should work.

Your involvement in the OSCELOT community is an implicit acceptance of this Code of Conduct.

Ground rules

This Code of Conduct covers your behaviour as a member of the OSCELOT Community, in any forum, mailing list, wiki, web site, IRC channel, install-fest, public meeting or private correspondence. The OSCELOT Community Council will arbitrate in any dispute over the conduct of a member of the community.

• Be considerate. Your work will be used by other people, and you in turn will depend on the work of others. Any decision you take will affect users and colleagues, and we expect you to take those consequences into account when making decisions. For example, when a project is in a feature freeze, please don't upload a dramatically new version, as other people will be testing the frozen system and not be expecting big changes.

  Be respectful. The OSCELOT community and its members treat one another with respect. Everyone can make a valuable contribution to OSCELOT. We may not always agree, but disagreement is no excuse for poor behaviour and poor manners. We might all experience some frustration now and then, but we cannot allow that frustration to turn into a personal attack. It's important to remember that a community where people feel uncomfortable or threatened is not a productive one. We expect members of the OSCELOT community to be respectful when dealing with other contributors as well as with people outside the OSCELOT community, and with users of OSCELOT projects.

  Be collaborative. OSCELOT and Free Software are about collaboration and working together. Collaboration reduces redundancy of work done in the Free Software world, and improves the quality of the software produced. You should aim to collaborate with other OSCELOT maintainers, as well as with the upstream community that is interested in the work you do. Your work should be done transparently and patches from OSCELOT should be given back to the community when they are made, not just when the project releases. If you wish to work on new code for existing upstream projects, at least keep those projects informed of your ideas and progress. It may not be possible to get consensus from upstream or even from your colleagues about the correct implementation of an idea, so don't feel obliged to have that agreement before you begin, but at least keep the outside world informed of your work, and publish your work in a way that allows outsiders to test, discuss and contribute to your efforts.

  When you disagree, consult others. Disagreements, both political and technical, happen all the time and the OSCELOT community is no exception. The important goal is not to avoid disagreements or differing views but to resolve them constructively. You should turn to the community and to the community process to seek advice and to resolve disagreements. We have the OSCELOT Board of Directors and the OSCELOT Community Council, both of which may help to decide suitable resolution to conflict. There are also several Project Teams and Team Leaders, who may be able to help you figure out which resolution or direction will be most acceptable. If you really want to go a different way with any project, then we encourage you to make a derivative distribution available, so that the community can try out your changes and ideas for itself and contribute to the discussion.

  When you are unsure, ask for help. Nobody knows everything, and nobody is expected to be perfect in the OSCELOT community (except of course the SABDFL). Asking questions avoids many problems down the road, and so questions are encouraged. Those who are asked should be responsive and helpful. However, when asking a question, care must be taken to do so in an appropriate forum. Off-topic questions, such as requests for help on a development mailing list, detract from productive discussion.

  Step down considerately. Developers on every project come and go and OSCELOT is no different. When you leave or disengage from the project, in whole or in part, we ask that you do so in a way that minimises disruption to the project. This means you should tell people you are leaving and take the proper steps to ensure that others can pick up where you leave off.

The OSCELOT code of conduct is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 license. You may re-use it for your own project, and modify it as you wish, just please allow others to use your modifications. The OSCELOT code of conduct is an extension of the Ubuntu code of content.

Mailing lists and web forums

Mailing lists and web forums are an important part of the OSCELOT community platform. This code of conduct applies very much to your behaviour in those forums too. Please follow these guidelines in addition to the general code of conduct:

1. Please use a valid email address to which direct responses can be made.
2. Please avoid flamewars, trolling, personal attacks, and repetitive arguments. On technical matters, the Technical Review Board can make a final decision. On matters of community governance, the Community Council can make a final decision.

Team leaders

In addition to this Code of Conduct, we hold our community leaders (such as IRC operators, Forums staff, team leaders and Charter coordinators) to an even higher standard which is documented in the Leadership Code of Conduct.