Incubation Candidate: An Incubation Candidate is a project or community that wishes to apply for entry to the Incubation Process, but that may or may not meet all the criteria for admission.
Endorsed Project or Software Community: Official Apereo project with an appropriate governance structure and supported by a community of users and developers. A software related project with more than one major release would normally be considered a software community.
Incubation Process: The Apereo Incubation Process is the process whereby open source software projects and communities are proposed, incubated, evaluated, progressed, and become full-fledged Apereo endorsed projects and communities as appropriate. Software that relates to an existing project should normally be transferred to the existing project governance structure for incubation and governance.
Incubation Proposal: A proposal to allow a project or community to enter the incubation process as an incubating project. Such proposals will contain the names of two Organizational Sponsors that are Apereo Foundation members
Organizational Recommendations: In order for a project or community to enter incubation, it must have expressions of support for entry from two organizations which are members of the Apereo Foundation in good standing. No financial sponsorship or other resource is implied by such nomination. The nominated organizational representatives of the member organization should make such recommendations.
Incubation Timeline: An approximate duration for the incubation process, established with the incubating project by negotiation when it enters the incubation process. This is intended to be a realistic and conservative “guiding statement”, setting expectations of the project, incubation working group, board, and broader community (including potential adopters) appropriately.
Incubation Working Group (IWG): The Incubation Working Group (IWG) oversees the incubation process. The IWG is also responsible for the periodic review of unsponsored Contributions. The Incubation Working Group consists of volunteers solicited from the Apereo community and approved by the Apereo Board. As with all groups operating under the auspices of Apereo, the Working Group is bound by Apereo bylaws. The Executive Director is a de facto member of the group. Members of the IWG are expected to serve as mentors once they achieve the needed qualification of at least two years of experience in a software community. The IWG will play a central formative and coordinating role in the development of the Apereo Mentor Program. The IWG is responsible for:
Assisting proposed projects in conforming to Apereo guidelines;
Assigning a Project Mentor, a member of the Apereo community assigned to help the Incubated Project reach acceptance;
Evaluating progress of the Incubated Project on a regular quarterly basis and recommending graduation to an endorsed project, continued support, or retirement, according to established criteria
Project Lead: Individual making to incubation request. The IWG will work with this person to complete the tasks to exit incubation and become an Endorsed Project.
Mentor: The Mentor is a particular person assigned by the Incubation Working Group to guide a candidate project through incubation. Mentors will normally have at least two years experience of participation in an endorsed software community. This need not necessarily be an Apereo endorsed community. Mentors participate in the Apereo Mentor Program. This program provides opportunities for training, monthly discussion of common issues and other opportunities to develop the skills required of mentors.
Board: The Apereo Board provides strategic leadership for Apereo, and is elected by representatives of Apereo member organisations. It oversees and supports the IWG and the process they execute. The board provides strategic guidance for the IWG, and is the overall custodian of foundation resources. The IWG provides additional strands of community and technical input for the board, particularly around the health of incubating and endorsed projects. Alignment and consensus between these two groups is an important component of the incubation process. Regular public and bi-directional communication is essential to creating and maintaining this consensus.
Unsponsored Contribution: In some cases, software may be contributed without being made by a sponsoring project. Such a contribution may exist indefinitely without becoming an Endorsed Project. Periodic review of unsponsored contributions is the responsibility of the Incubation WG. Software related to an Endorsed Project also may end up in as an Unsponsored Contribution when the Project governance structure decides it is not a viable component.