Draft Apache Kafka Project Bylaws

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Table of Contents

This document defines the bylaws under which the Apache Kafka project operates. It defines the roles and responsibilities of the project, who may vote, how voting works, how conflicts are resolved, etc.

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Committer access is by invitation only and must be approved by lazy consensus of the active PMC members. A Committer is considered emeritus by their own declaration or by not contributing in any form to the project for over six months. Project activity includes contributions considered for this purpose are any code contribution, code review, JIRA or mailing list discussion, documentation contributions, or user support on the mailing list. An emeritus committer may request reinstatement of commit access from the PMC which, if granted, will be sufficient to restore him or her to active committer status.

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Membership of the PMC is by invitation only and must be approved by a lazy consensus of PMC members. A PMC member is considered emeritus by their own declaration or by no activity in contribution to the project for a six month period. Project activity includes any contributions considered for this purpose are code contribution, code review, JIRA or mailing list discussion, documentation contributions, or user support on the mailing list. An emeritus member may request reinstatement to the PMC, which, if granted, will be sufficient to restore him or her to active PMC member.

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Within the Kafka project, different types of decisions require different forms of approval. For example, the previous section describes several decisions which require 'lazy consensus' approval. This section defines how voting is performed, the types of approvals, and which types of decision require which type of approval.

Voting

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Decisions regarding the project are made by votes on the primary project development mailing list ([dev@kafka.apache.org|mailto:dev@kafka.apache.org]). Where necessary, PMC voting may take place on the private Kafka PMC mailing list. Votes are clearly indicated by subject line starting with \ [VOTE\]. Votes may contain multiple items for approval and these should be clearly separated. Voting is carried out by replying to the vote mail. Voting may take four flavors

Vote	Meaning
+1	'Yes,' 'Agree,' or 'the action should be performed.'
+0	Neutral about the proposed action (or mildly negative but not enough so to want to block it).
-1	This is a negative vote. On issues where consensus is required, this vote counts as a veto. All vetoes must contain an explanation of why the veto is appropriate. Vetoes with no explanation are void. It may also be appropriate for a -1 vote to include an alternative course of action.

All participants in the Kafka project are encouraged to show their agreement with or against a particular action by voting. For technical decisions, only the votes of active committers are binding. Non-binding votes are still useful for those with binding votes to understand the perception of an action in the wider Kafka community. For PMC decisions, only the votes of active PMC members are binding.

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Approval Type	Definition
Lazy Consensus	Lazy consensus requires 3 binding +1 votes and no binding vetoes.
Lazy Majority	A lazy majority vote requires 3 binding +1 votes and more binding +1 votes that than -1 votes.
Lazy Approval	An action with lazy approval is implicitly allowed unless a -1 vote is received, at which time, depending on the type of action, either lazy majority or lazy consensus approval must be obtained.
2/3 Majority	Some actions require a 2/3 majority of active committers or PMC members to pass. Such actions typically affect the foundation of the project (e.g. adopting a new codebase to replace an existing product). The higher threshold is designed to ensure such changes are strongly supported. To pass this vote requires at least 2/3 of binding vote holders to vote +1.

Vetos

A valid, binding veto cannot be overruled. If a veto is cast, it must be accompanied by a valid reason explaining the reasons for the veto. The validity of a veto, if challenged, can be confirmed by anyone who has a binding vote. This does not necessarily signify agreement with the veto - merely that the veto is valid.

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