Internet DRAFT - draft-valentinbinotto-contributingtxt
draft-valentinbinotto-contributingtxt
WG Working Group V. Binotto
Internet-Draft V434 Project
Intended status: Informational 7 May 2023
Expires: 8 November 2023
a simple way to provide informations for contributors
draft-valentinbinotto-contributingtxt-03
Abstract
Open source projects rely on the cooperation of third parties. Other
websites also rely on user feedback, for example, when bugs occur.
There are various platforms that enable effective collaboration.
However, this diversity also presents a challenge. Where should
users who have discovered an error report it? Or how can third
parties participate in a project? This document presents one way to
communicate such information in a consistent manner.
About This Document
This note is to be removed before publishing as an RFC.
The latest revision of this draft can be found at
https://github.com/valentinbinotto/id-valentin-contributingtxt/.
Status information for this document may be found at
https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/draft-valentinbinotto-
contributingtxt/.
Discussion of this document takes place on the V434 Project External
Working Group mailing list (mailto:rfc-ext@v434project.com), which is
archived at https://github.com/valentinbinotto/id-valentin-
contributingtxt/tree/main/mailing-list.
Source for this draft and an issue tracker can be found at
https://github.com/valentinbinotto/id-valentin-contributingtxt.
Status of This Memo
This Internet-Draft is submitted in full conformance with the
provisions of BCP 78 and BCP 79.
Internet-Drafts are working documents of the Internet Engineering
Task Force (IETF). Note that other groups may also distribute
working documents as Internet-Drafts. The list of current Internet-
Drafts is at https://datatracker.ietf.org/drafts/current/.
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Internet-Drafts are draft documents valid for a maximum of six months
and may be updated, replaced, or obsoleted by other documents at any
time. It is inappropriate to use Internet-Drafts as reference
material or to cite them other than as "work in progress."
This Internet-Draft will expire on 8 November 2023.
Copyright Notice
Copyright (c) 2023 IETF Trust and the persons identified as the
document authors. All rights reserved.
This document is subject to BCP 78 and the IETF Trust's Legal
Provisions Relating to IETF Documents (https://trustee.ietf.org/
license-info) in effect on the date of publication of this document.
Please review these documents carefully, as they describe your rights
and restrictions with respect to this document. Code Components
extracted from this document must include Revised BSD License text as
described in Section 4.e of the Trust Legal Provisions and are
provided without warranty as described in the Revised BSD License.
Table of Contents
1. Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2
2. Conventions and Definitions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
3. The Specification . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
4. Security Considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
5. IANA Considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
6. Normative References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
Acknowledgments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
Author's Address . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
1. Introduction
Currently, there are various platforms for collaboration on projects
or communication with users of websites, services and so on. This
creates opportunities, for example in open source projects, to work
with contributors and exchange information. However, such
opportunities differ from project to project. Users who are
interested in participating in a project need to be aware of these
different procedures. This can be a challenge due to the
inconsistent form of the information and might also lead to users
deciding not to participate because they cannot find a contact point.
At the same time, there is a need for "bug reports" in other forms of
websites as well. Users are expected to point out bugs to the person
in charge and thus lead to a better user experience for all users.
Unfortunately, the ways and procedures for such "bug reports" also
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differ from website to website. These differences mean that users
might not be able to find a contact person to report a bug, and thus
fail to report it.
The goal of this document and the proposed form of communication in
the "contributing.txt" file is:
1. to provide open source or similar projects with the opportunity
to inform interested parties about the possibilities of
contributing.
2. to offer any kind of website the possibility to define a contact
person for bug reports etc.
2. Conventions and Definitions
The key words "MUST", "MUST NOT", "REQUIRED", "SHALL", "SHALL NOT",
"SHOULD", "SHOULD NOT", "RECOMMENDED", "NOT RECOMMENDED", "MAY", and
"OPTIONAL" in this document are to be interpreted as described in
BCP 14 [RFC2119] [RFC8174] when, and only when, they appear in all
capitals, as shown here.
3. The Specification
This document defines a file called "contributing.txt", which
provides information about possible contribution to a project or
website. The file format of "contributing.txt" MUST be plain text
(MIME type "text/plain") (Section 4.1.3 of [RFC2046]) and MUST be
encoded using UTF-8 ([RFC3629]).
The file "contributing.txt" MUST be placed directly under the domain
(for example: https://example.com/contributing.txt).
The file "contributing.txt" MUST contain at least:
* Paragraph "Admin" with the name of the administrator or the
webmaster.
* Paragraph "Bugs" with a mail address or a web address to report
bugs.
Admin: Valentin Binotto
Bugs: bugs@example.com
Figure 1: Example 1
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OPTIONAL the following paragraphs can be added to the
"contributing.txt" file:
* Paragraph "Open Source" with a web address to a suitable platform
for third party collaboration (for example github.com or
gitlab.com).
* Paragraph "License" with information about the license that
applies to the content of the website.
* Paragraph "Guidelines" with a web address to the guidelines for
contributing to this project.
Open Source: github.com/valentinbinotto
License: Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 Int. Public License
Guidelines: github.com/valentinbinotto/v434/guidelines.txt
Figure 2: Example 2
OPTIONAL, comments can be added to the "contributing.txt" file. Each
line of the comment must start with "#" (%x23).
# Hello, world!
Figure 3: Example 3
The specified paragraphs MUST be placed in the following order:
1. Admin
2. Bugs
3. Open Source
4. License
5. Guidelines
6. (Comments)
Only one entry is allowed per paragraph
However, paragraphs can be reused an unlimited number of times,
as long as the order of the paragraphs is still as specified.
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Admin: Valentin Binotto
Bugs: bugs@example.com
Open Source: 5672-40.org
License: Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 Int. Public License
Guidelines: github.com/valentinbinotto/v434/guidelines.txt
# Hello, world!
# 56616c656e74696e2042696e6f74746f202d20456c656374726f6e69632046726f6e7469657220466f756e646174696f6e204d656d626572
Figure 4: Example for a "contributing.txt" file
4. Security Considerations
Because of the use of URIs, security considerations of [RFC3986]
apply here.
5. IANA Considerations
This document has no IANA actions.
6. Normative References
[RFC2046] Freed, N. and N. Borenstein, "Multipurpose Internet Mail
Extensions (MIME) Part Two: Media Types", RFC 2046,
DOI 10.17487/RFC2046, November 1996,
<https://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc2046>.
[RFC2119] Bradner, S., "Key words for use in RFCs to Indicate
Requirement Levels", BCP 14, RFC 2119,
DOI 10.17487/RFC2119, March 1997,
<https://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc2119>.
[RFC3629] Yergeau, F., "UTF-8, a transformation format of ISO
10646", STD 63, RFC 3629, DOI 10.17487/RFC3629, November
2003, <https://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc3629>.
[RFC3986] Berners-Lee, T., Fielding, R., and L. Masinter, "Uniform
Resource Identifier (URI): Generic Syntax", STD 66,
RFC 3986, DOI 10.17487/RFC3986, January 2005,
<https://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc3986>.
[RFC8174] Leiba, B., "Ambiguity of Uppercase vs Lowercase in RFC
2119 Key Words", BCP 14, RFC 8174, DOI 10.17487/RFC8174,
May 2017, <https://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc8174>.
Acknowledgments
Author's Address
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Valentin Binotto
V434 Project
Email: valentinbinotto-id.ext@v434project.com
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