[jnummelin]

During a project review for Incubation, CNCF TOC suggests adding a intermediary role between contributor and maintainer.

This PR suggests a Reviewer role to with authoritative review capabilities.

See cncf/toc#1962 (comment)

[prithvi1307]

I believe adding a Reviewer role is great from a contributor ladder perspective but 2 things I wanted to add to this PR or the overall Contributors section is:

1. Defining a Contributor Ladder:
   Contributor Ladder
   This document outlines the different contributor roles within the k0s project, along with the responsibilities and privileges that come with them. Community members generally start at the first levels of the ladder and advance up it as their involvement in the project grows. Our contributors are happy to support your growth up the ladder!

Each of the contributor roles below is organized into three types of lists:

Responsibilities: tasks that a contributor is expected to do at this level
Qualifications: requirements a person needs to meet to be at that level
Privileges: rights contributors on that level are entitled to
As the k0s project grows, the current roles may be broken out into new roles and/or teams and roles may no longer be needed.

The final judgment on whether an individual fulfills the criteria for a role is up to the k0s Committers. After six months of inactivity for Committers and Reviewers, 12 months of inactivity for Organization Members, or after any behavior detrimental to the future of the project, any contributor can be removed from their position(s).

2. Defining a Contributor Explicitly:
   A Community Contributor contributes directly to the project and adds value to it. Contributions need not be code. People at the Community Contributor level may be new contributors, or they may only contribute occasionally.

Responsibilities:

Must follow the k0s CoC i.e. the CNCF CoC
Adheres to the contributing guide for each project
For example, see k0s's 'How to Contribute' Guide
Qualifications:

Anybody that is participating in the k0s community is welcome. Any contribution counts. Some possible forms of contribution are:

Participating in community discussions
Helping other users in Slack or in person
Submitting bug reports
Trying out new releases
Attending community events
Giving talks about k0s virtually or in person
Report and sometimes resolve issues
Occasionally submit PRs
Writing a CFP
Contribute to the documentation
Show up at community meetings and/or leads and/or takes notes
Answer questions from other community members
Submit feedback and comments on issues and PRs
Test releases and patches and submit reviews
Promote the project in public

3. Defining a k0s Committer, if not now then in the future.

[twz123]

The roles are currently described in a very formal and abstract way. I wonder if we should write one or two sentences of prose about what's the effect of each role in day-to-day practice.

I currently tend to think about it in the following terms:

• contributors: CI runs automatically, no need for approvals anymore (which means: we trust those persons to not steal any tokens)
• reviewers: Can replace another maintainer, i.e. a maintainer can self-merge PRs that got a reviewer's approval.

[twz123]

After six months of inactivity for Committers and Reviewers, 12 months of inactivity for Organization Members, or after any behavior detrimental to the future of the project, any contributor can be removed from their position(s).

Probably 6/12 months are probably too harsh, but I think we need at least something around role inactivity. OTOH, maybe we should add some time window for contributions that count for role eligibility, too? Doesn't make sense if 5 PRs merged over a period of 5 years are enough to become a contributor?

[prithvi1307]

After six months of inactivity for Committers and Reviewers, 12 months of inactivity for Organization Members, or after any behavior detrimental to the future of the project, any contributor can be removed from their position(s).

Probably 6/12 months are probably too harsh, but I think we need at least something around role inactivity. OTOH, maybe we should add some time window for contributions that count for role eligibility, too? Doesn't make sense if 5 PRs merged over a period of 5 years are enough to become a contributor?

I agree

[jnummelin]

Finetuned a bit according to the comments.

@twz123 @prithvi1307 PTAL again.

[twz123]

I'd always write "k0sproject, not "k0s project". It makes it more sound like an umbrella org IMO. (Still unsure if an article should be used in front or not.)

[twz123]

Alternative suggestion:

Suggested change

	The k0s Project community meetings are scheduled via [LFX Calendar](https://zoom-lfx.platform.linuxfoundation.org/meetings/k0s?view=month). Meeting notes are kept in CNCF [notes](https://notes.cncf.io/s/_5FVgysYK) tool. Both of these require a Linux Foundation account to access.
	Community meetings for k0sproject are scheduled via the [LFX calendar](https://zoom-lfx.platform.linuxfoundation.org/meetings/k0s?view=month). Meeting notes are kept in the [CNCF Notes tool](https://notes.cncf.io/s/_5FVgysYK) tool. Access to both requires a Linux Foundation account.

We could also add a link for account creation: https://docs.linuxfoundation.org/lfx/sso/create-an-account

[twz123]

Alternative suggestion. (It's a bit hard to only place comments on certain parts of this paragraph, since there are no hard wraps.)

Suggested change

The k0s community welcomes all contributors and has well-defined roles detailed below. The progression between the roles defines the contributor ladder. The contributor ladder is a way to provide a path for contributors to grow and take on more responsibilities in the project. Community members generally start at the first levels of the ladder and advance up it as their involvement in the project grows.

The k0s community welcomes all contributors and has well-defined roles detailed below. The progression between roles defines the contributor ladder. It provides a path for contributors to grow and take on more responsibilities in the project. Community members typically begin at the bottom of the ladder and advance as they become more involved in the project.

[twz123]

Suggested change

	All roles within the k0s project will need to adhere to CNCF [Code of Conduct](https://github.com/cncf/foundation/blob/master/code-of-conduct.md).
	All roles within the k0s project will need to adhere to the CNCF [Code of Conduct](https://github.com/cncf/foundation/blob/master/code-of-conduct.md).

[twz123]

Suggested change

	Each of the contributor roles below is organized into three types of lists:
	The contributor roles below are each characterized by three categories:

[twz123]

Alternative suggestion. I'd at least add the formatting as a bullet point list.

Suggested change

	Responsibilities: tasks that a contributor is expected to do at this level
	Qualifications: requirements a person needs to meet to be at that level
	Privileges: rights contributors on that level are entitled to
	- **Responsibilities:** what contributors are expected to do in that role.
	- **Qualifications:** what contributors are expected to have or demonstrate to hold that role.
	- **Privileges:** what contributors are entitled to do in that role.

[twz123]

Everything else in this table is ending with a period, so I'd do the same in the two cells in the Contributors row. Also, I'd just write "maintainers", not "k0s maintainers".

Suggested change

	| Role | Requirements | Ongoing Responsibilities | Defined by |
	|--------------|-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------|------------------------------------------------------------------------|-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------|
	| Contributors | At least five (5) contributions to any sub-project. | None | CONTRIBUTORS.md |
	| Contributors | At least five (5) contributions to any sub-project. | None | CONTRIBUTORS.md, voted in by current maintainers of the given sub-project |
	| Reviewers | An established contributor who regularly participates in the project via issues, PRs and discussions. | Review PRs and provide feedback to contributors. | Voted in by the k0s maintainers, listing in `MAINTAINERS.md`, GitHub organization member. |
	| Maintainer | At least ten (10) contributions to a sub-project + Highly experienced and active contributor + Voted in by k0s maintainers. | Monitor project growth, set direction and priorities for a subproject. | Voted in by the k0s maintainers, listing in `MAINTAINERS.md`, GitHub organization member, and repository owner. |
	| Role | Requirements | Ongoing Responsibilities | Defined by |
	|--------------|-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------|------------------------------------------------------------------------|-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------|
	| Contributors | At least five (5) contributions to any sub-project. | None. | CONTRIBUTORS.md, voted in by current maintainers of the given sub-project. |
	| Reviewers | An established contributor who regularly participates in the project via issues, PRs and discussions. | Review PRs and provide feedback to contributors. | Voted in by the maintainers, listing in `MAINTAINERS.md`, GitHub organization member. |
	| Maintainer | At least ten (10) contributions to a sub-project + Highly experienced and active contributor + Voted in by k0s maintainers. | Monitor project growth, set direction and priorities for a subproject. | Voted in by the maintainers, listing in `MAINTAINERS.md`, GitHub organization member, and repository owner. |

[twz123]

For all the contributors, I'd say they should be in both channels.

[twz123]

Suggested change

	- Check-in with maintainers to make yourself eligible to be voted in as a Contributor by the maintainers
	- Check-in with maintainers to make themselves eligible to be voted in as a Contributor by the maintainers

[twz123]

Suggested change

	- Reviewer can give authoritative review for a maintainers PRs and their approvals are considered binding for the purpose of merging
	- Reviewers can give authoritative review for a maintainers PRs and their approvals are considered binding for the purpose of merging

[twz123]

Suggested change

	- A maintainer or contributor has become in-active, meaning they have not contributed or participated in project activities for an extended period.
	- A maintainer or contributor has become inactive, meaning they have not contributed to or participated in project activities for an extended period of time.

[jnummelin]

@prithvi1307 @ncopa @soltysh care to have a look. Would appreciate a second LGTM before merging

[prithvi1307]

LGTM

[ncopa]

I agree with @twz123's comments

[soltysh]

I missed posting my comment, but Tom commented about the CI, we've talked on one of our earlier calls. So all in all this lgtm.

@jnummelin we should probably go ahead and ensure the links are pointing to pre-populated files. Currently https://github.com/k0sproject/k0s/blob/main/CONTRIBUTORS.md and https://github.com/k0sproject/k0s/blob/main/MAINTAINERS.md don't exist. I'll open a PR adding them and will ping you to double check me on it.