We are a community. Some are core developers who have been around for well over a decade, others are newer contributors, or are just users or fans, but regardless, it forms some kind of community. For this community to function we need to adhere to a set of guidelines to ensure it functions effectively and doesn't push new people away, or drive existing members away. This here is a set of rough guidelines for those with commit access (developers) and those without (general users or contributors) to follow to ensure things work well. It is not law, but know that if you stray too far from these guidelines, that there may be consequences such as deletion of accounts, removal from mailing lists, banning from IRC channels or loss of commit access, not to mention loss of respect.
We are a group of people with a sense of humor. We like to remain relaxed, swap jokes (of varying levels of taste), and otherwise encourage, cajole or simply banter at times. This community would not be what it is without this, so keep in mind that when interpreting what people say, it may be meant as humor or as a lighthearted poke. Look for an interpretation that is positive, rather than negative. If this simply is not possible, then someone has strayed from these guidelines.
Not everyone speaks English natively, but it is the primary language used here. Some people may not express themselves well. Have patience with that. Put yourself in their shoes.
- Have patience with developers. They are often very busy and sometimes very stressed.
- Please treat everyone with kindness and respect. Never try and hurt, demean, insult or abuse them.
- Never be rude or take any disagreement to a personal level. Agree to disagree if that is what is needed.
- Stick to coding conventions when working on code in EFL or related repositories we host
- Stick to commit guidelines with your commit shortlog, log contents and other metadata
- Be available on our IRC channels as often as possible for discussion, as well as be subscribed to and read/reply our Development, Users and Git Commits mailing lists
- Get a Gitea account so you can report, triage etc. bugs, review patches and so on
- Take responsibility for your code. Don't just "dump and run"
- Be friendly, welcoming, patient and helpful to newcomers especially, in addition to the above "Everyone" rules