a simple way to provide informations for contributors

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Table of Contents

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 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: 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.
  
  Example:
  
  Admin: Valentin Binotto
  Bugs: bugs@vauly.net
  
  
  OPTIONALLY 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.
  
  Example:
  
  Open Source: github.com/valentinbinotto
  License: Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 Int. Public License
  Guidelines: github.com/valentinbinotto/v434/guidelines.txt
  
  
  
  OPTIONALLY, comments can be added to the "contributing.txt" file. Each line of the comment must start with "#" (%x23).
  
  Example:
  
  # Hello, world!
  
  
  
  The specified paragraphs MUST be placed in the specified order. 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.
  
  Example for a "contributing.txt" file:
  
  Admin: Valentin Binotto
  Bugs: bugs@vauly.net
  Open Source: github.com/valentinbino
  License: Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 Int. Public License
  Guidelines: github.com/valentinbinotto/v434/guidelines.txt
  # Valentin Binotto
  # Hello, world!¶

4. Security Considerations

Because of the use of URIs, security considerations of [RFC3986] apply here.¶

5. IANA Considerations

This document has no IANA actions.¶

Acknowledgments

Author's Address