Folks, I wanted to post some responses to questions proware has raised w/r/t code contributions. This is an important topic so I thought I'd raise them here for maximum visibility.

Here are his questions:

1. What is the mechanism to submit such mods
2. What is the procedures you will go through to vet the mods
3. What is the decision making process to actually include the mods
4. What will the notification process be to when the mods will appear?

Before I begin please note that our recent newsletter mentions a Bounty Program that will go a great distance towards simplifying the overall community contribution process (code, designs, bugs, doco, etc.).

What is the mechanism to submit such mods?

Sugar often reaches out to the community for contributions but if you feel you have something of particular value to offer please feel free to contact me directly via a PM.

Simple contributions can be made here. Sometime we get contributions directly via SugarForge. Other times, good ol' email suffices. In any event, a contributor's agreement essentially assigns all rights to Sugar which ensures a spotlessly clean code base.

What is the procedures you will go through to vet the mods?

We audit the code, smoke test it using automation, and QA it. Once satisfied we roll it in to mainline.

What is the decision making process to actually include the mods?

We look for contributions that fill a decided gap in our product offering; is applicable for OS, Professional and Enterprise versions; conforms to accepted coding styles and standards; is suitable for all databases; and can easily be merged into baseline.

What will the notification process be to when the mods will appear?

The Sugar About page will always provide attribution for contributed code. As for notifications during the vetting process, for now we remain in contact with the contributors. As this process becomes more and more automated and numerous (which is a MAJOR task of mine) we'll also automate the notification process.

I hope this is helpful. There is much more time come.

Andy