Governance Structure

This document describes the formal governance structure of the JuMP project.

For the purpose of this document, “JuMP” includes all repositories in the JuMP-dev GitHub organization.

Mission

The mission of the JuMP project is to provide a free, open-source software stack for mathematical optimization based on the JuMP modeling language.

Code of Conduct

The JuMP community strongly values inclusivity and diversity. Everyone should treat others with the utmost respect. Everyone in the community must adhere to the NumFOCUS Code of Conduct and the Julia Community Standards, which reflect the values of our community. Both these links have information on how to confidentially report a violation.

Entities

This section outlines the different entities that exist within the JuMP project, their basic role, and how membership of each entity is determined.

Benevolent Dictator For Life

Due to his role in the creation of JuMP, Miles Lubin holds the title of Benevolent Dictator For Life (BDFL).

Core Contributors

Core contributors lead the technical development of the JuMP project, and they are the ultimate authority on the direction of the JuMP project.

The current core contributors are:

A new core contributor may be added by consensus of the current core contributors and notification to the Steering Committee.

Before becoming a core contributor, it is expected that the community member is a repository maintainer of several repositories in the JuMP-dev GitHub organization.

Emeritus Core Contributors

Emeritus core contributors are community members who were core contributors, but have stepped back to a less active role.

The emeritus core contributors are:

A core contributor may choose to switch to emeritus status by informing the other core contributors and the Steering Committee.

Repository Maintainers

Repository maintainers are trusted members of the community who help the core contributors by managing a limited number of repositories in the JuMP-dev GitHub organization.

Any core contributor has individual authority to appoint a community member as a repository maintainer of a repository with notification to the other core contributors.

Before becoming a repository maintainer, it is expected that the community member will have been an active participant in the development and maintenance of a repository for a sustained period of time. This includes triaging issues, proposing and reviewing pull requests, and updating any binary dependencies as needed.

Community members may be maintainers of multiple repositories at the same time.

The list of repository maintainers is available here.

Repository maintainers can step back from their role at any time by informing a core contributor. Furthermore, core contributors, by consensus, can choose to remove repository maintainers for any reason (typically inactivity).

NumFOCUS

JuMP is a fiscally sponsored project of NumFOCUS, a 501(c)(3) public charity in the United States. NumFOCUS provides JuMP with fiscal, legal, and administrative support to help ensure the health and sustainability of the project.

Steering Committee

The Steering Committee supports the core contributors by representing JuMP in all interactions with NumFOCUS, e.g., by attending NumFOCUS’s annual summit. In addition, the Steering Committee:

The current members of the Steering Committee are:

A member of the Steering Committee may leave the committee by notifying the Steering Committee and core contributors. The remaining Steering Committee members, in consultation with the core contributors, will invite a member of the community to join in order to maintain a quorum of five members.

The following people previously served on the Steering Committee:

Decision Making Process

This section outlines how financial and non-financial decisions are made in the JuMP project.

Financial Decisions

All financial decisions are made by the Steering Committee to ensure any funds are spent in a manner that furthers the mission of JuMP. Financial decisions require majority approval by Steering Committee members.

Community members proposing decisions with a financial aspect should contact the Steering Committee directly, or table their proposal as an agenda item for discussion on a monthly developer call.

Non-financial Decisions

All non-financial decisions are made via consensus of the core contributors and relevant repository maintainers. Emeritus core contributors are not considered to be core contributors for this purpose.

Code-related decisions, such when a pull request is ready to be accepted and merged, should be discussed via the relevant GitHub issues and pull requests. If consensus cannot be achieved, the community member proposing the change may be invited by a core contributor to present their proposal at a monthly developer call for further discussion and community input.

Non-code-related decisions, such as long-term strategic planning for JuMP, should either be discussed in a GitHub issue, or tabled as an agenda item and discussed on a monthly developer call.

If consensus on a non-financial decision cannot be achieved, the final decision will be made by the BDFL.

The Steering Committee can gain additional decision-making power if the core contributors decide to delegate.

Conflict of Interest

It is expected that community members will be employed at a wide range of companies, universities, and non-profit organizations. Because of this, it is possible that members will have conflicts of interest. Such conflicts of interest include, but are not limited to:

All members of the Steering Committee shall disclose to the Steering Committee any conflict of interest they may have. Members with a conflict of interest in a particular issue may participate in Steering Committee discussions on that issue, but must recuse themselves from voting.

Core contributors and repository maintainers should also disclose conflicts of interest with other core contributors and step back from decisions when conflicts of interests are in play.

GitHub Permissions

GitHub permissions are used to control access to repositories in the JuMP-dev GitHub organization.

Anyone with commit access to a repository is trusted to use it in a way that is consistent with the Decision Making Process. Those with permissions should prefer pull requests over direct pushes, ask for feedback on changes if they are not sure there is a consensus, and follow JuMP’s style guide and development processes.

Core Contributors

Core contributors are added as Owners of the JuMP-dev GitHub organization and have Admin permission to every repository.

Emeritus Core Contributors

Emeritus core contributors retain the same commit rights as core contributors, unless they choose to surrender them.

Repository Maintainers

Repository maintainers have Maintain rights to an individual repository as an outside collaborator. Among other rights, this allows them to push code to a branch in the JuMP-dev GitHub organization instead of their personal fork, merge pull requests, and close issues.

Community Involvement

The JuMP project highly values the contributions made by members of the community. As an open-source project, JuMP is both made for the community, and by the community.

There are five main channels that JuMP uses to engage with the community.

Community Forum

The community forum is a place for community members to post questions and receive help.

The current forum is the “Optimization (Mathematical)” section of the Julia Discourse Forum.

Developer Chatroom

The developer chatroom is a chatroom for developer-focused discussions about JuMP.

The current chatroom is the #jump-dev channel of the Julia slack.

Monthly Developer Call

The Steering Committee hosts a monthly developer call to discuss JuMP-related business.

The calls are currently scheduled on the fourth Thursday of every month at 14:00 Eastern. For information on how to take part, join the developer chatroom and ask @odow or @mlubin for an invite to the monthly developer call.

The invite contains information on how to table agenda items for upcoming calls.

JuMP-dev Workshops

The Steering Committee will periodically choose a Chair to organize a JuMP-dev workshop.

Previous workshops include Santiago, 2019, Bordeaux, 2018, and Boston, 2017.

Announcements of future workshops will be communicated through the community forum, social media, and via the jump.dev website.

Social Media

The JuMP Twitter handle is @JuMPjl.

Transferring repositories to jump-dev

The JuMP-dev GitHub organization exists to simplify the management of GitHub permissions on JuMP-related repositories. It is not a curation of all JuMP-compatible solvers and supporting packages.

Instead, community members who develop new pure-Julia solvers or solver-wrappers should first add their package to the list of supported solvers in the Installation Guide of the JuMP documentation.

Note that when developing a new solver or JuMP-extension, the core contributors request that you do not use “JuMP” in the name without prior consent.

Even once a package has matured, the bar for transferring repositories to the JuMP-dev GitHub organization is high, and can be summarized by the following:

Community members wishing to transfer a repository from their personal account to the JuMP-dev GitHub organization should contact the core contributors via the developer chatroom.