Contributing to COSS-Branded Projects: Make a Principled Impact

Contributing to open source is a rewarding way to give back, learn, and collaborate. When you contribute to a Contriboss (COSS) branded project, you’re also helping to build and uphold a standard of neutrality, interoperability, and ethical development. Your skills can make a significant impact on projects that prioritize the health of the broader ecosystem.

Why Contribute to a COSS-Branded Project?

Impact Beyond Code: Your contributions directly support software that aims to be a fair, open, and reliable standard, helping to combat vendor lock-in and promote user freedom.

Uphold Important Principles: You become part of a community that actively values and implements principles of universal access, anti-vendor lock-in, modularity for standardization, and ethical considerations.

Enhance Interoperability: Many COSS-branded projects focus on creating components that work well with others. Your work can directly improve how different systems connect and collaborate.

Foster Trustworthy AI Foundations: If the project is relevant to AI, your contributions can help build the neutral, standardized tools crucial for developing trustworthy and unbiased AI systems.

Collaborate with Principled Developers: Engage with a community that shares a commitment to these higher-level goals for software development.

How to Contribute Effectively and Align with COSS Principles

When contributing to a COSS-branded project, keep the following in mind, particularly in relation to the COSS Brand Principles:

Understand the Project’s Core Mission & COSS Alignment

• Familiarize yourself with the specific project’s goals and how it embodies the COSS principles. Most COSS-branded projects will have this information available.
• Read the project’s contribution guidelines, which may have specific notes related to maintaining COSS compliance.

Prioritize Neutrality and Interoperability (Principle 2 & 4)

• If you’re adding new features or modifying existing ones, consider how your changes will affect the project’s vendor neutrality and its ability to interoperate with other systems.
• Avoid introducing code that specifically favors or requires a particular proprietary product or service for core functionality, unless it’s clearly demarcated as an optional plugin or adapter (as per Principle 3).
• If working on APIs or data formats, lean towards open standards and generic naming.

Respect Universal Access (Principle 1)

• Ensure your contributions don’t inadvertently introduce barriers that would restrict access to the software’s core features for certain groups (beyond what law might require).

Adhere to Contributor Ethics (Principle 5)

This is crucial. Your contributions should not intentionally subvert the COSS principles. This means:

• No sabotage or intentionally degrading functionality for certain use cases or users.
• No introduction of DRM-like restrictions into the core.
• No covert telemetry designed for anti-competitive purposes.
• No politically or religiously motivated alterations to core functionality or data that would compromise the project’s neutrality or factual basis.

Always aim for transparency in your contributions. If a feature might have ethical implications, discuss it openly with the project maintainers.

Follow Standard Open Source Best Practices

• Communicate: Engage with the project maintainers and community before undertaking large changes. Discuss your ideas on their issue tracker or communication channels.
• Code Quality: Write clear, well-documented, and testable code.
• Respect Licensing: Ensure your contributions are compatible with the project’s underlying permissive license (e.g., MIT) and that you have the right to contribute the code.
• Be Constructive: Participate respectfully in discussions and code reviews.

Finding COSS-Branded Projects to Contribute To

(Future) COSS Project Showcase: Keep an eye on our website for a directory of COSS-branded projects (link to /projects or /for-projects/showcase when available).

Look for the COSS Mark: As projects adopt the standard, they will display the COSS Mark.

Your contributions, guided by these principles, are invaluable. By participating in COSS-branded projects, you’re not just writing code or documentation; you’re actively shaping a more open, fair, and innovative future for technology.