The Steering Committee’s responsibilities include:
- Establishing rules of governance for the Istio project, including creation and ratification of bylaws for the Steering Committee and Technical Oversight Committee.
- Establishing and enforcing principles to guide the Istio project.
- Fostering an environment for a healthy and happy community of developers, contributors, vendors, and users.
- Defining, evolving, and defending a Code of Conduct.
- Advising the Cloud Native Computing Foundation (CNCF) on issues relating to the Istio trademark and logo, as well as related conformance programs.
- Setting marketing and advocacy direction for the project; establishing a publishing schedule and vetting content, encouraging and assisting community members in creating content for conferences, fostering an ecosystem of vendors.
- Controlling and delegating access to, and establishing processes regarding, project resources/assets, including but not limited to artifact repositories, build and test infrastructure, web sites and their domains, blogs, and social media accounts.
- Providing neutral mediation as appropriate to try to resolve non-technical disputes that arise as part of the project.
- A Company shall mean an entity which employs a member, and all other entities that control, are controlled by, or are under common control with that entity.
- The Steering Committee is structured to allow Companies who are most invested in the success of the Istio project to participate in business and non-technical decision-making.
- All members should abide by the project Code of Conduct.
- There are two types of seats on the Steering Committee: Contribution Seats and Community Seats.
- Both Contribution and Community Seats will be appointed beginning in August 2020. The appointments for the Contribution and Community seat types will expire on staggered dates. After the initial term for both seats, all seats will have an annual term.
- Contribution Seat terms expire on January 31 and Community Seat terms expire on July 31. If necessary, a company holding a Contribution Seat may change the appointed individual at any time during the term.
- No Company can have more than 5 seats in total on the Steering Committee.
- There shall be nine Contribution Seats. Their allocation is determined
by the approximate effort and expenditure on the Istio project. Each year, when
Contribution Seat terms begin, the Steering Committee will vote on an exact
formula and procedure for determining allocation for the following year.
That procedure will be published to the istio/community repository;
modifications subsequent to the annual publication of rules shall be considered
modifications to the Steering Committee Charter.
- At least three Companies shall be represented in the Contribution Seat membership. If the formula and procedure would not award seats to at least three Companies, then the third highest Company shall be awarded a seat, and then the formula and procedure shall be applied to eight seats instead of nine.
- There shall be four Community Seats elected by the Istio contributors
and community, beginning in August 2020.
- Any project member can self-nominate for the election, or nominate another project member with their consent.
- Elections shall use time-limited, Condorcet voting.
- The following are eligible to vote for Community Seats:
- Project members who have had a merged PR in the 12 months prior to the election; and
- People who have submitted a voting exception form to the Steering Committee, demonstrating contribution to the Istio project that is of a non-code nature in the 12 months prior to the election, and are granted a vote for the election by a simple majority vote of the Steering Committee.
- No Company can hold more than one Community Seat.
- Community Seats are maintained for the term by the individual, even
if they change their Company affiliation.
- If an individual changes company affiliation mid-term in a way that is incompatible with the Company representation policies in this Charter, the individual will be considered to have resigned their seat and the first eligible runner-up from the previous election will replace them for the duration of the term. If there is no first runner-up eligible to serve in the as per these rules, then the Steering Committee shall vote by simple majority to replace the seat for the term.
- Because the goal of Community Seats is to increase the perspectives on the Steering Committee, employees of a Company that holds Contribution Seats are ineligible to be elected to hold a Community Seat.
- A simple majority of Seats shall be sufficient to call a vote of the Steering Committee, one nominating, and the rest agreeing, over email. Voting shall be done electronically, in a manner agreed on by the Steering Committee. Voting shall be open for nine calendar days, after which point it shall close. If at any point all the Steering Committee members have voted or abstained, voting shall close.
- An affirmative vote of at least 60% of the Seats shall be the decision of the Steering Committee. However, any changes to the Steering Committee Charter shall require an affirmative vote of at least 80% of the Seats.