From its inception as Hydra, Samvera has been designed to provide a generalizable, portable framework that would meet the needs not only of the three original institutions, but also those of a wider community. Originating as a multi-institutional project spanning three universities (Hull, Stanford and Virginia), and with support from Fedora Commons, Samvera has since expanded to include like-minded institutions with similar needs, technical infrastructures and complementary systems.
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Community Structure and Responsibilities
Adopters
Samvera is committed to being free and open source software. Adopters are members of the Samvera Community who use the software. The Community would not be what it is without adopters. Adoption, and all kinds of contributions big and small, can build toward Partnership.
Partnership
At the heart of the Samvera Community are the Samvera Partners, those who both use the software and formally contribute to the Samvera effort overallSamvera Partners are individuals, institutions, corporations or other groups that have formally committed to contributing to the Samvera Community. Samvera Partners collectively advance the project and the Community for the benefit of all participants.
The Samvera Partners include contribute to groups that coordinate effort across activity from multiple institutions and development efforts. These include the Steering Group, the Roadmap Council and , the Core Components Maintenance Group and Samvera’s Interest and Working Groups, as well as project-specific teams that focus on particular efforts teams working on specific projects and solutions such as the Avalon Media System, Hyrax, and Hyku solution bundles.
Samvera Partners are individuals, institutions, corporations or other groups that have formally committed to contributing to the Samvera Community; they not only use the Samvera technical framework, but also add to it. Samvera Partners collectively advance the project and the Community for the benefit of all participants.
Partnership is earned by actively contributing to the Community. Partners:
- Contribute. In at least
- any one or more of many ways, give
- : code, analysis, design, documentation, presentations and other forms of communication, marketing, support, funding, participation in working/interest groups, or other resources.
- Meet. Participate in the
- Samvera Partner meetings and other conversations that shape our future. Attend Samvera Partner Meetings, held twice a year.
- Vote. As a Partner, it is a duty and privilege to vote in elections
- on elected positions and on other matters of importance.
- Lead. Help lead the way by participating in the governance of Samvera. Partners may provide input on the Community and technical direction up to the highest levels, and represent Samvera to the broader community.
- Stay Informed. Additionally, be among the first to be notified of any known security issues and fixes, ahead of the information being made public.
How to become a Samvera Partner
The steps to become a Samvera Partner are:
Nomination. Be nominated by an existing Partner.
Invitation. Get invited to be a Partner by the Steering Group.
Application. Submit a brief letter of intent (which will be posted publicly) and the corporate Contributor License Agreement, and sign a Letter of Agreement (LoA) in support of the formal, legal Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) [PDF].
Approval. Be voted in by the Steering Group, and
Announcement. Be welcomed formally to the Community as a Partner.
Partners sign a formal one page Letter of Agreement (LoA) in support of the formal and legal Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) signed by the Steering Group in April 2012. Additionally, each Partner is asked at the time of joining the group to write a brief letter of intent indicating why they want to become a Samvera Partner and what they intend to contribute to the Community. (Note that we post these letters publicly in the wiki.) Partners are also required to have on file a corporate Contributor License Agreement (see Samvera Community Intellectual Property Licensing and Ownership page) to ensure that the Community can accept code and other intellectual contributions from the Partner institution. A composite document comprising the 2012 MoU, amendments made to it in 2018 to reflect the name change from Hydra to Samvera, changes made in 2019 to reflect governance changes in the Community, a version of the MoU showing the effect of these amendments, and a blank Letter of Agreement can be found here.
How to stop being a Samvera Partner
The steps to relinquish partnership are:
Notify. Provide notice in writing to the Samvera Steering Group that you wish to withdraw from your partner agreement; or
Vote. A majority of Partners in good standing vote to remove a Partner.
Partnership Fees
Samvera has operational costs and a budget managed by the Steering Group, and monetary contributions are vital to sustaining the mission. In 2018 the Samvera Partners unanimously adopted the recommendations of its Governance Working Group which included the hire of centralized staff and the development of a Partner financial contribution model to support the additional expenditure this would bring. In early 2020, after much consultation, the recommendations of the Contribution Model Working Group were adopted. These recommendations will inform Samvera's fundraising operations from 2020 on and will require Partners to make a minimum contribution (based on organizational size) to Samvera's funds each year.
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Benefits
By investing financially in Samvera’s future, Partners help ensure the longevity of the Community and its software. By contributing to Samvera’s Working and Interest Groups, and by having staff participate in the further development of our code and solutions, Partners protect their own investment in our products and services.
In return for Partner contributions, the Community undertakes to provide a number of specific services in return. These These include:
- The right to vote in formal Samvera decision making (one vote per Partner institution)
- The right to put up candidates for election to the Samvera Steering Group
- The right to attend Partner meetings and Partner calls
- The right to advance information about any security vulnerabilities discovered in Samvera software (via the Partners’ closed mailing list)
- Centrally coordinated legal and financial services relating to
- Rights management
- Financial stewardship
- Legal issues (including trademark)
- Marketing (including website and wiki)
- An annual Samvera Connect conference
- An annual Samvera Virtual Connect
- Access to the services of any Samvera appointed employees to help further local Samvera initiatives
- Public acknowledgement of Partnership in/on appropriate publicity materials (including the website and wiki)
Roles and Responsibilities
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In addition, there are less tangible, but potentially important, aspects to Samvera Partnership. For instance, many of our Partners have been successful in obtaining grants from philanthropic funds to assist and/or enhance the development of their local systems. An institution’s involvement in a larger community, and a commitment to feeding back developments for the wider benefit, can be seen to support the case for grant funding. The track record of Samvera Partners in successfully delivering the outputs of their respective grants and contributing those back to community solutions may be seen as a further benefit.
Responsibilities
All Samvera Partners are empowered with the responsibility to promote the well-being and development of the Community. Collectively Collectively, the Partners share responsibilities, including, but not limited to:
- Electing representatives to the Steering Group
- Community maintenance and growth
- Collaborative roadmapping (technical & community)
- Samvera application development
- Governance of, maintenance of and code contribution to the core components
- Design contribution: UI's, API's, data models, et al.
- Documentation and sharing of contributions, eg. through http://samvera.github.io/
- Community infrastructure provisioning & support (Bug trackers, Continuous Integration Servers, Web site, Wiki, etc.)
- Maintenance of the official Samvera website
- Resource coordination Recruiting
- Recruitment
- Community advocacy (e.g., public speaking, writing articles)
- Participation and leadership in "Interest Groups" and "Working Groups" within the Samvera Community
- Meeting organization & planning
- Determining Community strategy
In January 2020, the Partners decided to adopt a financial Contribution Model to replace the system of voluntary donations that had previously been in place. The intention is that the increased revenue generated should be used both to fund the Community’s annually recurrent expenditure and to hire a full time Community Manager. Ultimately it is hoped that it will also be possible to hire a Technical Manager. The minimum level of contribution is determined by the size of the Partner organization.
How to become a Samvera Partner
The steps to become a Samvera Partner are:
- Participation: Participate in the Samvera Community in one or more of the many ways described above.
- Nomination. Be nominated by an existing Partner.
- Invitation. Get invited to be a Partner by the Steering Group.
- Application. Submit a brief letter of intent and the corporate Contributor License Agreement, and sign a Letter of Agreement (LoA) in support of the formal, legal Memorandum of Understanding (MoU).
- Approval. Be voted in by the Steering Group, and
- Announcement. Be welcomed formally to the Community as a Partner.
Partners sign a formal one page Letter of Agreement (LoA) in support of the formal and legal Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) signed by the Steering Group in April 2012 (see below). Additionally, each Partner is asked at the time of joining the group to write a brief letter of intent indicating why they want to become a Samvera Partner and what they intend to contribute to the Community. (Note that we post these letters publicly in the wiki.) Partners are also required to have on file a corporate Contributor License Agreement (see Samvera Community Intellectual Property Licensing and Ownership page) to ensure that the Community can accept code and other intellectual contributions from the Partner institution. A composite document comprising the 2012 MoU, amendments made to it in 2018 to reflect the name change from Hydra to Samvera, changes made in 2019 to reflect governance changes in the Community, a version of the MoU showing the effect of these amendments, and a blank Letter of Agreement can be found here.
How to stop being a Samvera Partner
A Partner may leave by providing written notice to the Samvera Steering Group that they wish to withdraw from the Partner agreement.
Samvera Steering Group
The Samvera Steering Group is drawn from the Samvera Community. It consists of nine members elected from the Partner institutions. Each year, three members step down in rotation and elections are held to fill the three seats. Steering Group members are elected for three years and may serve no more than two contiguous terms. No two members may be supported concurrently by the same Partner institution. Steering Group members take on the same responsibilities as Partners and additional responsibilities including, but not limited to:
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The current set of Bylaws governing the operation of the Steering Group can be found here.
Samvera Code Development
Anyone is welcome to use, improve, and hack on the Samvera codebase -- the code is open source!
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Our code development is overseen and coordinated by a number of groups. The Roadmap Council exists to align the roadmaps of the various Samvera code initiatives where this makes sense. The council comprises the product owners of the core Samvera components and Solution Bundles and of representatives from relevant Interest or Working Groups. The essential elements of the Samvera code are maintained by the Core Components Maintenance Group which is devoted to the ongoing maintenance of identified core components via planned sprints organized in communication with the product owners. Hyrax, the repository toolkit that underpins other solution bundles has two key working groups: one for coordinating development, and another for its roadmap. Our solution bundles (Hyku and Avalon) each have their own development teams responsive to the needs of, and advised by, their users.
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