Re: [jakartaee-implementation-leads] [jakartaee-spec-project-leads] Proj

[Eclipse Management Office EMO <emo@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Hey Scott.

Here are some answers...

1.  How does the project lead get email addresses for committers that appear to be inactive to confirm that that they no longer can continue to contribute to the project?  

The EF cannot provide email addresses. To do so would violate the privacy policy. The practice that other project leads follow is to use the PMI to determine which committers are inactive and then post the names of inactive committers on the project's main communication channel (usually the dev list or an issue) with instructions for those individuals to respond if they feel that they should retain committer status. Set a reasonable deadline and retire everybody who does not respond when that date passes.

This technique has the benefit of being entirely transparent.

If the list of committers is so large that flipping through the PMI pages to determine who is active and who is not is especially cumbersome, then you can ask the EMO to run a query and generate a list for you.

Bear in mind that committer status is an important part of the IP workflows in the specification process and that it is normal to have inactive committers who represent member companies on specification projects.

 

2.  Any advice on retiring committers that appear inactive but they may become active if no one else can do work?

Traditionally, we have deferred to project leads and the PMC to decide what makes sense for the project. More recently, however, the EMO and Security Team have started to be concerned that long-term inactive committers represent a potential security risk. This is a topic that I intend to bring up with the Eclipse Technical Advisory Council.

We tend to not put value on what somebody may do.

 

3.  How long should the project lead wait for a response from an inactive committer before retiring them?  

My thinking is that the sweet spot is four weeks, and never during the summer.

If you make a horrible, horrible mistake and retire somebody by accident, contact the EMO and we'll help you sort it out.

HTH,

Wayne 

On Thu, Feb 19, 2026 at 1:45 PM Scott Marlow <scott.marlow.opensource@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:

Thank you Tanja for raising this topic!  For others reference, I found the "Committer Retirement" section in https://www.eclipse.org/projects/handbook/#elections-retire-cm helpful to understand what "inactive" means exactly.  I'll paste some text from that here and ask some followup questions below as well:

"
A project lead may also retire a committer. A project lead might, for example, retire a committer that has been inactive for an extended period of time (e.g., longer than a year). Before retiring a committer, the project’s community should be informed of the change and the committer must be given a chance to defend retaining their status via the project’s

Retired committers are listed as Historic Committers on a project’s Who’s Involved page. To restore an historic committer to committer status, they must be re-elected into the role.

A common practice is for the project lead to use the project’s dev-list to announce generically that they’re going to retire committers that have been inactive for some designated period of time and give the committers a chance to speak up before a deadline.

There is no means by which a committer can be forced out of a project if they have not done anything wrong (there is no notion of "voting a committer out" of a project). Leaving the company that sponsors the project, for example, is not a valid reason for retirement. On the other hand, that a committer has changed jobs or roles and can no longer continue to contribute the project is a completely valid reason for retirement.

"

1.  How does the project lead get email addresses for committers that appear to be inactive to confirm that that they no longer can continue to contribute to the project?  

2.  Any advice on retiring committers that appear inactive but they may become active if no one else can do work?

3.  How long should the project lead wait for a response from an inactive committer before retiring them?  

Thanks,

Scott

On Wed, Feb 18, 2026 at 3:14 PM Tanja Obradovic via jakartaee-spec-project-leads <jakartaee-spec-project-leads@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

Dear Project Team Leads,

We have noticed that for some projects, the status of committers and contributors has not been updated for some time. In several cases, individuals listed as active are no longer engaged.

As an example, Jakarta Persitance is a very active project; however, its current list of committers and contributors includes individuals who appear to have been inactive for a while.

Could you please review and update the status of your project’s committers and contributors at your earliest convenience?

I have copied the EMO for support, should you need any assistance in completing this task.

Additionally, I would like to encourage you to remind your teams to use the appropriate project labels to help us better engage and onboard new contributors.

Thank you for your attention to this matter.

Many thanks!
Tanja

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Tanja Obradović

Java Programs, Sr. Manager | Eclipse Foundation

Twitter:@TanjaEclipse

Eclipse Foundation: The Community for Open Collaboration and Innovation

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