After IBM and then Apple joined the OpenJDK Community it became clear that it was time to revive the effort to create a written set of rules by which the Community will operate.

I’m happy to report that, since last November, I’ve been doing just that: Drafting a set of Community Bylaws in collaboration with John Duimovich and Jason Gartner of IBM, Mike Milinkovich of Eclipse, Prof. Doug Lea of SUNY Oswego, and Adam Messinger of Oracle.

We didn’t start this effort from scratch. The draft—which I’ll post for public comment soon—draws upon the earlier work of the Sun-chartered OpenJDK Interim Governance Board and has exactly the same goal: To be a written set of rules that will foster the long-term health and growth of the OpenJDK Community by enabling and encouraging its members to act in an open, transparent, and meritocratic manner.

My sincere thanks to the members of the original Interim Governance Board for their many contributions: Doug Lea, Fabiane Nardon, Simon Phipps, and Dalibor Topić.