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• Provide a mechanism for transparent collaboration between geographically dispersed participants throughout all phases
• Allow each "incubation thing" to specify entry and exit criteria for each phase in a way that makes sense for that "incubation thing".
• The phases of the "incubation thing" must be easily understandable with specific entry and exit criteria
• A "incubation thing" must be well supported in order to remain active
• The status, activity, traction etc. of the each "incubation thing" must be readily available and easy to understand
• An "incubation thing" can be private or public. Pentaho uses the "incubation thing" process internally for management services and strategic partnership opportunities.
• The visibility can change during the "incubation thing". For example - Conception and Seeding can be restricted, then "opened" to the community for the rest of the "incubation thing"
• "incubation thing" can be terminated in any phase due to lack of interest or progress
• There may be different end games: results in new Pentaho open source project, new independent open source project, work gets folded into the Pentaho product, it becomes Allow for different conclusions for difference processes.  Here are some of the common results:
  • New Pentaho open source product
  • Added functionality for an existing product
  • New independent open source project
  • Becomes part of a non Pentaho open source
  project, it gets trashed, etc
  • project
  • A third party takes over the project
  • The idea gets trashed
  • ...

The "incubation thing"

The following diagram illustrated the steps in a typical development "incubation thing". The bullet points under each phase is only to illustrate the things that could happen during that phase in a typical process. They are not meant to be the rules that absolutely define each phase. Each "incubation thing" that follows this process will define the entry/exit criteria for each step. This should make the process work for the "incubation thing" and not try to shoehorn every "incubation thing" into the same exact steps.

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