Note: This document is mostly oriented towards internal guidelines, but you may be interested by it if you wish to join our team. Time and other regional references mentioned in this document are relative to Sofia, Bulgaria. Sofia time is UCT + 2.

Communication and netiquette

 The use of e-mail is important. You should answer within 24 hours delay at most. For this reason, we will try to limit e-mail communication to essential topics.

 You are free to communicate in either Bulgarian or English. The only exception is in CVS comments and source code, which must be in English.

 Main discussion for software development must be made on the public and archived mailing list that will be refered in this text as “lcm-dev”:

• legalcase-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
• https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/legalcase-devel

 Requests and internal communication must be made on the private mailing-list that will be refered to in this text as “lcm-core”:

• legalcase-core@lists.sourceforge.net
• https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/legalcase-core

 On mailing-lists, we expect you to respect basic netiquette rules:

• http://www.ngo-bg.org/article20.html (english)
• http://www.ngo-bg.org/article28.html (bulgarian)

 You are strongly advised to stick to the topic of the respective lists and avoid posting material such as jokes, weekend anecdotes and other non-project related material on project lists.

 Subjects related to bureaucracy and money should be posted only on lcm-core (private archives), while code-related subjects should be posted only on lcm-dev unless there are particular reasons not to. In the latter case, a short justification should be included in the message.

 Many financial and political issues have reasons which have been debated by the project leaders, the funder and the users. Please keep this in mind if you decide to criticise those goals in public or to participate in a public debate. The ’lcm-core’ list is the recommended resource for such questions and debates. If questionned about such issues, please let the project managers answer the question. If necessary, we will publish a list of frequently asked questions on the project website.

 We request that you use the lists as much as possible, except for personal or confidential topics, since this provides us with archives that we cannot modify. In case of disagreement, the archives will be a good reference. They are also a very valuable resource for when we will need to report to the funder.

Team and work guidelines

 We encourage the use of Free Software. If you chose to work with non-free software, then this must not create a software dependancy on other members of the team.

 Use “open formats”. Proprietary file formats may not be stored in the CVS nor published on our website since other members of the team may not have access to such proprietary software necessary to access information stored in proprietary formats. If you need to work with a proprietary format or if you are not sure, please confirm with the software project leader (Mathieu) via lcm-core.

 Your computer is your responsability, but we can provide technical assistance regarding the use of free software if it concerns the project.

 You may spend up to 10% of your “work time” per week (e.g. billed time) to improve your personal computer if it concerns the use or installation of free software. If you estimate that a task will take more than 10% of your work time or if the task concerns non-free software, you must first ask for authorization to the software project leader (Mathieu) via lcm-core.

 Every team member must shortly and clearly report the hours spent on each tasks before Friday 16h00 of every week. Such a report includes the daily tasks and the number of hours they represent. For example: "Monday: 2 hours on case information form, 3 hours on accessibility testing, .. Tuesday: ..., etc.". Reports should be sent to Mathieu personally.

 We will meet via the Internet every second week for up to 1 hour. Presence will be obligatory. If it will be impossible for you to participate, please warn us 2 days in advance so that we can move the meeting. The exact date/time and program used for meeting will be chosen on the 6th of september.

 Reports and deliveries must be made on time. If this is not possible, you must warn the code project leader (Mathieu) in advance, and explain the difficulties. Permission for over-time work must be requested a few days in advance.

 If you estimate that you will need additional financial resources for your tasks (such as making long distance calls or travelling around the country), please make a request to lcm-core first and wait for approval. In many cases, financial issues must be approved by our accountant.

CVS guidelines

 CVS provides a good journal of the evolution of your work and efforts. It will be an important resource for the reporting of the work to our funder and will avoid constant interrogation by the project leaders.

 Therefore, you are encouraged to "commit" your work after the completion of a given task, no matter how small.

 You are encouraged to create a branch if you are going to start a large experimental task that will alter an existing function. If you are only adding a new function that will not break the work of another member, there is no need to make a branch.

 Clear and short English comments must be included in every commit.

 Make one commit per task. For example, don’t commit 5 files with the message "fixed bugs", fix one bug at the time and explain what was the bug and if exists, the Source Forge tracker reference.