The Shibboleth Project, as distinct from the Shibboleth Consortium , is a traditional open source software project that is self-governing, under the control of the project's participants, known as Committers. Of course, this independence extends only so far, since the project's viability financially is dependent on the Consortium's success in attracting financial support for our work. To formalize the relationship, the Consortium's primary Operating Resolution, adopted in conjunction with the initial charter, contains a pair of sections, 4 and 5, that describe the Project's organization and governance, and the expectations placed on its participants.

Without repeating that material here, the highlights and some elaborations are:

• Project participants are known as Committers, signifying they have commit access to our source code respository.
• Important or contentious project decisions are in the hands of a Project Management Committee, or PMC, which is a subset of the Committers. Voting, in the rare cases it is necessary, is done by seeking 3 yes votes and 0 no votes on an issue, and then discussion on any objecting votes to attempt to reach consensus.
• The PMC is tasked with bestowing Committer status and that status is reviewed at least annually by the PMC.
• The Consortium Board has the right to request the removal of a Committer in rare circumstances but the final authority rests with the PMC.
• The PMC is ultimately responsible for the collective work product of the project and has the final authority over the acceptance of any contribution into the code base. In practice this acceptance is implied by the granting of Committer status, and all Committers are expected to review each other's contributions.

The Project Membership page contains the updated list of Committers and PMC members.

The Committer Agreement (DRAFT, not yet approved) contains the terms of participation in the project by Committers.

The policy for contributions to the project by both Committers and outside contributors is described on the Contribution Policy page (also DRAFT).