Cool! I see you have mentors lined up. I would love to also be involved as mentor.
The list of initial committers seems a little small. Browsing the commit history it does seem to be dominated by just a couple of contributors. I see this is acknowledged (at least implicitly) in the proposal. I expect a principal challenge will be attracting diverse contributors, committers, and PMC to ensure this project survives independent of any particular entity (individual or corporate). Kenn On Wed, Oct 30, 2019 at 1:16 PM Dominik Riemer <rie...@fzi.de> wrote: > Hi all, > > > > a short introduction to myself: My name is Dominik Riemer and I'm a > co-initiator of StreamPipes, an open source self-service toolbox for > analyzing IoT data streams. After presenting the tool at this year's > ApacheCon NA, followed by very friendly and fruitful discussions with many > people from the Apache community, we are sure that we'd like continue the > development of StreamPipes as an Apache community project. Before we start > a discussion process, I'd like to ask to get write access to the Incubator > wiki (username: riemer). An initial draft of the proposal is attached below. > > > > Thanks for your help! > > Dominik > > > > > > -------------------------------- > > > > StreamPipes - Apache Incubator Proposal, Proposal Draft > > > > == Abstract == > > StreamPipes is a self-service (Industrial) IoT toolbox to enable > non-technical users to connect, analyze and explore (Industrial) IoT data > streams. > > > > = Proposal = > > > > The goal of StreamPipes (www.streampipes.org<http://www.streampipes.org>) > is to provide an easy-to-use toolbox for non-technical users, e.g., domain > experts, to exploit data streams coming from (Industrial) IoT devices. Such > users are provided with an intuitive graphical user interface with the > Pipeline Editor at its core. Users are able to graphically model processing > pipelines based on data sources (streams), data processors and data sinks. > Data processors and sinks are self-contained microservices, which implement > either stateful or stateless processing logic (e.g., a trend detection or > image classifier). Their processing logic is implemented using one of > several provided wrappers (we currently have wrappers for > standalone/Edge-based processing, Apache Flink, Siddhi and working wrapper > prototypes for Apache Kafka Streams and Spark, in the future we also plan > to integrate with Apache Beam). An SDK allows to easily create new pipeline > elements. Pipeline elements can be installed at runtime. To support users > in creating pipelines, an underlying semantics-based data model enables > pipeline elements to express requirements on incoming data streams that > need to be fulfilled, thus reducing modeling errors. > > Data streams are integrated by using StreamPipes Connect, which allows to > connect data sources (based on standard protocols, such as MQTT, Kafka, > Pulsar, OPC-UA and further PLC4X-supported protocols) without further > programming using a graphical wizard. Additional user-faced modules of > StreamPipes are a Live dashboard to quickly explore IoT data streams and a > wizard that generates code templates for new pipeline elements, a Pipeline > Element Installer used to extend the algorithm feature set at runtime. > > > > === Background === > > StreamPipes was started in 2014 by researchers from FZI Research Center > for Information Technology in Karlsruhe, Germany. The original prototype > was funded by an EU project centered around predictive analytics for the > manufacturing domain. Since then, StreamPipes was constantly improved and > extended by public funding mainly from federal German ministries. In early > 2018, the source code was officially released under the Apache License 2.0. > At the same time, while we focused on bringing the research prototype to a > production-grade tool, the first companies started to use StreamPipes. > Currently, the primary goal is to widen the user and developer base. At > ApacheCon NA 2019, after having talked to many people from the Apache > Community, we finally decided that we would like to bring StreamPipes to > the Apache Incubator. > > > > === Rationale === > > The (Industrial) IoT domain is a highly relevant and emerging sector. > Currently, IoT platforms are offered by many vendors ranging from SMEs up > to large enterprises. We believe that open source alternatives are an > important cornerstone for manufacturing companies to easily adopt > data-driven decision making. From our point of view, StreamPipes fits very > well into the existing (I)IoT ecosystem within the ASF, with projects such > as Apache PLC4X focusing on connecting machine data from PLCs, or other > tools we are also using either in the core of StreamPipes or with > integrations (Apache Kafka, Apache IoTDB, Apache Pulsar). StreamPipes > itself focuses on enabling self-service IoT data analytics for > non-technical users. > > The whole StreamPipes code is currently on Github. To get a rough estimate > of the project size: > > * streampipes: Backend and core modules, ~3300 commits > > * streampipes-ui: User Interface, ~1300 commits > > * streampipes-pipeline-elements: ~100 Pipeline Elements (data > processors/algorithms and sinks), ~500 Commits > > * streampipes-connect-adapters: ~20 Adapters to connect data, ~100 commits > To achieve our goal to further extend the code base with new features, new > connectors and new algorithms and to grow both the user and developer > community, we believe that a community-driven development process is the > best way to further develop StreamPipes. Finally, after having talked to > committers from various Apache IoT-related projects and participation in > spontaneous hacking sessions and being impressed by the collaboration among > individual projects, we decided that (from our point of view) the ASF is > the ideal place to be the future home of StreamPipes. > > > > === Initial Goals === > > * Move the existing codebase to Apache > > * Fully align with Apache development- and release processes > > * Perform name search and do a thorough review of existing licenses > > * First Apache release > > > > === Current Status === > > ** Meritocracy ** > > We are absolutely committed to strengthen StreamPipes as a real > community-driven open source project. The existing committer base is highly > motivated to foster the open source way in the industrial IoT sector and, > together with existing Apache communities focused on this domain, provide > open source tooling for Industrial IoT projects in the same way Apache > offers in the Big Data space, for instance. > > The development philosophy behind StreamPipes has always followed the > principles of meritocracy - although most committers are still active in > the project, we managed to onboard new, committed developers regularly. 2 > people, who are today core of the developer team, have joined during the > past year. Therefore, we would aim to continuously expand the PMC and > committer base based on merit. > > > > ** Community ** > > Since being open-sourced in 2018, the public interest in StreamPipes has > steadily grown. Several companies, mainly from the manufacturing domain, > have tested StreamPipes in form of proof-of-concept projects. First > companies have started to use StreamPipes in production. This was due to a > high number of events from meetups, research conferences, demo sessions up > to hackathons we participated or organized during the past two years. After > having generated a general interest in StreamPipes, our next focus will be > to find more committers to diversify the contributor base. > > > > ** Core Developers ** > > The core developers of the system are Dominik Riemer, Philipp Zehnder, > Patrick Wiener and Johannes Tex. All core developers are initial committers > in the current proposal. Some former students who recently started to work > at companies and who have also worked on the project with great commitment, > will be asked to further contribute to the project. > > > > ** Alignment ** > > StreamPipes has dependencies to a lot of existing Apache projects - this > is one reason why we think that the ASF is the best future home for > StreamPipes. The messaging layer is based on Apache Kafka (and also Apache > Pulsar as a future option), and runtime wrappers exist for Apache Flink, > Apache Spark and Apache Kafka Streams. StreamPipes Connect already includes > adapters for several Apache projects. Most importantly, we integrate (and > plan to deepen the integration) with IIoT-focused projects such as Apache > PLC4X. Also, several data sinks exist to send messages to tools from other > Apache projects (e.g., Apache Kafka, Apache Pulsar, and Apache IoTDB). > Together with these tools (and also after having talked to the core > developers after this year's ApacheCon) we are absolutely convinced that a > tight integration between these tools will strengthen the open source IoT > ecosystem. > > > > === Known Risks === > > ** Orphaned Products ** > > We don't expect the risk of an orphaned product. The initial committers > have worked on the project for years and are absolutely committed to making > this open source tool a great success. All initial committers are committed > to work on StreamPipes in their free time. > > > > ** Inexperience with Open Source ** > > All initial committers have years of expertise related to open source > development and understand what open source means. However, none of the > initial committers are currently committers to Apache projects, although > some have already contributed to some projects. From a variety of events > and from intensively studying Apache mailing lists, we are sure that the > Apache Way is the way we'd like the project to move into the future. We > expect to benefit from the experiences from the ASF in building successful > open source projects. > > > > ** Length of Incubation ** > > We are aware that incubation is a process that is focused on building the > community, learning the Apache Way and other important things such as > learning the release process and handling licensing and trademark issues. > We are also aware that, although there is a steadily increasing interest in > StreamPipes, a major challenge we would need (and are willing) to work on > during the incubation phase is widening the committer base. We look forward > to that as a large developer base is exactly what we are striving for. > > > > ** Homogeneous Developers ** > > Most current developers work for the same institution (FZI). The > motivation of all developers goes beyond their commitment to work and all > current committers work on StreamPipes in their free time. Recently, we > have received first pull requests from external contributors and a growing > interest from users and companies outside of FZI. First manufacturing > companies have already evaluated and adopted StreamPipes. To attract > external developers, we've created an extensive documentation, have a Slack > channel to quickly answer questions, and provide help via mail. Therefore, > we believe that making the developer community more heterogeneous is not > only mandatory, but something that can be achieved during the next months. > > > > ** Reliance on salaried developers ** > > Currently, StreamPipes receives support from salaried developers, mainly > research scientists from FZI. However, all core developers substantially > work on StreamPipes in their spare time. As this has been the case from the > beginning in early 2014, it can be expected that a substantial portion of > volunteers will continue to be working on the project and we aim at > strengthening the base of non-paid committers and paid committers of other > companies. At the same time, funding of the initial StreamPipes team is > secured by public funding for the next few years, making sure that there > will be also enough commitment from developers during their work time. > > > > ** Relationships with other Apache products ** StreamPipes is often > compared to tools such as Node-Red and Apache Nifi. This is mainly based on > a similar UI concept (dataflow approach). Despite some technological > differences (e.g., the microservice analytics approach vs. single-host > runtime of Node-Red, the wrapper architecture and the underlying > semantics-based model), we believe the target audience differs. We aim to > collaborate with the Apache Nifi community in terms of exchanging best > practices and also integrating both projects (e.g., by building connectors). > > As mentioned above, quite a few adapters and data sinks are already > available that link to existing Apache projects. > > > > ** An excessive fascination with the Apache Brand ** Although we recognize > the Apache brand as the most visible brand in the open source domain, the > primary goal of this proposal is not to create publicity, but to widen the > developer base. We believe that successful projects have broad and diverse > communities. We expect that an Apache project, with a clear and proven way > to develop open source software, helps in finding new committers. As the > core development team has already worked on StreamPipes for the past few > years and is fully committed to the software and its benefit for the > industrial IoT domain, we would also continue development without being an > Apache project. > > > > === Documentation === > > Currently, we host a website at https://www.streampipes.org More > technical info (user + developer guide) can be found in the documentation: > https://docs.streampipes.org, where users can find tutorials and manuals > on how to extend StreamPipes using the SDK. > > > > === Initial Source === > > Currently, the following Github repositories exist, all licensed under the > Apache Software License 2.0: > > * streampipes (https://www.github.com /streampipes/streampipes, the > backend & pipeline management module) > > * streampipes-ui (https://www.github.com/streampipes/streampipes-ui, the > UI module) > > * streampipes-pipeline-elements ( > https://www.github.com/streampipes/streampipes-pipeline-elements, library > of data processors and sinks) > > * streampipes-connect-adapters ( > https://www.github.com/streampipes/streampipes-connect-adapters, > StreamPipes connect adapters) > > * streampipes-docs (https://www.github.com/streampipes/streampipes-docs, > the abovementioned documentation) > > > > === Source and intellectual property submission plan === All initial > committers will sign a ICLA with the ASF. FZI, as the organizational body > that has employed the main contributors of StreamPipes, will sign a CCLA > and donate the codebase to the ASF (both subject to formal approval). All > major contributors are still active in the project. > > > > === External Dependencies === > > We did an initial review of all dependencies used in the various projects. > No critical libraries that depend on category X licenses were found, some > minor issues have already been resolved (e.g., removing dependencies to > org.json libraries). Most external dependencies used by the Java-based > (backend, pipeline-elements and connect) modules are licensed under the > Apache License 2.0, whereas some licenses are Cat B (e.g., CDDL). Most > external dependencies the UI requires on are licensed under the MIT license. > > Once we are moving to the Incubator, we would do a complete check of all > transitive dependencies. We don't expect any surprises here. > > > > === Cryptography === > > (not applicable) > > > > === Required Resources === > > ** Mailing Lists ** > > We plan to use the following mailing lists: > > * us...@streampipes.incubator.apache.org<mailto: > us...@streampipes.incubator.apache.org> > > * d...@streampipes.incubator.apache.org<mailto: > d...@streampipes.incubator.apache.org> > > * priv...@streampipes.incubator.apache.org<mailto: > priv...@streampipes.incubator.apache.org> > > * comm...@streampipes.incubator.apache.org<mailto: > comm...@streampipes.incubator.apache.org> > > As StreamPipes is targeted to a non-technical audience, we see a dedicated > user mailing list as an important requirement to help users. > > > > ** Subversion directory ** > > (not applicable) > > > > ** Git repositories ** > > We would like to use Git for source code management and enable Github > mirroring functionality. > > > > As we plan to merge some of the repos described above to simplify the > release process we ask to create the following source repositories: > > * streampipes (containing backend + UI) > > * streampipes-extensions (containing modules that can be dynamically > installed at runtime: pipeline elements and connect adapters) > > * streampipes-website (containing docs + website) > > > > ** Issue tracking ** > > JIRA ID: StreamPipes > > > > === Initial Committers === > > List of initial committers in alphabetical order: > > Christofer Dutz (christofer.dutz at c-ware dot de) Dominik Riemer (dominik > dot riemer at gmail dot com) Johannes Tex (tex at fzi dot de) Patrick > Wiener (wiener at fzi dot de) Philipp Zehnder (zehnder at fzi dot de) > > > > === Sponsors === > > ** Champion ** > > * Christofer Dutz (christofer.dutz at c-ware dot de) > > > > ** Mentors ** > > * Christofer Dutz (christofer.dutz at c-ware dot de) > > * Julian Feinauer (Jfeinauer at apache dot org) > > * Justin Mclean (justin at classsoftware dot com) > > > > ** Sponsoring Entity ** > > The Apache Incubator > >
