200 lines
11 KiB
Plaintext
200 lines
11 KiB
Plaintext
<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0in" align="CENTER"><b>Project
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Submission Guidelines</b></p>
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<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0in"><br>
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</p>
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<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0in">At Handmade Network, we
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pride ourselves on being open to hosting all sorts of projects, from
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low level tools to games to conscientious web applications to
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innumerable other carefully crafted varieties of software. With this
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in mind, there are certain standards of content quality that we
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expect projects hosted on the site to meet, and certain
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characteristics that we believe projects should uphold in order to
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best contribute to the community of software development we are
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attempting to cultivate.
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</p>
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<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0in"><br>
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</p>
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<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0in">This document outlines
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these standards and characteristics as specifically as possible,
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allowing for exceptions both in favor and against project approval if
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unanticipated circumstances arise. All project approvals or
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rejections will be accompanied by a justification, and we expect to
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be held accountable if the provided justification is insufficiently
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backed by these guidelines.</p>
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<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0in"><br>
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</p>
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<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0in"><b>Content Quality</b></p>
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<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0in; font-weight: normal">A
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high-quality Handmade Network project submission will:</p>
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<ol>
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<li><p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0in"><b>Have a relevant
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and informative blurb</b><span style="font-weight: normal"> which
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gives those browsing project listings a basic idea of the project's
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purpose and value. The 'elevator pitch', if you will.</span></p>
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</li><li><p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0in"><b>Have a thorough
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description</b><span style="font-weight: normal">, which will give
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visitors several vital pieces of information in understanding the
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project:</span></p>
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<ol type="i">
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<li><p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0in; font-weight: normal">
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The background / impetus for the project’s creation</p>
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</li><li><p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0in; font-weight: normal">
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The project's short-term and long-term goals</p>
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</li><li><p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0in; font-weight: normal">
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The current status of the project</p>
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</li><li><p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0in"><span style="font-weight: normal">The
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road-map to reaching these goals, both short- and long-term</span></p>
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</li></ol>
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</li></ol>
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<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0in; font-weight: normal"> Excellent
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descriptions will also make use of (BBCode) markup to make it easier
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for readers to scan for relevant information.</p>
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<ol start="3">
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<li><p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0in"><b>Provide links
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to other relevant websites</b> where visitors may find out more
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about project development or the current activity of the author(s).
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Common examples:</p>
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<ol type="i">
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<li><p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0in">A YouTube channel
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where the author(s) showcase latest features or record development
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logs</p>
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</li><li><p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0in">An external
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project homepage where new development builds can be found</p>
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</li><li><p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0in">An external
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source-code hosting site where the project's source code is
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available</p>
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</li><li><p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0in">A social media
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page for the project or the author(s) showing development progress</p>
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</li></ol>
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</li><li><p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0in">P<b>rovide several
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screenshots showcasing the current state of project development</b>,
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if the project is visually oriented. Examples:</p>
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<ol type="i">
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<li><p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0in">A project with a
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graphical user interface should show what a typical user will see
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when interacting with the running program</p>
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</li><li><p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0in">Same goes for
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command line tool with a curses-like TUI</p>
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</li><li><p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0in">A game or game
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engine should provide several screenshots to give visitors an idea
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of what makes it unique</p>
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</li><li><p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0in">Visually-oriented
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projects with support for multiple platforms should provide at
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least one screenshot of the project running on each platform</p>
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</li></ol>
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</li><li><p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0in"><b>Where possible,
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provide current builds of the project</b> that visitors can run to
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see the state of the project.</p>
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</li><li><p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0in"><b>Customize the
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project page with appropriate colors or background images</b> to
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give the project a sense of visual identity.</p>
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</li></ol>
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<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0in"><br>
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</p>
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<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0in">Providing as much
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information about your project as possible will help us decide
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whether it meets the qualifications listed below, and whether
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community members will be invested in your project's success.</p>
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<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0in"><br>
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</p>
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<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0in"><b>Acceptable Projects</b></p>
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<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0in; font-weight: normal">For
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us to be willing to approve a project on the site, it should:</p>
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<ol>
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<li><p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0in"><b>Be a
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legitimate, unique, and original work.</b><span style="font-weight: normal">
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We unequivocally will not accept projects which are blatantly
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advertisements for unrelated websites or companies, projects which
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are indistinguishable from others on the site, projects which are
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incorrectly attributed to someone other than the actual creator. </span>
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</p>
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</li><li><p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0in"><b>Have a
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meaningful amount of development work planned or completed above its
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dependencies, parent project, or previous incarnation.</b><span style="font-weight: normal">
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We will not accept projects which cannot prove themselves to be more
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than a thin layer of “glue code” above several libraries, or
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which are barely-modified forks of other projects.</span></p>
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</li><li><p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0in"><b>Be the
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development effort of an individual or small team, organization or
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company.</b><span style="font-weight: normal"> We wish to keep the
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focus of this site on projects which highlight the inspiring work of
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small developers, projects which provide a high ratio of value-added
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to man-hours worked, and the exploration of software creation as a
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craft. We will refrain from defining “small” for the purposes of
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this guideline, and instead give examples of approvals and
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rejections:</span></p>
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<ol type="i">
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<li><p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0in; font-weight: normal">
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A commercial compression tool developed by a small team of 2-4
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programmers and a few miscellaneous staff under the umbrella of an
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LLC would be approved.</p>
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</li><li><p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0in; font-weight: normal">
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A suite of productivity software developed by a large multinational
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corporation would be rejected, as it is not in line with the
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intended focus of the site, and such a corporation is likely
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already receiving widespread exposure elsewhere and may have their
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own extensive user community.</p>
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</li><li><p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0in; font-weight: normal">
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An existing, well-established open-source project with a
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contributor count at the time of submission in the thousands may be
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approved or rejected depending on other factors like the age of the
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project, the number of current contributors, the content to be
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provided on Handmade Network vs the project's homepage, and the
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current state of development of the project.</p>
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</li></ol>
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</li><li><p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0in"><b>Enrich to the
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community </b><span style="font-weight: normal">by releasing
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finished projects for community members to use or purchase and
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providing regular updates that inform and educate community members.
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We heavily encourage activities such as:</span></p>
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<ol type="i">
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<li><p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0in; font-weight: normal">
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Writing or recording logs/articles explaining decisions/trade-offs
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made during development and their rationale, theory behind a piece
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of code, information discovered about an API or dependency.</p>
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</li><li><p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0in; font-weight: normal">
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Releasing demos, samples, or pre-release versions demonstrating the
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mechanics or evolution of a particular feature</p>
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</li><li><p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0in"><span style="font-weight: normal">Responding
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to questions about functionality in comments/forums</span><b>.</b></p>
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</li></ol>
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</li></ol>
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<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0in"><b> </b><span style="font-weight: normal">For
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more information on this, please see our <a href="/monthly-update-policy">Monthly Update Policy</a>
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requirements and suggestions.</span></p>
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<ol start="5">
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<li><p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0in"><b>Have a clear,
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achievable goal or set of goals</b><span style="font-weight: normal">,
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and </span><b>provide lasting value to its intended audience.</b><span style="font-weight: normal">
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We want to discourage projects from falling into development limbo
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and slowly dying off. We also want to encourage project owners to
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support their projects past release, so that they might have
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continuing usefulness as the dependencies and platforms they rely on
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continue to develop.</span></p>
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</li></ol>
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<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0in"><br>
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</p>
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<p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0in"><span style="font-weight: normal">Additionally,
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there are some criteria that we guarantee will </span><b>not</b><span style="font-weight: normal">
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be considered in approving or rejecting a project:</span></p>
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<ol>
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<li><p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0in"><b>Implementation
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language</b><span style="font-weight: normal">. A language is merely
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a tool, and worthwhile software can be created in any language or
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environment.</span></p>
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</li><li><p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0in"><b>Use (or not) of
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libraries</b><span style="font-weight: normal">. While we are
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supportive of efforts to develop software that makes minimal use of
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libraries, and to write code that supplants existing libraries, this
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is by no means a requirement of projects hosted on the site. We
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merely ask, as stated above, that projects perform some significant
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work above that which its dependencies perform on their own.</span></p>
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</li><li><p class="western" style="margin-bottom: 0in"><b>License,
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monetization, and source-code provision</b><span style="font-weight: normal">.
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We do not require projects be open-source, free software, etc. While
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we are very supportive of these movements and the principles behind
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them, we also understand the need to make a living off of
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development work, and wish to make it possible for any project to
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contribute to and benefit from our software development community.</span></p>
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</li></ol>
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