A Fediverse Enhancement Proposal (FEP) is a document that provides information to the Fediverse community. The goal of a FEP is to improve interoperability and well-being of diverse services, applications and communities that form the Fediverse.
This document describes the scope, format and process of publishing Fediverse Enhancement Proposals.
## Scope and Objectives
A Fediverse Enhancement Proposal (FEP) should be a concise and focused documentation of a specific topic that is of interest to the Fediverse community.
A proposal should always have the intention of improving the interoperability and well-being of diverse services, applications and community of the Fediverse.
The Fediverse includes applications, services and communities using the ActivityPub protocol and other protocols that foster decentralized and diverse social media and culture.
Proposals may include descriptions of technical protocols and mechanism, documentation of experimental work or current best practices.
Proposals are not limited to technical topics and may focus on social and cultural aspects.
Proposals may be entertaining and humorous (unlike this proposal).
## Language, Document Structure and Format
All Fediverse Enhancement Proposals must be written in English, be properly formatted as CommonMark [CommonMark] and be reasonably grammatical.
An identifier is computed from the proposal title as the first 4 digits of the sha256 hash (in hex). The identifier can be computed from the title with standard Unix tools:
1. A Fediverse Enhancement Proposal can be submitted by individuals or groups of individuals (authors). See the `SUBMISSION.md` file for a list of accepted submission methods.
2. Within seven days one of the editors will read and respond to the proposal. The editor checks if the proposal conforms to the required structure and fits the scope and objective of the FEPs. The editor may request the authors to clarify, justify, or withdraw the proposal. Such a request must not reflect the personal bias of an editor. Rather, it will be made strictly to maintain a high quality of submissions. The editors reserve the right to reject a submission when a proposal amounts to blatant misuse of the process. The authors may seek feedback from the wider community if the submitted proposal is rejected or clarifications are requested.
3. If a FEP editor approves a submission it receives the status `DRAFT` and is added to the repository.
4. While a proposal has the status `DRAFT`:
- Authors are responsible for initiating community discussion and collecting feedback.
- Authors may submit updates to the proposal which will be checked in to the repository by an editor.
- Authors may withdraw the submission upon which an editor will set the status of the submission to `WITHDRAWN`.
5. After at least 60 days the authors may request the proposal to be finalized. This is done by requesting final comments on the proposal.
- If there are no community objections within 14 days and the authors can show that they have initiated sufficient awareness and discussion of the proposal, an editor will set the status of the submission to `FINAL`.
6. If after 120 days the authors have not requested the proposal to be finalized or there is no community consensus, an editor will set the status of the submission to `WITHDRAWN`.
7. A proposal with status `FINAL` can not be changed or updated in a way that would lead to adjustments to implementations. Minor corrections are allowed.
8. Any substantial change to finalized proposal must be submitted as a separate FEP.
- The new FEP MUST include a `replaces` metadata attribute pointing to FEPs it supersedes.
- If the new FEP becomes `FINAL`, the original one MUST point to it in an added `replacedBy` metadata attribute.
9. A proposal with status `WITHDRAWN` remains in the repository and can be resubmitted.
The process and format described in this proposal is influenced by other community driven documentation efforts such as the BitTorrent Enhancement Proposal Process [BEP-1], Scheme Request for Implementation [SRFI] and the IETF RFC Series [RFC-8729].
CC0 1.0 Universal (CC0 1.0) Public Domain Dedication
To the extent possible under law, the authors of this Fediverse Enhancement Proposal have waived all copyright and related or neighboring rights to this work.
