Hyperledger Labs provides a space (i.e., GitHub repos) where work can easily be started without the creation of a project. Please refer to the Hyperledger Labs wiki page for additional information.

1. Fork the hyperledger-labs.github.io repository.

2. Fill out the Proposal Template and save it into the labs subdirectory under the name of your lab, such as labs/mynewlab.md. It is expected that your lab repository will have the same name so keep that in mind.

3. In the Proposal Template, there is an entry for sponsor(s). Although not required, proposers are encouraged to seek a sponsor who can help them create ties with the rest of the Hyperledger community and ensure that the proposal is cogent and novel (in conception, proposed execution, or interested community).
   
   To find sponsors:

   1. use your connections to existing projects and ask maintainers,
   2. find working groups or projects with affinities to the proposed lab and pitch the project (good to have the template already filled out) in associated channels and/or mailing lists. The WG chairs emails, the maintainers contacts etc can be found on the wiki or github. Make personal appeals if you can. Every repository contains a MAINTAINERS file that lists the current maintainers with their contact information and you can reach them all by posting to the Maintainers list.

4. Commit your changes with proper sign-off. This means that your commit log message must contain a line that looks like the following one, with your actual name and email address:

    Signed-off-by: John Doe <[email protected]>
   

   Adding the -s flag to your git commit command will add that line automatically. You can also add it manually as part of your commit log message or add it afterwards with git commit --amend -s.

5. Submit a Pull Request.

The labs stewards will then review your proposal. Like sponsors, stewards do not have a responsibility beyond this; ongoing work like contributing code or reviews is not tied to their role as stewards. In reviewing the proposal, the stewards make sure that the proposal is cogent and novel (in conception, proposed execution, or interested community).

IMPORTANT: It is up to the proposer to ensure that any comments or requested changes by the lab stewards are addressed. Failure to do so may delay the approval of your proposal.

By default the Lab stewards will create a new repository for you to start from but if you have an existing github repo you would like to bring to your proposed lab you have the option to request for that repo to be reused instead. This is however only possible if every commit in your existing repo is signed-off so there is no DCO related issues. If that is not the case, you have two options:

1. bring your code by squashing all of your commits into a single first commit made against your new lab repo with your sign-off.

2. amend the commit history to include DCO sign-off for each of the commits. The Hyperledger Indy community has documented steps to fix DCO on previous commits. Also, the Fix DCO Guide from src-d contains some different steps you can take.

IMPORTANT: Regardless of which option you use, please be sure that the past committers to your project agree to the DCO.

Stewards are responsible for curating the set of labs, archiving (see below) those that become dormant or unresponsive for an extended period (3+ months), or are explicitly deemed by the committers to be deprecated/obsoleted.

Deprecated, obsoleted, or dormant labs (as defined above) will be marked as "archived" in GitHub; that signifies that the lab is no longer maintained. Archived labs are read-only, and they can be moved back out of the archives, if there is interest in reviving them.

All Hyperledger software must be made available under an Apache 2.0 license. This applies to Labs. Please, make sure to license all incoming code and new code accordingly, and ensure that all commits are made with proper sign-off so that no DCO related issue is introduced.

All Hyperledger community members must adhere to the Code of Conduct.