Slides have most of the information about how to get started with CentOS Special Interest Groups (SIGs) and how you can contribute to it.

1. CentOS SIG
Get started with CentOS SIG
CentOS Dojo 2016,
Bangalore

2. About Me
 Contributing to various Special Interest Groups (SIG) in CentOS.
 RPM package maintainer in Fedora.
 Software engineer in Red Hat
 lalatendu.org
 Find me in Twitter or Freenode as {@ #}lalatenduM

3. Introduction
● CentOS stands for Community Enterprise Operating System.
● Since March 2004, CentOS Linux has been a community-
supported distribution.
● It is derived from sources freely provided to the public by Red
Hat.
● The first CentOS Linux release in May 2004.

4. About CentOS
● CentOS is almost identical to RHEL except that it modifies
packages to remove Red Hat branding and artwork *
Note*: Many RPMs still contain the name redhat, rhel, or rh.
● Though RHEL have many channels, CentOS only builds from
RHEL base channel.
** but merges all variants into one distro ( no Workstation,
Server etc)
● Uses Yum repos only.
For details refer : http://wiki.centos.org/FAQ/General

5. Popular with:
● Sysadmins who prefer the Red Hat way of doing things
● Hosting industry ( facebook, twitter, tumblr -> big web users of
CentOS )
● Voice Over IP Industry
● HPC and Super-computing
● Large Embedded (ie. machines with > 4G of ram and > 2 cores
)
● Developers for open source infra and systems management
code ( puppet, chef, ansible etc were all bootstrapped on
CentOS )
● On Premise Cloud providers ( Eucalyptus, CloudStack,

6. Past: (Before SIGs)
RHEL CentOSFedora
open source
projects
SIG stands for Special Interest Group

7. CentOS Core VS SIG
l Stability Vs Cutting edge technology.
l Distribution vs Specialized distribution.

8. The SIG Mindset
● A better upstream user experience.
● Solving a bigger technology issue without worrying about
platform.
● Each CentOS (i.e. 6 and 7) has 10 years of life cycle.

9. The SIG Mindset (Continued..)
● Freedom to change RPM spec file to make packages work with
each other better.
● Freedom to rebuild package from core CentOS. e.g. latest
Docker, GlusterFS
● SIGs should address user stories.

10. Current SIGs
● Stable : Xen4CentOS
● Planning and Getting Started: Atomic, Storage, Virtualization,
Cloud, Cloud Instance, Software Collections, Config
Management, PaaS
● Proposed: VOIP, Public CI
Refer: http://wiki.centos.org/SpecialInterestGroup

11. Starting a SIG
● Anyone can propose to set up a SIG
● To start with, send a proposal to CentOS-Devel mailing list.
● SIG must be approved by the Board.
For Details Refer: http://wiki.centos.org/SpecialInterestGroup

12. Requirements
● Should be an user story.
● All code produced within the SIG should have a distributable
license.*
● At least one CentOS board member should part of SIG (as
mentor).

13. Infrastructure for SIG
● CentOS Community Build System
● ci.centos.org
● Wiki space on wiki.centos.org
● Bug tracker
● Separate email List (if required)
● Yum repos, RPM signing, mirrors

14. Bootstrap and running
● Send your proposal to centos-devel ML.
● Get a CentOS core team member on board.
● Wiki page for the SIG.
● Get a CentOS build system account.
● Buildsys repo -> Testing repo -> Stable repo.

15. SIG Responsibility
● Creating and maintaining the SIG.
● Make the functional area open for participation.
● Foster a community around the functional aspect, to share the
responsibility, workload, and innovation.

16. SIG Governance
● Gradually gets autonomy after the early stage.

17. Upstream VS SIG
● SIG should be able to deliver Upstream user story.
● Communication between upstream community and SIG.

18. Contributing to SIG
● RPM packaging
● Automation testing/CI
● Upstream contribution

19. Getting Involved In A SIG
● Join Weekly meeting
● Join mailing list. In most cases it is centos-devel@centos.org
● Refer the SIG wiki page for more information.

20. Future
● Grow organically.
● A definite life cycle for the SIG?
● Evolve as a distribution?
● ISOs, cloud images, containers, live CDs?

21. Questions?