From Active To Archive: Shepherding Repositories Through Their Sunset

I've blogged before about how not every open source software project can or should live on forever: priorities change, technologies evolve, and interests shift over time. You don't want to have neglected or abandoned open source projects with security vulnerabilities owned by your organization. However, responsibly sunsetting an open source project is more than just clicking the archive button on your repository. This was the premise behind the CHAOSS Practitioner Guide: Getting Started with Sunsetting an Open Source Project.

The Open Source Program Office at the Digital Service at the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services in the US Government built on the CHAOSS sunsetting practitioner guide, contributed their improvements back into the guide, and built tooling to automate some of the tasks! They've done some excellent work, so I was thrilled when they asked me to join them to talk more about all of this at the recent Open Source Summit North America! The slides and video are available if you want to have a look at what we discussed.

Additional Reading:

• Responsibly Sunsetting OSS Projects: A Guide for OSPOs
• CHAOSS Practitioner Guide: Getting Started with Sunsetting an Open Source Project
• CHAOSScast Episode 123: Practitioner Guides: #6 Sunsetting an Open Source Project
• CHAOSS Practitioner Guides
• Assessing the Viability of Open Source Projects
• Stefka Dimitrova on When and How to Deprecate an Open Source Project (Part 1 and Part 2) along with a video from the Open Source Summit in Europe in 2022 about Simple Steps for a Calm “Sunset”.
• Contributor Sustainability Impacts Risk and Adoption of OSS Projects