Title: Coding Standards

### Code Conventions

Most developers of Apache Stanbol use the Eclipse IDE for development. The
code conventions for this IDE can be imported from the
'/conventions/stanbol-eclipse-codeformatter.xml' file
[in SVN](http://svn.apache.org/repos/asf/stanbol/trunk/conventions/).

### SVN Structure

The Apache Stanbol [SVN](http://svn.apache.org/repos/asf/stanbol/)
is divided into the classical trio of

  * trunk: where the main development takes place
  * branches: used for release branching and to implement prove of concepts
    that are not yet ready to be part of the trunk
  * tags: used for tagging releases, i.e. stable version of Apache Stanbol

Additionally, there is the 'site' directory in the SVN. This holds the
sources of the website you are currently reading. Apache Stanbol uses the
[ASF CMS](https://blogs.apache.org/infra/entry/the_asf_cms) to create
and maintain its website.

### Legal Issues

The Apache Stanbol software is released under the Apache Software License
(AL). Therefore, we have to ensure that our software is developed according
to this license. Here is a short list of the most important rules every
developer has to keep in mind when writing this software.

  * Ideally, each file in SVN should have the Apache license header. This is
    especially important for each source (*.java) file. This rule is checked
    automatically before doing a release using the Apache RAT tool.
  * The licenses of all dependencies that are used by Apache Stanbol must
    be compatible with the AL.
  * All dependencies used by Apache Stanbol should be available from the
    Maven central repository. If this is not the case, the Apache Stanbol
    module depending on a libraray that is not available from Maven
    central can not be released that easy, i.e. a separate -deps package
    would be required.