Abstract

KIE (Knowledge is Everything) is a community of solutions and supporting 
tooling for knowledge engineering and process automation, focusing on events, 
rules, and workflows.

Proposal<https://cwiki.apache.org/confluence/display/INCUBATOR/New+Podling+Proposal#proposal>

KIE is a community dedicated to supporting knowledge engineering and process 
automation, using standards from groups like OMG (BPMN, CMMN, DMN), CNCF 
(Serverless Workflow, Cloud Events), and DMG (PMML, PFA). KIE is comprised of 
leading open-source projects (like Drools and jBPM), which provide modeling and 
code authoring tools in this space. The work has a strong emphasis on being a 
first-class citizen for Kubernetes but will continue to support embedded and 
other environments such as edge computing. Drools and jBPM are well-known 
projects in their areas of rules and workflow and they will be joined by 
another project, building on a shared core with jBPM, for CNCF’s Serverless 
Workflow - this project is going through a naming process at the time of this 
application. Kogito is the foundation project for workflow which jBPM and 
CNCF’s Serverless Workflow build on. Services and frameworks are provided to 
enable those projects in a cloud-native environment and tooling is made 
available through KIE Tools.

Background<https://cwiki.apache.org/confluence/display/INCUBATOR/New+Podling+Proposal#background>

Experience has shown that a holistic approach is a practical requirement for 
any  knowledge engineering and process automation. This requires a breadth of 
capabilities able to model and execute an application’s data models, rules, 
workflows, and events. These projects aim to provide a holistic approach with a 
strong emphasis on congruency across them.

Rationale<https://cwiki.apache.org/confluence/display/INCUBATOR/New+Podling+Proposal#rationale>

Knowledge engineering and process automation have been and continue to play a 
large part in today’s software lifecycle. To date, there have been few truly 
open-source implementations of any of the specifications (DMN, PMML, BPMN, CNCF 
Workflow, etc). The projects within Red Hat implement these standards and fill 
that gap of having an open-source implementation.


The projects within KIE also mesh well with other Apache projects such as 
Apache Camel and Apache Airavata. Integrations could be done at the IoT level 
with Apache PLC4X and others.


Developers need a solution that follows, implements, and collaborates with 
these industry specifications. The Apache Software Foundation would allow these 
projects to continue to grow in a vendor-neutral environment and promote 
further collaboration with existing integrations and future partners.

Initial 
Goals<https://cwiki.apache.org/confluence/display/INCUBATOR/New+Podling+Proposal#initial-goals>

First and foremost, we aim to enlarge the community. KIE has primarily been an 
open-source community of Red Hat Developers and users outside of Red Hat. 
Adding IBM to the list of developers helps, but we would like to see more. We 
have ideas for the various sub-projects, such as straight-through processing 
support in Kogito, better spec compliance for the tooling, and more research 
into language bindings for non-Java languages. We believe we can address some 
of these while an Apache Incubator project.

Current 
Status<https://cwiki.apache.org/confluence/display/INCUBATOR/New+Podling+Proposal#current-status>

Code for the various projects with the KIE community is all hosted on GitHub. 
This includes Kogito, Drools, jBPM, and KIE Tools. All of the code is Apache 2 
licensed. Red Hat has been the project’s custodian since its inception and has 
maintained leadership in that area. Moving forward into the Apache Incubator, 
we would need to establish the habit of holding votes and meetings and the 
project updates per the Apache Way.


We also currently maintain a YouTube channel dedicated to the community and 
projects, a Twitter presence, and a LinkedIn page for the KIE Community.

Meritocracy:<https://cwiki.apache.org/confluence/display/INCUBATOR/New+Podling+Proposal#meritocracy>

Red Hat runs all of its open-source projects as meritocracies, the KIE 
Community is no different. This aspect would not change any. Kogito currently 
does not make a distinction between “committer” and “PMC member” the same way 
Apache does. That aspect would need implementation.

Community:<https://cwiki.apache.org/confluence/display/INCUBATOR/New+Podling+Proposal#community>

The KIE Community has an active base of contributors within and outside Red 
Hat. Community members currently use Zulip chat or mailing lists hosted by 
Google Groups as communication tools. It has been that way for many years. 
Before that, we were using IRC at Freenode for many years. There are also 
mailing lists hosted on Google Groups that are leveraged for those who prefer 
mailing list communication. Zulip was started as a standard communication 
medium for KIE Community back in 2020. IRC has been used since 2003.

Core 
Developers:<https://cwiki.apache.org/confluence/display/INCUBATOR/New+Podling+Proposal#core-developers>

Core developers would come from both Red Hat and IBM. They include people who 
have been working on related projects and the creation of the KIE Community 
since the beginning, and also people new to the project.

Alignment:<https://cwiki.apache.org/confluence/display/INCUBATOR/New+Podling+Proposal#alignment>

Projects within the KIE Community align with multiple efforts within Apache, 
namely:

  *   Apache OpenWhisk

  *   Apache Airavata

  *   Apache Camel


We are currently actively involved in collaboration with Apache Camel, while 
the other two are more alignments and usages within the communities. There may 
be other Apache projects which could benefit from integration with KIE 
Community projects.


jBPM, the proposed Serverless Workflow project and the Kogito workflow 
foundation are targeting serverless and microservice deployments. It helps to 
create automation and integration with other technologies in a simple-to-use 
and understandable way. The Apache Software Foundation is a great place to 
collaborate with multiple companies and technologies. We’re looking to build a 
community that is inclusive, helpful, and a good citizen to the larger Open 
Source community.


Other projects within the KIE Community umbrella target a more standard 
enterprise software approach and deployment model.

Known 
Risks<https://cwiki.apache.org/confluence/display/INCUBATOR/New+Podling+Proposal#known-risks>

The Kogito workflow foundation targets the Quarkus environment, an open-source 
project that Red Hat maintains. Should Red Hat no longer wish to maintain 
Quarkus or move it in a direction that harms Kogito, a pivot may be necessary. 
The Kogito workflow foundation will still run on other runtimes, so it is less 
of a risk as well.

There should not be any risks for other projects.

Project 
Name<https://cwiki.apache.org/confluence/display/INCUBATOR/New+Podling+Proposal#project-name>

All names and trademarks have been vetted by Red Hat’s legal team to be usable 
in the space. Transferring these over to Apache will not be a problem.

Orphaned 
products<https://cwiki.apache.org/confluence/display/INCUBATOR/New+Podling+Proposal#orphaned-products>

Primary contributions to the KIE Community of projects will be made by 
engineers employed by Red Hat and IBM. IBM is a leading vendor in the Business 
Automation space. Red Hat up until the second half of 2022 was also a major 
vendor in the same space. While Red Hat is no longer pursuing the Business 
Automation market it does still need to augment the capabilities of its other 
products with workflow, rules, and event technologies in a way that aligns with 
Red Hat’s target audiences and Red Hat’s strategic direction. Red Hat will 
continue to pursue the development around CNCF serverless workflow, which will 
be built upon Kogito and Drools. There is no risk of these projects being 
orphaned by either company.

Inexperience with Open 
Source:<https://cwiki.apache.org/confluence/display/INCUBATOR/New+Podling+Proposal#inexperience-with-open-source>

All initial committers are well-versed in Open Source development.

Length of 
Incubation:<https://cwiki.apache.org/confluence/display/INCUBATOR/New+Podling+Proposal#length-of-incubation>

Incubation should take somewhere between six to twelve months.

Homogenous 
Developers:<https://cwiki.apache.org/confluence/display/INCUBATOR/New+Podling+Proposal#homogenous-developers>

The list of initial project committers includes developers from IBM and Red 
Hat, all from different locations around the world.

Reliance on Salaried 
Developers:<https://cwiki.apache.org/confluence/display/INCUBATOR/New+Podling+Proposal#reliance-on-salaried-developers>

Currently, the list of developers is from IBM and Red Hat. We’re hoping by 
moving to Apache we can grow this list of developers outside of those two 
companies. All the projects within KIE have been around for a long time and 
have a large user base. Developers have come and gone over the years, but the 
initial list of developers is coming from Red Hat and IBM.

Relationships with Other Apache 
Products:<https://cwiki.apache.org/confluence/display/INCUBATOR/New+Podling+Proposal#relationships-with-other-apache-products>

The Apache Camel project has had integrations with KIE Community projects, 
namely jBPM and Drools. Camel K also has integrations with Kogito. Kogito and 
Camel also have integrations with Quarkus. Kogito is built using Apache Maven.

An Excessive Fascination with the Apache 
Brand:<https://cwiki.apache.org/confluence/display/INCUBATOR/New+Podling+Proposal#a-excessive-fascination-with-the-apache-brand>

We have looked at both the Apache Software Foundation and the Eclipse 
Foundation and have decided that Apache would be a better place for the code 
base. Red Hat, and IBM, have worked with both foundations and continue to do so.


While the Apache brand is indeed well known and has great recognition, we’re 
looking more toward the neutral nature of being at Apache and keeping the 
project alive in an environment that is not solely controlled by a single 
entity.

Documentation<https://cwiki.apache.org/confluence/display/INCUBATOR/New+Podling+Proposal#documentation>

Kogito Documentation: 
https://docs.kogito.kie.org/latest/html_single/#con-kogito-automation_kogito-docs

Drools Documentation: https://www.drools.org/learn/documentation.html

jBPM Documentation: https://docs.jbpm.org/7.73.0.Final/jbpm-docs/html_single/

Drools DMN Engine landing page: https://www.drools.org/learn/dmn.html

DMN Specification: https://www.omg.org/spec/DMN

BPMN Specification: https://www.omg.org/spec/BPMN/2.0/

Cloud Events Specification: https://github.com/cloudevents/spec

Initial 
Source<https://cwiki.apache.org/confluence/display/INCUBATOR/New+Podling+Proposal#initial-source>

All the code will be coming from the KIE Community GitHub repo at 
https://github.com/kiegroup. There will be multiple repositories including 
examples and code bases for Drools, jBPM, and Kogito.

Source and Intellectual Property Submission 
Plan<https://cwiki.apache.org/confluence/display/INCUBATOR/New+Podling+Proposal#source-and-intellectual-property-submission-plan>

  *   Source code within GitHub

  *   Domains: kie.org, kogito.org, kogito.kie.org, blog.kie.org, jbpm.org, 
drools.org, bpmn.new, dmn.new, pmml.new, and sandbox.kie.org are all currently 
owned by Red Hat

External 
Dependencies:<https://cwiki.apache.org/confluence/display/INCUBATOR/New+Podling+Proposal#external-dependencies>

There are some LGPL, and Eclipse dependencies for some of the projects in the 
test or provided scopes of the Maven poms. For example jdt dependencies for the 
Eclipse plugins, logback, junit, and similar. Hibernate jars are LGPL as well, 
those are in jBPM.

Cryptography:<https://cwiki.apache.org/confluence/display/INCUBATOR/New+Podling+Proposal#cryptography>

There are some calls to the JVM vault, for process migration.

Required 
Resources<https://cwiki.apache.org/confluence/display/INCUBATOR/New+Podling+Proposal#required-resources>
Mailing 
lists:<https://cwiki.apache.org/confluence/display/INCUBATOR/New+Podling+Proposal#mailing-lists>

  *   priv...@kie.incubator.apache.org

  *   d...@kie.incubator.apache.org

  *   comm...@kie.incubator.apache.org

Subversion 
Directory:<https://cwiki.apache.org/confluence/display/INCUBATOR/New+Podling+Proposal#subversion-directory>

None

Git 
Repositories:<https://cwiki.apache.org/confluence/display/INCUBATOR/New+Podling+Proposal#git-repositories>

Assuming we can continue to use GitHub, though it may need to migrate to be 
beneath the Apache Organization.

Issue 
Tracking:<https://cwiki.apache.org/confluence/display/INCUBATOR/New+Podling+Proposal#issue-tracking>

If possible, we would like to use GitHub issues.

Other 
Resources:<https://cwiki.apache.org/confluence/display/INCUBATOR/New+Podling+Proposal#other-resources>

None.

Initial 
Committers<https://cwiki.apache.org/confluence/display/INCUBATOR/New+Podling+Proposal#initial-committers>


List of GitHub names:


Name

GitHub Username

Apache CLA

Apache Email

Mario Fusco

mariofusco

FALSE


Toshiya Kobayashi

tkobayas

TRUE


Matteo Mortari

tarilabs

TRUE


Tristan Radisson

radtriste

FALSE


Gabriele Cardosi

gitgabrio

FALSE


Edoardo Vacchi

evacchi

FALSE


Paolo Bizzarri

pibizza

FALSE


Cristiano Nicolai

cristianonicolai

FALSE


Michael Biarnés Kiefer

mbiarnes

FALSE


Enrique González Martínez

elguardian

FALSE


Vani Haripriya Mudadla

vaniharipriya

FALSE


Jason Porter

lightguard

TRUE

lightguar...@apache.org

Gonzalo Muñoz

gmunozfe

FALSE


Francisco Javier Tirado Sarti

fjtirado

FALSE


Helber Belmiro

hbelmiro

TRUE


Antonio Fernandez Alhambra

afalhambra

FALSE


Abhijit Humbe

abhijithumbe

FALSE


Martin Weiler

martinweiler

FALSE


Enrique Mingorance Cano

ginxo

FALSE


Tiago Dolphine

tiagodolphine

FALSE


Alex Porcelli

porcelli

FALSE


Kris Verlaenen

krisv

TRUE

(requested kr...@apache.org)

Pere Fernández

pefernan

FALSE


Jan Stastny

jstastny-cz

FALSE


Jozef Marko

jomarko

FALSE


Walter Medvedeo

wmedvede

FALSE


Kennedy Bowers

kbowers-redhat

FALSE


Roberto Oliveira

rgdoliveira

FALSE


Andrea Lamparelli

lampajr

FALSE


Bai Xiaofeng

bxf12315

FALSE


Ruben Romero Montes

ruromero

FALSE


Filippe Spolti

spolti

FALSE


Massimiliano Dessì

desmax74

TRUE


Tiago Bento

tiagobento

FALSE


Yeser Amer

yesamer

FALSE


Guilherme Caponetto

caponetto

FALSE


Paulo Martins

paulovmr

FALSE


Thiago Lugli

thiagoelg

FALSE


William Antônio Siqueira

jesuino

FALSE


Fabrizio Antonangeli

fantonangeli

FALSE


Valentino Pellegrino

vpellegrino

FALSE


Ricardo Zanini

ricardozanini

FALSE


Tibor Zimányi

baldimir

FALSE


Eder Ignatowicz

ederign

FALSE


Mark Proctor

mdproctor

FALSE


Thiago Lugli

thiagoelg

FALSE


Luiz João Motta

ljmotta

FALSE


Jaime Enriquez

inodeman

FALSE


Luca Molteni

lucamolteni

FALSE


Davide Salerno

davidesalerno

TRUE


Edson Tirelli

etirelli

FALSE

Sponsors<https://cwiki.apache.org/confluence/display/INCUBATOR/New+Podling+Proposal#sponsors>

IBM and Red Hat are the sponsors for the project.

Champion:<https://cwiki.apache.org/confluence/display/INCUBATOR/New+Podling+Proposal#champion>

Brian Proffitt

Nominated 
Mentors:<https://cwiki.apache.org/confluence/display/INCUBATOR/New+Podling+Proposal#nominated-mentors>

Brian Proffitt

Claus Ibsen

Andrea Cosentino

Sponsoring 
Entity:<https://cwiki.apache.org/confluence/display/INCUBATOR/New+Podling+Proposal#sponsoring-entity>

Apache Camel


Jason Porter
Software Engineer
He/Him/His

IBM


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