We as members, contributors, and leaders pledge to make participation in the CleverKeys community a harassment-free experience for everyone, regardless of age, body size, visible or invisible disability, ethnicity, sex characteristics, gender identity and expression, level of experience, education, socio-economic status, nationality, personal appearance, race, religion, or sexual identity and orientation.
We pledge to act and interact in ways that contribute to an open, welcoming, diverse, inclusive, and healthy community.
- Being Respectful: Using welcoming and inclusive language
- Being Empathetic: Showing empathy towards other community members
- Being Constructive: Giving and gracefully accepting constructive feedback
- Being Collaborative: Focusing on what is best for the community
- Being Accountable: Accepting responsibility and apologizing to those affected by our mistakes
- Being Open-Minded: Learning from our mistakes and growing as individuals
- Harassment: The use of sexualized language or imagery, and sexual attention or advances of any kind
- Trolling: Insulting or derogatory comments, personal or political attacks
- Discrimination: Public or private harassment based on protected characteristics
- Privacy Violations: Publishing others' private information without explicit permission
- Inappropriate Content: Posting inappropriate content or imagery
- Unprofessional Conduct: Other conduct which could reasonably be considered inappropriate in a professional setting
As a privacy-focused project, we hold ourselves to additional standards:
-
Respect User Privacy
- Never ask for unnecessary personal information
- Don't share user data or behaviors without consent
- Respect the privacy choices users make
-
No Data Collection
- Contributors must not introduce telemetry or analytics
- No tracking code in any form
- All processing must remain local
-
Transparency
- Be transparent about code changes that affect privacy
- Clearly document any data handling
- Explain privacy implications of features
-
Responsible Disclosure
- Report security vulnerabilities privately to maintainers
- Allow reasonable time for fixes before public disclosure
- Don't exploit vulnerabilities for personal gain
-
No Malicious Code
- Never introduce malicious code or backdoors
- Don't obfuscate code to hide functionality
- Be transparent about all code functionality
Community leaders are responsible for clarifying and enforcing our standards of acceptable behavior and will take appropriate and fair corrective action in response to any behavior that they deem inappropriate, threatening, offensive, or harmful.
Community leaders have the right and responsibility to remove, edit, or reject comments, commits, code, wiki edits, issues, and other contributions that are not aligned to this Code of Conduct, and will communicate reasons for moderation decisions when appropriate.
This Code of Conduct applies within all community spaces, including:
- GitHub Repositories: Issues, pull requests, discussions
- Communication Channels: Email, chat, forums
- Events: Meetups, conferences, online gatherings
- Representation: When representing the project publicly
This Code of Conduct also applies when an individual is officially representing the community in public spaces.
Instances of abusive, harassing, or otherwise unacceptable behavior may be reported to the community leaders responsible for enforcement at:
Email: [conduct@cleverkeys.org] (to be set up)
All complaints will be reviewed and investigated promptly and fairly.
All community leaders are obligated to respect the privacy and security of the reporter of any incident.
- Reports will be kept confidential
- We will not share reporter identity without consent
- Exceptions only for safety or legal requirements
- Your contact information (so we can follow up)
- Names/identities of those involved (if known)
- Description of behavior that violated the Code of Conduct
- When and where it occurred
- Any additional context or evidence
- What action you'd like to see taken (optional)
Community leaders will follow these Community Impact Guidelines in determining the consequences for any action they deem in violation of this Code of Conduct:
Community Impact: Use of inappropriate language or other behavior deemed unprofessional or unwelcome in the community.
Consequence: A private, written warning from community leaders, providing clarity around the nature of the violation and an explanation of why the behavior was inappropriate. A public apology may be requested.
Community Impact: A violation through a single incident or series of actions.
Consequence: A warning with consequences for continued behavior. No interaction with the people involved, including unsolicited interaction with those enforcing the Code of Conduct, for a specified period of time. This includes avoiding interactions in community spaces as well as external channels like social media. Violating these terms may lead to a temporary or permanent ban.
Community Impact: A serious violation of community standards, including sustained inappropriate behavior.
Consequence: A temporary ban from any sort of interaction or public communication with the community for a specified period of time. No public or private interaction with the people involved, including unsolicited interaction with those enforcing the Code of Conduct, is allowed during this period. Violating these terms may lead to a permanent ban.
Community Impact: Demonstrating a pattern of violation of community standards, including sustained inappropriate behavior, harassment of an individual, or aggression toward or disparagement of classes of individuals.
Consequence: A permanent ban from any sort of public interaction within the community.
If you believe you have been unfairly accused of violating the Code of Conduct:
- Submit an appeal to the same email address used for reporting
- Include your perspective on what happened
- Provide any evidence supporting your appeal
- Wait for review by a different moderator (when possible)
Appeal decisions are final and will be communicated within 7 days.
DO:
- ✅ Be patient with newcomers
- ✅ Provide constructive feedback
- ✅ Assume good intentions
- ✅ Ask questions when unclear
- ✅ Celebrate others' contributions
- ✅ Focus on the code, not the person
DON'T:
- ❌ Use condescending language ("obviously", "just", "simply")
- ❌ Make assumptions about skill level
- ❌ Dismiss questions as "stupid"
- ❌ Be passive-aggressive
- ❌ Take criticism personally
- ❌ Engage in flame wars
DO:
- ✅ Respond to issues and PRs promptly
- ✅ Provide clear feedback on contributions
- ✅ Explain decisions when rejecting contributions
- ✅ Recognize and thank contributors
- ✅ Be consistent in enforcement
- ✅ Lead by example
DON'T:
- ❌ Ignore contributors
- ❌ Be dismissive of ideas
- ❌ Play favorites
- ❌ Make unilateral decisions on major changes
- ❌ Let issues fester
- ❌ Abuse moderator power
Communication:
- Use clear, simple language
- Be respectful of language barriers
- Provide context for discussions
- Avoid jargon when simpler words work
Collaboration:
- Give credit where due
- Share knowledge freely
- Help others learn and grow
- Celebrate diversity of thought
Conflict Resolution:
- Address conflicts directly but respectfully
- Seek to understand before responding
- Focus on solutions, not blame
- Escalate to moderators if needed
Healthy Debate:
✅ "I prefer approach A because of X, Y, Z. What are your thoughts?"
✅ "Have you considered the performance implications of this approach?"
✅ "Let's benchmark both approaches to see which performs better."
Unhealthy Debate:
❌ "This code is garbage. Did you even think before writing this?"
❌ "Anyone who uses X framework doesn't know what they're doing."
❌ "This is obviously wrong." (without explanation)
Constructive:
✅ "I'd like to suggest [feature] because it would help with [use case]."
✅ "I understand this might not fit the roadmap, but here's my reasoning..."
✅ "Would it be possible to implement [alternative] instead?"
Unconstructive:
❌ "Why doesn't this keyboard have [feature]? Every other keyboard does!"
❌ "This is useless without [feature]."
❌ "I'm going to fork this and do it right." (without prior discussion)
Helpful:
✅ Includes steps to reproduce
✅ Provides device information
✅ Attaches relevant logs
✅ Describes expected vs actual behavior
Unhelpful:
❌ "It doesn't work. Fix it."
❌ "Worst keyboard ever. Crashes all the time."
❌ No details, just complaints
Acceptable:
- Discussing technical implementation of local-only features
- Proposing privacy-preserving improvements
- Questioning potential privacy implications
Unacceptable:
- Suggesting telemetry or analytics
- Proposing cloud-based features without strong justification
- Dismissing privacy concerns as "paranoid"
Responsible:
- Private disclosure of vulnerabilities
- Constructive security analysis
- Proposing security improvements
Irresponsible:
- Public disclosure of unpatched vulnerabilities
- Exploiting vulnerabilities for demonstration
- Sharing exploitation techniques publicly
This Code of Conduct is adapted from:
Modified to reflect CleverKeys' privacy-first principles and open-source values.
If you have questions about this Code of Conduct:
- Email: [conduct@cleverkeys.org] (to be set up)
- GitHub: Open a discussion with the "meta" label
- Documentation: See CONTRIBUTING.md for more details
This Code of Conduct is a living document. We welcome feedback and suggestions for improvement through:
- GitHub Discussions: Propose changes for community discussion
- Pull Requests: Submit specific wording improvements
- Email: Send private feedback to maintainers
We review this Code of Conduct annually and update as needed to serve our community better.
Thank you for helping make the CleverKeys community welcoming, inclusive, and respectful. Together, we're building not just great software, but a great community.
Remember: Everyone you interact with is a person. Be kind. 💙
Version: 1.0 Effective Date: 2025-11-16 Last Reviewed: 2025-11-16 Next Review: 2026-11-16
For the CleverKeys community - building privacy-first technology, together.
🧠 Think Faster • ⌨️ Type Smarter • 🔒 Stay Private • 🤝 Be Kind