QUALITY_DECLARATION

This document is a declaration of software quality for the rcutils package, based on the guidelines in REP-2004.

rcutils Quality Declaration

The package rcutils claims to be in the Quality Level 1 category.

Below are the rationales, notes, and caveats for this claim, organized by each requirement listed in the Package Quality Categories in REP-2004 of the ROS2 developer guide.

Version Policy [1]

Version Scheme [1.i]

rcutils uses semver according to the recommendation for ROS Core packages in the ROS 2 Developer Guide

Version Stability [1.ii]

rcutils is at a stable version, i.e. >= 1.0.0. The current version can be found in its package.xml, and its change history can be found in its CHANGELOG.

Public API Declaration [1.iii]

All symbols in the installed headers are considered part of the public API.

All installed headers are in the include directory of the package, headers in any other folders are not installed and considered private.

Additionally, there are generated header files which are installed and therefore part of the public API. The source templates for these generated headers are in the resource folder.

API Stability Policy [1.iv]

rcutils will not break public API within a released ROS distribution, i.e. no major releases once the ROS distribution is released.

ABI Stability Policy [1.v]

rcutils contains C code and therefore must be concerned with ABI stability, and will maintain ABI stability within a ROS distribution.

ABI and ABI Stability Within a Released ROS Distribution [1.vi]

rcutils will not break API nor ABI within a released ROS distribution, i.e. no major releases once the ROS distribution is released.

Change Control Process [2]

rcutils follows the recommended guidelines for ROS Core packages in the ROS 2 Developer Guide.

Change Requests [2.i]

All changes will occur through a pull request, check ROS 2 Developer Guide for additional information.

Contributor Origin [2.ii]

This package uses DCO as its confirmation of contributor origin policy. More information can be found in CONTRIBUTING

Peer Review Policy [2.iii]

All pull request will be peer-reviewed, check ROS 2 Developer Guide for additional information.

Continuous Integration [2.iv]

All pull request must pass CI on all tier 1 platforms

Currently nightly results can be seen here:

• linux-aarch64_release

• linux_release

• mac_osx_release

• windows_release

Documentation Policy [2.v]

All pull requests must resolve related documentation changes before merging

Documentation [3]

Feature Documentation [3.i]

rcutils has a documented feature list and it is hosted here.

Public API Documentation [3.ii]

rcutils has documentation of its public API and it is hosted here.

License [3.iii]

The license for rcutils is Apache 2.0, and a summary is in each source file, the type is declared in the package.xml manifest file, and a full copy of the license is in the LICENSE file.

There is an automated test which runs a linter that ensures each file has a license statement. Here can be found a list with the latest results of the various linters being run on the package.

Copyright Statements [3.iv]

The copyright holders each provide a statement of copyright in each source code file in rcutils.

There is an automated test which runs a linter that ensures each file has at least one copyright statement. Latest linter result report can be seen here.

Testing [4]

Feature Testing [4.i]

Each feature in rcutils has corresponding tests which simulate typical usage, and they are located in the test directory. New features are required to have tests before being added. Currently nightly test results can be seen here:

• linux-aarch64_release

• linux_release

• mac_osx_release

• windows_release

Public API Testing [4.ii]

Each part of the public API has tests, and new additions or changes to the public API require tests before being added. The tests aim to cover both typical usage and corner cases, but are quantified by contributing to code coverage.

Coverage [4.iii]

rcutils follows the recommendations for ROS Core packages in the ROS 2 Developer Guide, and opts to use line coverage instead of branch coverage.

This includes:

• tracking and reporting line coverage statistics

• achieving and maintaining a reasonable branch line coverage (90-100%)

• no lines are manually skipped in coverage calculations

Changes are required to make a best effort to keep or increase coverage before being accepted, but decreases are allowed if properly justified and accepted by reviewers.

Current coverage statistics can be viewed here. A description of how coverage statistics are summarized from this page, can be found in the “ROS 2 Onboarding Guide”.

Performance [4.iv]

rcutils follows the recommendations for performance testing of C code in the ROS 2 Developer Guide, and opts to do performance analysis on each release rather than each change.

System level performance benchmarks that cover features of rcutils can be found at:

• Benchmarks

• Performance

Changes that introduce regressions in performance must be adequately justified in order to be accepted and merged.

Linters and Static Analysis [4.v]

rcutils uses and passes all the ROS2 standard linters and static analysis tools for a C package as described in the ROS 2 Developer Guide. Passing implies there are no linter/static errors when testing against CI of supported platforms.

Currently nightly test results can be seen here:

• linux-aarch64_release

• linux-arm64_release

• mac_osx_release

• windows_release

Dependencies [5]

Direct Runtime ROS Dependencies [5.i]

rcutils has no run-time or build-time dependencies that need to be considered for this declaration.

It has several “buildtool” dependencies, which do not affect the resulting quality of the package, because they do not contribute to the public library API.

Optional Direct Runtime ROS Dependencies [5.ii]

rcutils has no run-time or build-time dependencies that need to be considered for this declaration.

Direct Runtime non-ROS Dependency [5.iii]

rcutils has no run-time or build-time dependencies that need to be considered for this declaration.

Platform Support [6]

rcutils supports all of the tier 1 platforms as described in REP-2000, and tests each change against all of them.

Currently nightly build status can be seen here:

• linux-aarch64_release

• linux_release

• mac_osx_release

• windows_release

Vulnerability Disclosure Policy [7.i]

This package conforms to the Vulnerability Disclosure Policy in REP-2006.

Current status Summary

The chart below compares the requirements in the REP-2004 with the current state of the rcutils package.

Number	Requirement	Current state
1	Version policy	—
1.i	Version Policy available	✓
1.ii	Stable version	✓
1.iii	Declared public API	✓
1.iv	API stability policy	✓
1.v	ABI stability policy	✓
1.vi_	API/ABI stable within ros distribution	✓
2	Change control process	—
2.i	All changes occur on change request	✓
2.ii	Contributor origin (DCO, CLA, etc)	✓
2.iii	Peer review policy	✓
2.iv	CI policy for change requests	✓
2.v	Documentation policy for change requests	✓
3	Documentation	—
3.i	Per feature documentation	✓
3.ii	Per public API item documentation	✓
3.iii	Declared License(s)	✓
3.iv	Copyright in source files	✓
3.v.a	Quality declaration linked to README	✓
3.v.b	Centralized declaration available for peer review	✓
4	Testing	—
4.i	Feature items tests	✓
4.ii	Public API tests	✓
4.iii.a	Using coverage	✓
4.iii.a	Coverage policy	✓
4.iv.a	Performance tests (if applicable)	✓
4.iv.b	Performance tests policy	✓
4.v.a	Code style enforcement (linters)	✓
4.v.b	Use of static analysis tools	✓
5	Dependencies	—
5.i	Must not have ROS lower level dependencies	✓
5.ii	Optional ROS lower level dependencies	✓
5.iii	Justifies quality use of non-ROS dependencies	✓
6	Platform support	—
6.i	Support targets Tier1 ROS platforms	✓
7	Security	—
7.i	Vulnerability Disclosure Policy	✓