Registering an OSS Project

Once your project is registered, it will be visible within the tea community, attracting potential supporters, contributors and users. You can also track the utilization and impact of your project, which can earn you rewards based on its value and receive vulnerabilities reports from other members of the tea community. Registering your project on the tea protocol showcases your commitment to the sustainability and integrity of open-source software.

Why register an OSS Project?

Registering your OSS project on the tea protocol offers several benefits. It allows you to gain visibility within the tea community, attract potential contributors and users, and track the utilization and impact of your project. This data can be used to earn rewards based on the value of your project. Additionally, registering your project on the tea protocol incentivizes security researchers to disclose vulnerabilities ethically and responsibly.

The tea protocol introduces the concept of teaRank, which measures a project's utilization or dependents in the open-source ecosystem. A project's teaRank is calculated using the Proof of Contribution algorithm, which assesses the project's impact on the entire open-source software ecosystem.

Based on your project's teaRank, the protocol determines the number of rewards to be distributed on a daily basis. Higher teaRank, achieved through more (reputable) open-source software depending on your project, results in more rewards. However, earning rewards is not limited to teaRank alone. Projects can also earn rewards from community members who stake their TEA on them. When community members stake their TEA on your project, they signify their belief and support for your project and empower your project with additional incentives by distributing a portion of their staking rewards to your project's treasury.

How to register a project?

To register an OSS project on the protocol you need to follow these steps:

IMPORTANT - YOU CAN ONLY REGISTER PROJECTS THAT YOU ARE A CORE CONTRIBUTOR TO AND FOR WHICH YOU HAVE PERMISSION TO PERFORM DIRECT COMMITS.

1. Visit the tea web app and log in to your tea protocol account.

2. Go to the "My OSS Projects" section.

3. Provide the project’s name.

   

   Make sure to double check that it's the correct project by checking its package manager and URL.

4. Continue to your project's constitution configuration screen, where you can decide to add contributors. The quorum rules define the minimum number of contributors required to approve any treasury disbursement, any treasury deposits, manage vulnerability reports, govern voting, etc.

   
5. You will need to download your project's constitution file, and manually commit the file to your project's repository. For more information on what the constitution file is, check out this FAQ.

   
6. Once the file is committed, click on "Validate Constitution". Once the file's presence in the repo is confirmed and contents validated, the tea Protocol will deploy the project's treasury (on-chain account). You can find your project's on-chain address in the project details page.

Updating your URL based on your package manager

If the tea Application shows an error message indicating that your project is missing a URL, the most likely cause is that you need to update the package metadata that you published to include your project's URL. For each package, we index a specific field to build the URL, and enable project registration.

Package Manager	URL Field	Source
NPM	repository	package.json
PyPI	project_urls.Source	You can use setup, or pyproject.toml to specify this
rubygems	source_code_uri	spec.metadata.source_code_uri in the gemfile, or gemspec
crates	repository	Cargo.toml, under the packages section
Homebrew	parsed.stable.url	Homebrew Formula: https://github.com/Homebrew/homebrew-core/tree/master/Formula
PKGX	url	Pkgx yaml files: https://github.com/pkgxdev/pantry/tree/main/projects

FAQs

What is the tea.yaml file and why does my project need it?

For a project to be registered on the tea Protocol it requires a tea.yaml file which serves as the project's constitution to govern its number of contributors and number of votes required to carry out certain actions.

Variables required by the file are: 1. codeOwners: A list of addresses of said project's contributors that have profiles on the tea Protocol. 2. quorum: The minimum number of contributors required to approve any treasury disbursement, any treasury deposits, manage vulnerability reports, govern voting, etc. 3. version: Your constitution's current version.

Why verify ownership?

We have been informed that multiple projects were getting spammed with PRs from tea users attempting to register a project that was not theirs. This behavior goes against the very principles of the tea Protocol and will not be tolerated.

To protect the OSS developers that the tea Protocol aims to serve, all users will have to prove a direct association with the project in order to continue with the registration process.

The tea Protocol will confirm the user’s association with the project based on GitHub activity. Users that are confirmed contributors on GitHub will be able to register that project. Users that are not may be banned from registering any project and see all their points zeroed out during the Incentivized Testnet.

Will my project start earning rewards immediately after registering it?

If your registered project exceeds the minimum teaRank threshold, it is eligible to receive rewards during the next distribution cycles. teaRank rewards distribution occur approximately every 24 hours.

Are projects I register tied to my tea account or are they independent?

Projects you register are tied to your tea account as long as you are a signing contributor of said projects.

Can I register projects that I do not own?

No, you can not. You can only register projects that you are a core contributor to, in which you have permission to perform direct commits. Registration will only be complete once the tea.yaml file has been committed to the project's repository.

Are there any fees associated with registering projects on the tea protocol?

At launch, no fees will be associated with project registration on the tea protocol. Fees may be introduced in subsequent updates to the tea protocol.