2023 Transparency Report

From: Louis Tatta (louis_at_[hidden])
Date: 2024-02-20 17:09:55

Hello, Louis Tatta here, CEO of The C++ Alliance, Inc, a registered
501(c)(3) non-profit organization dedicated to the support of C++.
This is our 2023 transparency report regarding our charitable work for
the Boost C++ Library Collection.

First, some background on our operations. The C++ Alliance seeks out
the highly talented and experienced C++ experts and hires them,
usually full-time, so they can focus completely on their open-source
projects. Our Staff Engineers maintain existing Boost libraries, write
new Boost libraries, and contribute to other Boost projects. We employ
IT experts full-time to maintain and improve the infrastructure which
supports Boost, including the legacy web server, the Drone continuous
integration servers, the scripts used to deploy GitHub Actions for
Boost repositories, and the scripts which publish the Boost release.
In addition, we provide on-demand technical support services for Boost
authors and maintainers who have infrastructure related problems.

The Boost Mailing List continues to be the premier place for
high-quality discussion of the Boost libraries and tangential C++
Standards related topics. The C++ Alliance supports the use of the
mailing lists going forward. We are upgrading it to the latest Mailman
version, and building an optional web-based front-end allowing
interaction using only a browser.

We continue to operate the Official C++ Language Slack Workspace
(https://cpp.al/slack) which hosts the most popular interactive
discussions regarding the Boost libraries. The C++ Alliance sponsors a
paid plan to provide full history, video and audio conferences,
collaboration tools, and unlimited document storage for seventeen
dedicated Boost library channels and one main Boost discussion
channel.

Our largest project for 2023 is the continuation of work on the new
Boost website. The new site is a C++ social media portal with rich
support for user-generated content, and a powerful back-end which has
visibility into the contributions made on GitHub and the release
process. This allows us to deliver an elevated user experience with
the hopes of attracting fresh talent to Boost. Also,note that the
graphics on the website are hand-drawn by our contract artist and
reflect our level of commitment to ensure that Boost, to put it
simply, looks good.

In 2023 there were a total of four Boost Formal Reviews. One of the
reviewed libraries is authored by a C++ Alliance Staff Engineer. Three
of the reviews were managed by C++ Alliance team members. Out of a
total of twenty-eight submitted reviews for the year, twelve were from
C++ Alliance team members.

Last year we increased our efforts to build Boost’s social media
presence. There were a total of twelve messages from the
@Boost_Libraries X (formerly Twitter) account, all submitted by C++
Alliance team members. Three of them contained artwork from Bob Ostrom
commissioned by us. Messages containing images get three times more
engagement than text-only messages. We believe that the X platform has
unique strategic value for informing newer generations about the Boost
value proposition.

A total of $1,768,000 was spent on Boost-related contributions, broken
down thusly (and rounded to the nearest thousand):

Staff Engineers Compensation $1,240,000
Website Software Development $570,000
Server Hosting $62,000
C++ Slack Workspace $96,000
Conference Sponsorship $10,000
Conference Attendance $10,000

During 2023 we employed a total of 12 individuals to contribute to
Boost. Here is a high-level summary of accomplishments:

Sam Darwin (Chief Technical Officer)
* Boost website maintenance and administration
* Boost per-pull-request documentation previews
* Boost Release Process development, maintenance, and administration
* Boost Mailman services maintenance and upgrade
* Boost GitHub Actions self-hosted runner project development
* Boost Drone service administration and maintenance
* New Boost website deployment, administration, and development

Dmitry Arkhipov (Staff Engineer)
* Boost.JSON maintenance

Alan de Freitas (Staff Engineer)
* Boost.URL maintenance
* Mr. Docs project management (https://mrdocs.com)
* GitHub actions support scripts for Boost CI
(https://alandefreitas.github.io/cpp-actions/cpp-actions/index.html)

Christian Mazakas (Staff Engineer)
* Boost.Unordered evolution project
* Boost.Buffers development (new library)
* Boost.Http.Proto, Boost.Http.Io development (new libraries)
* Boost.Websocket.Proto, Boost.Websocket.Io development (new libraries)

Krystian Stasiowski (Staff Engineer)
* Boost.StaticString maintenance
* Mr. Docs Lead engineer (https://mrdocs.com/)
* Clang/LLVM contributions

Peter Turcan (Senior Technical Writer)
* Boost User Guide development (new documentation)
* Boost Contributor Guide (new documentation)
* Boost Formal Reviews (new documentation)

Matt Borland (Staff Engineer)
* Boost.Charconv (new, accepted library)

Ruben Perez
* Boost.MySQL maintenance (new, accepted library)
* User Guide, Contributor Guide contribution (new documentation)

Mohammad Nejati (Staff Engineer)
* Boost website full-text search feature
* Boost.Beast maintenance

Fernando Pelliccioni (Staff Engineer)
* Mr. Docs development (https://mrdocs.com/)

Spencer Strickland (Senior Web Developer)
* New website front-end and scripting

Klemens Morgenstern (Staff Engineer)
* Boost.Beast maintenance
* Boost.Cobalt (new, accepted library)

Joaquin M Lopez Munoz (Staff Engineer)
* Boost.Unordered evolution project lead
* Boost Contributor Guide contributions (new documentation)

Our sources of funding are secure and we look forward to continuing
our charitable contributions throughout this decade and beyond. It is
an honor and a pleasure to support the Boost C++ Library collection.

Thank You
Louis Tatta