Votorola
Votorola is software for hosting free and open elections.
It provides the freedom to nominate one's own candidate,
to retain control of one's own vote,
and to express one's choice in year round, continuous elections.
It offers a refreshing alternative to the usual prospect of joining a party,
waiting for the next election campaign, and then watching thereafter as a spectator
while those elected make the decisions and vote on the laws.
Instead of that prospect, Votorola invites you to consider an independent electoral system,
one in which the elections are hosted by volunteers in your own community,
the votes are openly posted for verification,
and the voter lists are backed by a trust network that is rooted in local neighbourhoods.
You are invited to join with your neighbours in advancing your candidates for public office,
your policies for executive action, and your legislative bills for statutory law.
All it takes to declare independence is to vote free.
Project Outline•Outlining
the concept of Votorola as a medium of assent,
and predicting its fit with society.
•See also the rough notes (very sketchy)
toward a more complete theoretical grounding.
Use-Case Scenarios•Various
attempts to envision free and open elections from the user's vantage
(some more convincing than others).
System Design•Detailing
the design of Votorola as an electoral system.
•Covers the technical
structure, function, and interrelations of the top-level components:
electoral offices, servers, networks and services.
Demonstration•Subserver
zelea.com:8080/votodemo/w/
runs the latest release of the code,
with electoral districts configured for Toronto.
•It isn't quite ready for voters,
but it works (most days), and you are welcome to try it out.
User's Guides and Screenshots•The
Web User's Guide is nearing completion,
and will be finished for the beta-one release.
•The
Mail User's Guide is still rough and incomplete, pending beta-two.
(You will be able to vote from your Blackberry, Senator.)
Administrator's Manual•Documents
the technical procedures for setting up and administering
an open, independent electoral office in your community.
•Covers seeding
the electoral register, defining the elections,
and configuring the Web and email interfaces.
Download•Download
the latest release of the executable code, for installing on your server.
•Upgrade releases are announced to
the mailing list
and to Freshmeat.
Licence•Votorola's licence
is MIT — an OSI approved, open source licence.
•The licence is liberal.
It lets you use Votorola pretty much as you please;
as long as you don't claim you wrote it (and don't sue us).
Changes•The project's
release history, and a summary of changes for each release.
Source Files•Browse the latest source files.
•These include recent changes,
not yet committed to the repository.
•The system code is Java,
build scripts are Perl, and the Web framework
is Apache Wicket.
Source Repository•Browse
the repository for the release trunk.
•We use
a distributed revision control system
(Mercurial).
•The repository is open.
You are invited to tap into the patch flow,
and to contribute patches of your own. See the
instructions for developers.
API•Developer's documentation
for the application programming interface.
Development Tasks•A prioritized
list of current development tasks.
•The next milestone
is a beta release — beta-one (we expect several takes).
Initial trials are expected in August 2008, in Toronto
(and maybe other hometowns that volunteer).
Mailing List•For discussion
(never enough, please share your thoughts) and announcements too.
•New releases are also announced
to Freshmeat.
Contributors•A welcome
to contributors (where have you been hiding?)
and instructions for getting started.
