Announcing PHEP 4: PyHC Package Tiering

[Shawn Polson]

Hi all,

PyHC has formally adopted PHEP 4: PyHC Package Tiering! This new PHEP establishes a three-tier structure for PyHC packages—Gold, Silver, and Bronze—that will replace the current "Core," "Other," and "Unevaluated" groupings.

Tiering preserves PyHC as an inclusive collection of Heliophysics-relevant Python packages while making it clearer which packages have completed additional review, standards compliance, and community-support steps. Higher tiers also carry more benefits: summer school tutorial invitations, priority for inclusion in broader PyHC efforts like the PyHC Environment and PyHC-Chat, standards-compliance assistance, and consideration for conference travel funding (depending on tier and available PyHC resources).

Adopting PHEP 4 kicks off a process to re-designate every PyHC package into the new tiers. A few pieces of groundwork need to be in place first, though, including finalizing the related PyHC–pyOpenSci review PHEPs and standing up the Technical Steering Committee that performs reviews. As a result, there will be a delay before we launch the re-designation process. When we do begin, we'll announce it officially (by email and at a telecon) and follow the timeline laid out in PHEP 4 from that point. No action is needed from package maintainers right now.

Read the full PHEP 4 document here: https://github.com/heliophysicsPy/standards/blob/main/pheps/phep-0004.md

Thanks to Julie Barnum for authoring PHEP 4, and to everyone who shaped it through community discussion and votes. Questions or feedback are welcome on PyHC's mailing list or Slack.

Thanks,

Shawn Polson

PyHC Tech Lead