software maintainer

{{one source |date=March 2024}}

In free and open source software and inner source software, a software maintainer or package maintainer is usually one or more people who build source code into a binary package for distribution, commit patches, or organize code in a source repository.{{cite web| url=https://www.linux.com/news/ols-kernel-documentation-and-submitting-kernel-patches/| title=OLS: Kernel documentation, and submitting kernel patches| author=David "cdlu" Graham| publisher=Linux.com| date=2008-07-25| accessdate=2008-08-20 }} If the maintainer stops doing their work on the project, then the development of the project stops. If another person not associated with the maintainer releases a new version of the project, it is said that a fork has been created. So for example happened with uClibc.

Maintainers often cryptographically sign binaries so that people can verify their authenticity.