The technical committees and working groups create and maintain the hardware ISA, test and debug frameworks, software specs, and other technical aspects.
The Technical Steering Committee (TSC) is the technical governance body within RISC-V, made up of task group chairs and Premier members, with a hard limit of one representative per company, reporting monthly to the Board of Directors. RISC-V organizes our technical work through standing committees which guide the work done by task groups and technical special interest groups (SIGs).
The Certification Steering Committee (CSC) is the governance body in charge of developing, governing, and managing and sustaining certification programs within RISC-V. Unlike the TSC, participation in the CSC is open to all members.
All RISC-V technical work is open and the archives are publicly visible. Active participation in working groups is limited to members. Contributions to these working groups are RISC-V community property. In other words, ownership of all specifications is assigned directly to RISC-V International, who maintains the copyright and Creative Commons license on behalf of the member community, and no individual contributor retains ownership of work that ends up in the RISC-V specifications.
Technical task groups that have achieved their final deliverables are considered “graduated” – they are kept as archives, but participation is locked. Technical groups that were archived before 2020 are archived within the server in separate groups titled groupname-archive.
Members can access all archives, and they can join any working technical group other than tech-chairs and the TSC.
Working Group Meetings
Many working groups meet periodically. You can find these meetings from the group calendar. However, calendars are visible to members only. Additionally, you must be a member to attend a meeting. If you are not a member, you can see the calendar entries for a meeting, but not the meeting information itself. Mailing list archives for technical groups are publicly available.
Types of Technical Committees and Groups
Technical Steering Committee (TSC)
Delegation of responsibilities to organizational components below it, strategy, escalation, group and chair and preliminary charter approvals, ratification, voting (most discussion and notification by email, web page listing and supporting docs, automated voting system). The TSC has voting members and non-voting attendees. The voting members include premiers and HC and IC chairs (non-voting attendees are advisors and RISC-V staff).
Certification Steering Committee (CSC)
Organizational structure and policies consistent with ISO alignment. Interaction model with other RVI groups and other non-RVI groups. Role, selection process, and accreditation of 3rd-party test labs (if required).
ISA Committees (IC)
Approve and oversee packages for TSC vote for the creation of ISA Extension TGs and filling the chair and vice-chair vacancies for its TGs. Develop strategy for the groups under it and complete coverage of areas of responsibility under it including gaps.
Horizontal Committees (HC)
Approve and oversee non-extension TGs, and has responsibilities to make sure that all Extension TGs cover the area overseen by the HC before ratification. Responsible for developing a holistic strategy and reaching out to the external ecosystem and community groups.
Task Groups (TG)
Must have a charter that defines deliverable work products, extension specifications, standards, requirements, best practices, etc.. TGs under the Unprivileged and Privileged ISA Committees can have ISA extension work products. TGs under HCs generally do not have ISA extension work products.
View all Active Technical Task Groups
Special Interest Groups (SIG)
Topic discussion. No work product. Can be created by the TSC, ICs, or HCs with TSC approval not required.
Technical Chairs Meeting
Invitees are RISC-v staff, Chairs and vice chairs of all ICs, HCs, TGs, and SIGs. Policy approval, general governance, escalations, exceptions, final charter approval, voting as appropriate.
Technical Committee Chair Coordination Meeting
Invitees include chairs of the HCs and ICs. This meeting focuses on execution only, no policy.
How to Use Groups.io
Our groups server is based on groups.io, a popular cloud-based service that features mailing lists, calendars, file storage, and wiki pages. Each user has a profile based on their email address.
Members are typically added to the server when they join RISC-V. If you are affiliated with a member organization (i.e. if you have an email address within your organization’s domain) and you want to join, send a note to info@riscv.org and we will add you to the server.
The main Group
The main group functions as an identity server – all members of the system are members of the main group, although there is no traffic there. All other groups are considered “subgroups”.
If you remove yourself from main, you also remove yourself from all other lists.
Navigating groups
All members in good standing may participate in the discussions, subscribe to the lists, and view the files on the server, including the archives. Once you are logged into the system, you can visit and subscribe to groups by clicking Subgroups from the left navigation panel.
To join a subgroup from the list of available subgroups, select that subgroup and click Join this Group from the group page. You are then subscribed to the group and receive all communications.
To navigate quickly to your subscribed groups, click Your Groups. You can adjust your profile and preferences for the site by clicking your name in the upper right corner.
To find which group you are currently viewing, find the title box near the top of the page. The current group sets the context for the navigation menu. You can change groups by clicking Your Groups.
To return to the main page from any group page, select Subgroups and then RISC-V Main Group
For more information about using the Working groups portal, see https://lists.riscv.org/helpcenter/membersmanual.