# Maintainers Calls - 2026 JAN to MAR

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[Next time](https://arewemeetingyet.com/Berlin/2022-10-20/19:00/b/BIDS%20Maintainers%20Meeting) | [Where (Zoom)](https://stanford.zoom.us/j/98245168832?pwd=dXpYSGhvTFFwRFpjMjM0dGpFYmNBdz09) | [GDrive](https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1qCx4Zopmz7IyLpi8KdrSqIdfpb-bELsV) | [Mattermost](https://mattermost.brainhack.org/brainhack/channels/bids_maintainers)
[GCalendar](https://calendar.google.com/calendar/u/0/r?cid=[e-mail]) | [AllNotes](https://hackmd.io/@bids-standard/H1z2OgeYA) | [TimeZoneViewer](https://www.worldtimebuddy.com/?pl=1&lid=6077243,4671654,5746545,2618425,2147714&h=6077243&hf=1)
[GitHub BEP board](https://github.com/orgs/bids-standard/projects/19/views/1) | [BEP project status](https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/17vXDUEjDyaycbnbCgUZDf1fJlhyi7gaqmTP9KlxQdT4/edit?gid=0#gid=0)

</center>

> Next WEST meeting - Wednesday, January ?, 8pm EST?
> Next EAST meeting - Thursday, January 22, 9am EST

## Meeting Template

<details><summary>Click to expand</summary>

## 2026 Month # EAST (9am EST)

Lead: 
Present: 
Absent: 
Guests: 

### Steering requests & communications

### Steering meeting summary

### Focus

### Follow-ups

### Homework

### Maintainer Updates

#### Name

- Stuff
    

</details>

## 2026 Feb 18 (4pm EST)

Lead:
Present:
Absent:
Guests:

### Steering requests & communications

- we should let them know how many people need funds for OHBM and how much each: no "maybe" is accepted anymore, steering needs a concrete number
- BEP043: discuss at BIDS meeting in Bordeaux; steering not really clear on what it is supposed to be
- look out for grants to organize workshops, hackathons

### Steering meeting summary

1. when/how is steering planning to announce the OHBM BIDShack publicly? (shortly after the Brainhack announcement?)
**Answer**: Don't know yet because room organization is not finalized yet

2. Any funding applications coming up for BIDS?
**Answer**:
- maybe: https://grassfoundation.org/
- in general: look out for grants to organize workshops, hackathons

3. Loosening the criteria for [getting a BEP number as Yarik suggested](https://mattermost.brainhack.org/brainhack/pl/5qmb9wdurbgu7epqdxx843ne5r) -- is this getting adopted just based on Mattermost consensus?
- so far: had to go to steering and need to get three approvals from steering
- proposed: open a PR and get approval from two people (either maintainers or steering)
- Options:
- 1. proposed in mattermost, no contentious problem
- 2. can be resolved w some discussion in mattermost
- 3. needs steering discussion
--> ask steering to formalize it: Who decides under which option the proposal falls?

**Answer**: will be formalized by BEP process WG

4. what to do when things stall with a BEP?
**Answer**: will be formalized by BEP working group

5. ask steering what to do about chatbot: deploy it now and ask for feedback? It's been stalled for some time now; [Yarik's PR](https://github.com/bids-standard/bids-specification/pull/2254)
- see also the OSA's [BIDS chat](https://develop.osa-demo.pages.dev/bids)

**Answer**: steering will look at it

6. authorship convention for BEP papers --> [issue on github](https://github.com/bids-standard/bids-website/issues/748)
- related: [BIDS Guidelines for Article Authors and Reviewers](https://github.com/bids-standard/bids-website/issues/684)

**Answer**: steering will look at it

7. informed them about new maintainer João Amaro from Lisbon
8. informed them about new maintainers meeting schedule

- BEP043: discuss at BIDS meeting in Bordeaux; steering not really clear on what it is supposed to be

### Focus

### Follow-ups

### Homework

### Maintainer Updates

#### Name

- Stuff

## 2026 Feb 5 EAST (9am EST)

Lead: Chris
Present: Ross, Chris, Yahya, Eric, Boris, Julia, Christine, Taylor, João Amaro (new maintainer)
Absent:
Guests:

### Housekeeping

- new faces - João Amaro https://github.com/bids-standard/bids-specification/issues/2317
- BIDS Bud : Contact Chris with questions
- new meeting time - alternating
- https://www.when2meet.com/?34486111-bcpHk
- Meeting 1: Wednesdays every 4 weeks, 4pm-5pm EST
- We'll miss Anthony and Boris for the full meeting, and Ashley and Taylor for half that meeting
- Meeting 2: Thursdays every 4 weeks, 9am-10am EST
- We'll miss Ashley, Kim, and Nell
- When's the next meeting?

### Steering requests & communications

**copied from last meeting since there wasn't a steering meeting since then:**
- when/how is steering planning to announce the OHBM BIDShack publicly? (shortly after the Brainhack announcement?)
- Any funding applications coming up for BIDS?
- Loosening the criteria for [getting a BEP number as Yarik suggested](https://mattermost.brainhack.org/brainhack/pl/5qmb9wdurbgu7epqdxx843ne5r) -- is this getting adopted just based on Mattermost consensus?
- so far: had to go to steering and need to get three approvals from steering
- proposed: open a PR and get approval from two people (either maintainers or steering)
- Options:
- 1. proposed in mattermost, no contentious problem
- 2. can be resolved w some discussion in mattermost
- 3. needs steering discussion
--> ask steering to formalize it: Who decides under which option the proposal falls?
- BEP046 leads (Ariel Rokem, Franco Pestilli, Rob Smith) mentioned that they are getting ready to convert their Google Doc to a PR.
- Julia mention for BEP updates: BEP021 will be closed this year (Christine), just needs consensus
- what to do when things stall with a BEP

**new from this meeting:**
- ask steering what to do about chatbot: deploy it now and ask for feedback? It's been stalled for some time now; [Yarik's PR](https://github.com/bids-standard/bids-specification/pull/2254)
- see also the OSA's [BIDS chat](https://develop.osa-demo.pages.dev/bids)
- authorship convention for BEP papers --> [issue on github](https://github.com/bids-standard/bids-website/issues/748)
- related: [BIDS Guidelines for Article Authors and Reviewers](https://github.com/bids-standard/bids-website/issues/684)

### Steering meeting summary

no steering meeting since last maintainer meeting

### Focus

### Follow-ups

- Everyone look at [Zotero](https://www.zotero.org/groups/5111637/bids) and [Zenodo](https://zenodo.org/communities/brain-imaging-data-structure/) and join us
- [Follow-ups from EBRAINS/INCF outreach (Brussels December)](https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1MSy_Oe5ffSc7bJ2pdatQGXOymq-xnX9Ec7GhkywIB-8/edit?gid=0#gid=0)
--> Was everyone contacted? Do all the outreach by end of Jan!
- CJM: Ping Ben Dichter about row 8
- so far not getting answers back from outreach
- Ross, Julia, Chris to send a few emails per spreadsheet

### Homework

- Chris failed to collect last year's action items. Will make myself do it this week.
- Try out Yarik and Yahya's chat bots, [give feedback](https://github.com/bids-standard/bids-specification/pull/2254).
- Yahya's - https://develop.osa-demo.pages.dev/bids
- Yarik's - https://bids-assistant.neurosift.app

### Maintainer Updates

#### Julia

- [BIDS chatbot PR](https://github.com/bids-standard/bids-specification/pull/2254)
- who wants to take care of [BIDS Google Scholar Issue](https://github.com/bids-standard/bids-website/issues/658)?
- Chris to add Guiomar to 1Password group
- who wants to take care of [Integrate with FAIRsharing for listing of BEPs etc issue](https://github.com/bids-standard/bids-website/issues/644)?
- is there a bids-steering tag on GitHub? if not we should create one and also, how about we make a project on GitHub called "steering help needed" where we can put the issues and PRs for which we want input from steering?

#### Christine

* Mtl BrainHack outreach: got a question about hyperscanning that [had been answered in the bids-starter-kit FAQ](https://github.com/bids-standard/bids-starter-kit/issues/195) but is now awol ([under construction](https://bids.neuroimaging.io/faq/index.html))
* How can we help restore the FAQ this quarter? other content we still want to port over?
* Anyone welcome to create an issue to help prioritize and of course contribute PRs.
* Feature/tool request: [standard tabular format](https://github.com/bids-standard/bids-specification/issues/2329) to generate overview of what's in a BIDS dataset(s), standandardized for interoperability - raised and seconded at BrainHack last week
* Gabriel Devenyi could lead the effort. What kind of meta effort is this, where does it fit in for governance / spec development etc?
* Homework [Please add to issue:](https://github.com/bids-standard/bids-specification/issues/2329) your links (to tools like Neurobagel) and examples and stakeholders, tag anyone who wants to be involved.

#### Chris

- BIDS 1.11.0 released

#### Eric

- Check your calendars for the invite to new BIDS maintainers meetings

## 2026 Jan 22 EAST (9am EST)

Lead: Julia
Present: Eric, Anthony, Christine, Taylor, Chris
Absent:
Guests:

### Steering requests & communications

- when/how is steering planning to announce the OHBM BIDShack publicly? (shortly after the Brainhack announcement?)
- Any funding applications coming up for BIDS?
- Loosening the criteria for [getting a BEP number as Yarik suggested](https://mattermost.brainhack.org/brainhack/pl/5qmb9wdurbgu7epqdxx843ne5r) -- is this getting adopted just based on Mattermost consensus?
- so far: had to go to steering and need to get three approvals from steering
- proposed: open a PR and get approval from two people (either maintainers or steering)
- Options:
- 1. proposed in mattermost, no contentious problem
- 2. can be resolved w some discussion in mattermost
- 3. needs steering discussion
--> ask steering to fromalize it: Who decides under which option the proposal falls?
- BEP046 leads (Ariel Rokem, Franco Pestilli, Rob Smith) mentioned that they are getting ready to convert their Google Doc to a PR.
- Julia mention for BEP updates: BEP021 will be closed this year (Christine), just needs consensus
- what to do when things stall with a BEP

### Steering meeting summary

1. OHBM OSSIG Brainhack in collab with BIDS will likely be the 3 days before OHBM (June 11-13).
- OSSIG and Yarik+Camille are discussing BIDS' requests and trying to come to agreement
- OSSIG are currently offering a 20-person room for one private BIDS day (Maintainers+Steering-only meeting) and a separate half-day BIDS "public" workshop
- If maintainers feel more is necessary, there may be the ability to have a pre-brainhack day for BIDS at another venue
- Steering needs a head count of who can make the OHBM brainhack work for their schedules, see Mattermost
- Christine just tagged Nell, Ross, Ashley for responses on this in Mattermost
2. Steering agrees we should have two regular BEP Review Periods each year to both give us a known time we'll need to work on BEP support and a known time for BEPs to work toward being ready
3. JB and Camille will look for ways to support getting travel paid for and approved for maintainers who can't secure travel approval or funding through your own institution
4. Lots of notes on BEP updates
- BEP041 updates are next
5. Steering meetings will be 1.5 hours long

### Focus

### Follow-ups

- Everyone look at [Zotero](https://www.zotero.org/groups/5111637/bids) and [Zenodo](https://zenodo.org/communities/brain-imaging-data-structure/) and join us
- [Follow-ups from EBRAINS/INCF outreach (Brussels December)](https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1MSy_Oe5ffSc7bJ2pdatQGXOymq-xnX9Ec7GhkywIB-8/edit?gid=0#gid=0)
- Was everyone contacted? Do all the outreach by end of Jan!
- Eric made [a new When2Meet](https://www.when2meet.com/?34486111-bcpHk) for possible new maintainers meeting time(s)

### Homework

- [Chris] - Review OCT-DEC 2025 meeting notes and collect old maintainer action items before next maintainers meeting.
- [Eric] - Provided BEP updates from last steering meeting into [the slides](https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1y4-McSmmkgBtiLaA8PQNVtDTZYPKY34gB37rYCBRCRo/edit?usp=sharing).
- [Eric] - Bring details about communications maintainer post. Found [here](https://notes.inria.fr/mmS8gnriQiW54w6EMo1WWg#)
- Please contact everyone in [Follow-ups from EBRAINS/INCF outreach (Brussels, December 2025)](https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1MSy_Oe5ffSc7bJ2pdatQGXOymq-xnX9Ec7GhkywIB-8/edit?gid=0#gid=0) before next maintainers meeting
- everyone look at - [1.11.0 milestone](https://github.com/bids-standard/bids-specification/milestone/18)
- please do a maintainers' pass at BEP28
- please think about and make suggestions: - what to do when things stall with a BEP --> will be discussed in the next maintainers AND steering meeting ; would like to have consensus
- What are the options? what's worked in the past?

### Maintainer Updates

#### Name

- Stuff

#### Christine

- Question for Steering: When/how/Who will announce publicly the OHBM BIDShack? cc @YQPx2xuzS-yqaCkzr3VWDQ What/who needs to prepare anything?
- planned for shortly after the brainhack
- lots of groups pre-meeting June 11-13
- Any funding applications coming up for BIDS?
- BrainHack - Montreal
- Loosening the criteria for [getting a BEP number as Yarik suggested](https://mattermost.brainhack.org/brainhack/pl/5qmb9wdurbgu7epqdxx843ne5r) -- is this getting adopted just based on Mattermost consensus?
- Yarik suggested weakening criteria for assigning a BEP number, this means Cardiac would get a BEP number too.
- this was actually based on the context of Ben's PR, lots of work just held up by the lack of a BEP number
- BEP process working group will spell out who/when/how these 3 ways to getting a BEP number; julia will follow up to ask steering to make a PR:
- 1. proposed in mattermost, no contentious problem
- 2. can be resolved w some discussion in mattermost
- 3. needs steering discussion
- Comms role, what's up with planning, who could do it? (external, because no stipend.)
- Eric to share the role posting draft, any updates.
- e.g. a minimum time / duration commitment is probably a good idea so that we're not just onboarding someone for like a 6 month stint

#### Taylor

- BEP046 leads (Ariel Rokem, Franco Pestilli, Rob Smith) mentioned that they are getting ready to convert their Google Doc to a PR. They asked if I (or other maintainers) would like to join IST SU meetings (including this month's on January 30th). I have agreed to join.

#### Eric

- Pushing on BEP036 some more. Thanks to Chris and Ross in advance for their help.

#### Anthony

- BEP011 what's the status on this? Does it need a new lead? --> Anthony is the new lead, haha
- scheduling a call for next week w/ Chris, Anthony, and anyone else involved.
- BEP023 have been pushing small changes to the validator to get things to work, no blockers other than my own at this point.

#### Chris

- 1.11.0 release
- BEPs 020, 038, 042 all merged
- [1.11.0 milestone](https://github.com/bids-standard/bids-specification/milestone/18)
- Open release PR next monday?
- datacite.yml: [spec#2221](https://github.com/bids-standard/bids-specification/pull/2221)
- Doing a maintainers' pass at BEP28

### If there's time...

1. Assignee needed in the Homework section to wrap up old meeting notes
2. BEP updates from steering prior to BEP041: https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1y4-McSmmkgBtiLaA8PQNVtDTZYPKY34gB37rYCBRCRo/edit?usp=sharing

## 2026 Jan 8 EAST (9am EST)

Lead: Chris & Christine
Present: Eric, Ross, Taylor, Christine, Boris, Chris, Julia, Anthony
Absent: Nell (Ashley)
Guests: None

### Steering requests & communications

- Take 5 minutes right now to co-work and do [steering meeting 1/15/26 BEP updates](https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/17vXDUEjDyaycbnbCgUZDf1fJlhyi7gaqmTP9KlxQdT4/edit?usp=sharing)
- Please fill in any updates where you are a BEP lead
- Julia and Anthony will follow up on 2 BEPs & updates
- Eric will email all other BEP leads later today ([email template](https://docs.google.com/document/d/1A1MJC-YPYmHrvrEN0etRU1Ysa6o2Z5wbSvN8KmKx5qY/edit?tab=t.xmi4iq3dwqor))
- Do we need another "BEP review period"? April and October? Maintainers discussed how this motivates some BEPs to try reaching the community review period.
- Raise to steering: Some BIDS maintainers may need funding to attend the maintainers meeting at OHBM Brainhack

### Focus

### Follow-ups

- BEP process WG followups
- (CR) Tidying nomenclature re the "BEP Roadmap" board -> rename because it's confusing to BEP leads in discussion.
- `BEP Status (Dash)board` is probably a better name
- but what's the other website BEP status table called?
- (CR) New GH [Website Label](https://github.com/bids-standard/bids-website/issues?q=label%3A%22BEP%20Process%20WG%22) and [initial checklist](https://github.com/bids-standard/bids-website/issues/770) based on Camille's feedback - stuff to clarify publicly. Please add to the thread. EE+YS will make the PR
- (YS) In reaching out to the BEP Leads, ask them what are (have been) the main blockers for their progress, and how maintainers/steering can (could have) help

### Homework

Last meeting of 2025 homework:

- Everyone look at [Zotero](https://www.zotero.org/groups/5111637/bids) and [Zenodo](https://zenodo.org/communities/brain-imaging-data-structure/); join it
- Please do/claim [1-2 followups from EBRAINS/INCF outreach (Brussels December)](https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1MSy_Oe5ffSc7bJ2pdatQGXOymq-xnX9Ec7GhkywIB-8/edit?gid=0#gid=0)
- Aim to contact everyone by Jan. 15
- **[ASSIGNEE]** old maintainer action items need to be collected before next maintainers meeting
- Eric will make a new When2Meet for possible new maintainers meeting time

### Maintainer Updates

#### Next release

Chris says imminent but a few weeks away.

#### Christine

- GitHub Housekeeping:
- Who's on top of the [Review Period banners](https://github.com/bids-standard/bids-specification/issues) generally?
- target for this year: 2 periods per year, plus on request.
- Chris will pin these on the repo (and unpin)
- Helpful to signal when the periods are, even if they're not strict.
- Might as well schedule a review period for when we have capacity. April and October.
- Rémi has set `squash commits` default on the repo(?); given [past discussion](https://mattermost.brainhack.org/brainhack/pl/z1fy8kzcwbdopco9xw7gxkmjur) + history of discussion, better to keep the option open ?
- every commit ends up in the history
- only christine is objecting

- December chatter: anyone Not feel that [Somnography << EEG](https://github.com/bids-standard/bids-specification/issues/2138) ?
- Yahya to follow up (Reached out);
- Add a sub-section on the website, Bids-specification example paragraph
- bids-example would be great. they can add the pr
- Ask the people what isn't covered. Offer to meet.

- Python validator - is it done, are there future phases?
- CLI does some filename checking, raw only
- infrastructure built;
- Dan starting on expression language to support the rest
- progress is currently too slow to make any estimates

#### Eric

- We skipped the above follow-ups
- BEP036 feels stuck and needs concentrated effort or more community feedback once the validator hurdle is cleared ("if anyone uses sessions, everyone uses sessions")
- OHBM Brainhack attendance: I don't know if I'll be able to travel due to dates. Perhaps I should plan on virtual/hybrid attendance?
- virtual sync unlikely given time difference Europe/WestCoast
- is there any funding for maintainers to attend? (like 2-5 ppl)
- Eric to raise these to Steering, just so it's on the table early

#### Anthony

- BEP 023:
- Updating examples with latest outputs to nipreps/petpreps
- Pushing changes to validator need to merge/increase coverage on this [PR #330](https://github.com/bids-standard/bids-validator/pull/330)

#### Julia

- [BIDS Study layout PR](https://github.com/bids-standard/bids-specification/pull/2191) has been open for a while and no response in a while; only Chris and I were involved from maintainer side but would be very good if 1-2 other maintainers would comment their thoughts
- question: when is next release?
- is this meeting time still good for everyone?
- Eric to send around a poll to refresh avails
- An

## 2026 Jan 7 WEST (7pm EST)

Lead: Ashley
Present: Chris, Anthony
Absent: None
Guests: None

### Focus

- Neurodesk ezBIDS integration works - Ashley integrating it further into JupyterLab environment
- Reviewed and merged PyBIDS schema driving PR https://github.com/bids-standard/pybids/pull/1163