Draft policy on the usage of generative AI tools by santisoler · Pull Request #177 · fatiando/community

santisoler · 2026-04-21T18:50:59Z

Add a policy on the usage of generative AI within the project to CONTRIBUTING.md.

Relevant issues/PRs:

Fixes #171

santisoler · 2026-04-21T18:58:15Z

@leouieda, @mdtanker I started drafting a policy text here. I would love to hear your thoughts on it. Feel free to trim it and improve it! Let me know if I'm leaving anything out, or if you disagree with any of the points.

mdtanker

This looks really good to me! I think it sets clear boundaries but isn't too strict. I've added a few minor suggestions.

mdtanker · 2026-04-21T19:14:54Z

+  Issues, and any communication channel of the project.
+- ❌ Pasting outputs of genAI content directly into Pull Requests, Issues, and
+  any communication channel of the project.
+- ❌ Use of genAI tools to circumvent license restrictions. For example,


The other points in this section I think are good, but this seems a bit niche, at least it's not something I've heard about. But if it's a common issue, then all good to leave it!

Yes, I know. I wanted to list it still, just to make it explicit in case someone plans to use AI tools to build a reimplementation of a piece of software, particularly old academic software that original researchers had not released under open-source licenses.

The most relevant case of "license laundry" is what happened in chardet: a maintainer overwrote the entire LGPL-licensed code base with an AI generated output and released it under a more permissive license. Leaving a link here to the Issue raising the concern: https://github.com/chardet/chardet/issues/327.

I think this is relevant to free software but not really in the context of a project like our right? Unless you think someone could do this as a module in a package?

I'm OK with leaving this in since it's not doing any harm.

mdtanker · 2026-04-21T19:19:33Z

+  license.
+- ❌ Use of genAI tools in code reviews in any of our repositories. We highly
+  value the *peer-review* process as a way for everyone to learn from each
+  other's expertise.


Maybe we could offer an alternative here, and say something like: As an alternative to genAI tools for code review, we recommend code analysis tools such as PyLint or Ruff, which can catch many common code issues.

Sure! We mention Ruff as part of the normal workflow. We can mention it here again.

Now that I reread this item, I think not allowing genAI tools in code reviews is too broad. What I mean is not to ask a chatbot to review a whole PR. But acceptable uses of genAI during a code review process would be to check for grammar, write snippets that would show how the solution is not covering all cases, helping to write additional tests, etc.

I'm open to suggestions to improve this sentences.

leouieda

@santisoler thanks for getting this started. I think a lot of the policies I've seen around are way too lenient. I'd be a bit stricter on a few things and make it clear that the use of these tools is discouraged in many cases.

leouieda · 2026-04-28T17:36:21Z

  - [Testing your code](#testing-your-code)
  - [Documentation](#documentation)
  - [Code Review](#code-review)
+* [Policy on Usage of Generative AI Tools](#policy-on-usage-of-generative-ai-tools)


Suggested change

* [Policy on Usage of Generative AI Tools](#policy-on-usage-of-generative-ai-tools)

* [Usage of Generative AI Tools](#usage-of-generative-ai-tools)

leouieda · 2026-04-28T17:36:38Z

 [get in touch](#how-can-i-talk-to-you).
+
+
+## Policy on Usage of Generative AI Tools


Suggested change

## Policy on Usage of Generative AI Tools

## Usage of Generative AI Tools

leouieda · 2026-04-28T17:41:05Z

+Generative AI tools (genAI tools) are being widely used for generating these
+types of content. We understand that some contributors might find them useful,
+and would like to include them in their workflows and use them when
+contributing to open-source projects.


Move this paragraph to the start of this section. Then everything else flows a bit better.

Also might be worth

Suggested change

Generative AI tools (genAI tools) are being widely used for generating these

types of content. We understand that some contributors might find them useful,

and would like to include them in their workflows and use them when

contributing to open-source projects.

Generative AI tools (genAI tools, including chatbots and coding agents) are being widely used for generating these

types of content. We understand that some contributors might find them useful,

and would like to include them in their workflows and use them when

contributing to open-source projects.

leouieda · 2026-04-28T17:43:09Z

+
+Usage of genAI tools in contributions to Fatiando a Terra are not forbidden,
+but when being used as an aid in developing code and editing documentation,
+**contributors must**:


I'd rephrase this to make it clear that the usage is not forbidden exactly but strongly discouraged.

Suggested change

**contributors must**:

Usage of genAI tools in contributions to Fatiando a Terra is **strongly discouraged** but are not forbidden (see below).

When such tools are used, **contributors must**:

leouieda · 2026-04-28T17:44:22Z

+1. ensure that they fully understand the proposed changes and can explain why
+   they are correct, and
+2. communicate that genAI tools have been used in the process.


Suggested change

1. ensure that they fully understand the proposed changes and can explain why

they are correct, and

2. communicate that genAI tools have been used in the process.

1. Ensure that they **fully understand the proposed changes** and can explain why

they are correct with the aid of a bot.

2. **Declare** that genAI tools have been used in the process (this is covered in our PR template).

leouieda · 2026-04-28T17:55:14Z

+Maintainers reserve the right, at their sole discretion, to close Pull
+Requests, Issues, and delete comments that incur in unacceptable usage of genAI
+tools.


Suggested change

Maintainers reserve the right, at their sole discretion, to close Pull

Requests, Issues, and delete comments that incur in unacceptable usage of genAI

tools.

The lists above are not exhaustive and serve as examples.

Maintainers reserve the right, at their sole discretion, to close Pull

Requests, Issues, and delete comments that they judge to incur in unacceptable usage of genAI

tools.

leouieda · 2026-04-28T17:56:12Z

+  Issues, and any communication channel of the project.
+- ❌ Pasting outputs of genAI content directly into Pull Requests, Issues, and
+  any communication channel of the project.
+- ❌ Use of genAI tools to circumvent license restrictions. For example,


I think this is relevant to free software but not really in the context of a project like our right? Unless you think someone could do this as a module in a package?

leouieda · 2026-04-28T17:56:25Z

+  Issues, and any communication channel of the project.
+- ❌ Pasting outputs of genAI content directly into Pull Requests, Issues, and
+  any communication channel of the project.
+- ❌ Use of genAI tools to circumvent license restrictions. For example,


I'm OK with leaving this in since it's not doing any harm.

leouieda · 2026-04-28T17:56:54Z

+- ❌ Pasting outputs of genAI content directly into Pull Requests, Issues, and
+  any communication channel of the project.


Suggested change

- ❌ Pasting outputs of genAI content directly into Pull Requests, Issues, and

any communication channel of the project.

- ❌ Pasting outputs of genAI content without human revision directly into Pull Requests, Issues, and

any communication channel of the project.

leouieda · 2026-04-28T18:03:06Z

+- ⚠️ Write code for us. While they can save some *typing time*, one needs to
+  spend time reviewing the generated output and making sure we fully understand
+  the proposed solution.


Suggested change

- ⚠️ Write code for us. While they can save some *typing time*, one needs to

spend time reviewing the generated output and making sure we fully understand

the proposed solution.

- ⚠️ Write code for us. While they can save you some *typing time*, we need to

spend time reviewing the generated output to make sure we fully understand

the proposed solution and then maintain it in the future. Typing time is not the bottleneck in our projects.

Draft policy on the usage of generative AI tools

b3a1970

santisoler mentioned this pull request Apr 21, 2026

Add checkbox for generative AI tools usage in PR template fatiando/.github#25

Draft

Add extra item to list

226ab4f

mdtanker approved these changes Apr 21, 2026

View reviewed changes

leouieda requested changes Apr 28, 2026

View reviewed changes

	* [Policy on Usage of Generative AI Tools](#policy-on-usage-of-generative-ai-tools)
	* [Usage of Generative AI Tools](#usage-of-generative-ai-tools)

		[get in touch](#how-can-i-talk-to-you).


		## Policy on Usage of Generative AI Tools

	## Policy on Usage of Generative AI Tools
	## Usage of Generative AI Tools

	contributors must:
	Usage of genAI tools in contributions to Fatiando a Terra is strongly discouraged but are not forbidden (see below).
	When such tools are used, contributors must:

		- ❌ Pasting outputs of genAI content directly into Pull Requests, Issues, and
		any communication channel of the project.

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santisoler commented Apr 21, 2026

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santisoler commented Apr 21, 2026 •

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