Community Participation

How to Participate

Welcome to the OVAL Community! You have joined numerous colleagues from across the international information security community who have come together to help build this growing industry effort.

Broad community participation in OVAL comes via the OVAL Language Forum for contributing to the development of the OVAL Language, OVAL Repository Forum for discussing and submitting OVAL Definitions to the OVAL Repository, OVAL Board of representatives from across the information security community, and the growing list of OVAL-Compatible Products and Services and Declarations to Be OVAL-Compatible for numerous information security products and services from around the world.

With the OVAL Repository

• Join the OVAL Language Forum
• Offer comments on the current version of the OVAL Language
• Comment on any upcoming major or minor versions of the OVAL Language
• Comment on past discussions about the OVAL Language from the Discussion Archive
• Develop and submit new schemas for OVAL (Email oval@mitre.org to volunteer or request more information)

With the OVAL Language

• Join the OVAL Repository Forum
• Submit OVAL Definitions to the OVAL Repository for the issues of your choice
• Comment on previously posted OVAL Definitions (e.g., comments on the XML, on the issue itself, etc.)
• Discuss OVAL Definitions that are in development in Forum email messages and not yet posted on the site (e.g., comments on adherence to the schema, on the XML, on the issue itself, etc.)
• Discuss CVE entries, configuration issues, patches, etc., on which OVAL Definitions are based
• Comment on past discussions about OVAL Definitions from the Discussion Archive
• Submit/suggest definitions for platforms not yet covered by OVAL (Email oval@mitre.org to volunteer or request more information)

Spread the Word about OVAL

• Recommend that your organization adopt tools that use OVAL
• Actively encourage your vendors to incorporate OVAL to better support your organization’s enterprise security requirements
• Work with your organization to incorporate or convert XML on which OVAL Language and Definitions are based into the proprietary code or language of your company’s products and services
• Work with your organization to incorporate or convert standardized OVAL Definitions information into your company’s security advisories and fix sites
• Promote the OVAL Language, OVAL Repository, and OVAL-Compatible Products and Services to colleagues through email, in news articles and blogs, and at industry events

Feedback Requested!

• You may contribute in as many different ways as you prefer. As always, active participation is important to the success of OVAL. Please send your ideas, comments, and suggestions about OVAL to oval@mitre.org.

Page Last Updated: May 30, 2008