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Teaclave Repository Restructuring and Community Focus

zfc@apache.org

Teaclave was originally created with a broad vision to explore the possibilities of confidential computing. It consisted of multiple components, including SDKs supporting Intel SGX and Arm TrustZone, a general-purpose application framework (FaaS), and experimental verification efforts, spanning several repositories under the Apache Incubator.

Over the years, as the field of confidential computing evolved, we observed a clear trend: developers increasingly preferred building their own Trusted Applications using SDKs directly, rather than relying on a general-purpose FaaS framework. This organic shift in usage has also been reflected in our contributor activities. Most community engagement and active development now center around the SDKs, especially the Rust-based TrustZone and SGX SDKs.

As part of our preparation for graduation from the Apache Incubator, we’ve received recurring questions about what Teaclave is today, and what its long-term focus should be. To address this and align with current usage and contributions, we propose a refined mission and corresponding repository restructuring.

Refined Mission​

Teaclave empowers developers to build memory-safe (e.g. Rust) Trusted Applications across diverse confidential computing platforms.
Our primary focus going forward will be on maintaining and improving SDKs that support this mission.

Repository Restructuring Plan​

Goals​

  • Reflect Teaclave’s active development and current focus
  • Reduce long-term maintenance costs for inactive components
  • Preserve historical contributions and community merit

incubator-teaclave​

Current Status:

  • Role: Former flagship repository for the FaaS-style confidential computing framework.
  • Activity: Last commit in July 2023.
  • Maintenance: No longer actively developed or aligned with the community’s current direction.

Shift in Focus:

  • This repository will be repurposed as the main landing page for the Teaclave project (Podling or TLP). It will provide high-level documentation, links to active SDKs, examples to help users get started, and showcases to build with Teaclave SDKs.
  • Historical contributions and community merit will be preserved 1.
  • Preview of reorganized content is already hosted on the main branch 2.
    • A clear project overview
    • Links to active SDK repositories (TrustZone, SGX, etc.)
    • Showcases for each SDK
    • A unified contribution guide and roadmap

Action Items:

  • Deprecate the existing master branch and rename it to legacy
  • Set main as the default branch

incubator-teaclave-crates​

Current Status:

  • Role: Hosts ported/forked crates for TEE platforms (e.g., sgx-crypto, protobuf)
  • Activity: Some crates are outdated or redundant
  • Maintenance: Partial

Shift in Focus:
This repository will remain an auxiliary dependency hub supporting only the active SDKs. It will be cleaned and scoped down to what is still necessary for TrustZone/SGX development.
Action Items:

  • Retain the repository to support SDK builds and examples
  • Remove:
    • Crates no longer used by maintained SDKs or demos
    • Redundant forks of crates that now work upstream
  • Preserve and maintain:
    • Crates required by incubator-teaclave-trustzone-sdk or incubator-teaclave-sgx-sdk

incubator-teaclave-verification​

Current Status:

  • Role: Experimental repo for formal verification methods
  • Activity: No active development or adoption
  • Maintenance: Unmaintained

Shift in Focus:
This repository will become a historical archive for early verification efforts, preserved for transparency and reference.

Action Items:

  • Archive the repository on GitHub (read-only)
  • Add a short README noting its archival status and rationale

Active SDKs​

These SDKs are actively maintained and form the core of Teaclave’s current focus:

  • incubator-teaclave-trustzone-sdk
  • incubator-teaclave-sgx-sdk
  • incubator-teaclave-java-tee-sdk

No changes are proposed at this time. Any future updates will be discussed in separate threads.