Debian developers have various responsibilities, and as official project members, they have great influence on the direction the project takes. A Debian developer is generally responsible for at least one package, but according to their available time and desire, they are free to become involved in numerous teams, acquiring, thus, more responsibilities within the project.

Package maintenance is a relatively regimented activity, very documented or even regulated. It must, in effect, comply with all the standards established by the Debian Policy. Fortunately, there are many tools that facilitate the maintainer's work. The developer can, thus, focus on the specifics of their package and on more complex tasks, such as squashing bugs.

The Policy, an essential element of the Debian Project, establishes the norms ensuring both the quality of the packages and perfect interoperability of the distribution. Thanks to this Policy, Debian remains consistent despite its gigantic size. This Policy is not fixed in stone, but continuously evolves thanks to proposals formulated on the debian-policy@lists.debian.org mailing list. Amendments that are agreed upon by all interested parties are accepted and applied to the text by a small group of maintainers who have no editorial responsibility (they only include the modifications agreed upon by the Debian developers that are members of the above-mentioned list). You can read current amendment proposals on the bug tracking system:

政策含包装的技术细节。计划的大小也引发组织的问题；由 Debian 宪法处理，即创建决策的结构与方法。换句话说，就是正式的治理系统。

Debian 宪章定义了一些角色和职位，以及各自的职责和权力。值得特别指出的是，通过投票决议，Debian 开发者们总是拥有最终的决定权。对于重大的修改（例如会对基金会文档产生影响的），只有当有效票数超过四分之三（75%）时，才会通过。然而，开发者们每年都会选举一位“领导人”作为他们的会议代表，同时领导人也会在内部的各个团队协调沟通。这一选举总是伴随着一段紧张激烈的讨论过程。领导人的角色并没有在任何官方文件内被定义：参选的候选人常常会提出自己对于该职位的理解和定位。在实际工作中，领导人角色包括媒体发言人，协调内部团队，对项目提供总体领导。每一位开发者都参与其中，因为大多数项目成员都认同了 Debian 项目领导人的观点。

特别的，领导人拥有真正的特权；他们的投票可以解决票数相等的问题；他们可以对某个尚未归属于任何人管辖名下的事件作出决定，同时可以将他们自己的一部分职责委托他人代为执行。

Since its inception, the project has been successively led by Ian Murdock, Bruce Perens, Ian Jackson, Wichert Akkerman, Ben Collins, Bdale Garbee, Martin Michlmayr, Branden Robinson, Anthony Towns, Sam Hocevar, Steve McIntyre, Stefano Zacchiroli, Lucas Nussbaum, Mehdi Dogguy and Chris Lamb.

宪章同样也定义了一个“技术委员会（technical committee）”。技术委员会的核心角色是对于那些在开发者之间尚未达成一致意见的技术事宜进行决策。除此以外，委员会则作为顾问角色，为任何无法为他们所负责的事宜作出决定的开发者提供帮助。值得一提的是，只有在相关问题方给委员会发送邀请时，委员会才会介入。

最后，宪章定义了一个“项目秘书”的职位，这一角色负责组织各种选举和决议的投票。

The “general resolution” procedure is fully detailed in the constitution, from the initial discussion period to the final counting of votes. The most interesting aspect of that process is that when it comes to an actual vote, developers have to rank the different ballot options between them and the winner is selected with a Condorcet method (more specifically, the Schulze method). For further details see:

即使宪法创建了表面的民主，每日的运作却大不相同：Debian 遵守自由软件的蠢蛋进化论：做事的人决定怎么做事。争论解决问题的方法只是浪费时间；选择有用且满意的方案才是王道…有能力的人就是这么做。

这就是升级的唯一方法：做有用的事且显示把事情做好。Debian '管理' 团体以增选方式管理，采用已有效奉献且证明其能力的志愿者。新的奉献者看到这些团队做了具有公共利益性质的工作就会主动加入协助。这就是 Debian 常被称为 '任人唯贤'。

这种有效的管理方法保证在 Debian '关键' 团队奉献者的品质。不见得是完美的且偶而凸搥。选择被团队接受的开发者是随兴的，甚至不公平的。而且，不是每个人对这些团队服务的期望是一样的。有些人受不了等8天才能收录新的 Debian 软件包，也有人耐心等待3周毫无怨言。所以，有些团队对 '服务品质' 经常不满。

或许奇怪，需要在讨论 Debian 计划内工作者时加入用户，答案是必须的：用户扮演关键的角色。不只是 '被动' 的角色，有些用户运行发展版并定期报告指定问题的错误。其他的人更深一层提出改进的意见，以 '愿望清单' 或送出称为 '补丁' 的修正后源代码 (见专栏 基础 补丁，送出修订)。

Additionally, numerous satisfied users of the service offered by Debian like to make a contribution of their own to the project. As not everyone has appropriate levels of expertise in programming, they may choose to assist with the translation and review of documentation. There are language-specific mailing lists to coordinate this work.

$ diff -u file.old file.new >file.patch

$ patch -p0 file.old <file.patch

靠着用户的参与这些奉献愈来愈有效。不断地交换消息，用户不是孤立的个人而是一个真正的社区。从邮件列表里，debian-user@lists.debian.org (第 7 章 问题的解决与相关信息的检索 可看出详情)。

用户不仅自助 (也助人) 于直接影响他们的技术面，也讨论奉献 Debian 计划的最佳途径与协助其向前行 — 经常出现改进的建议。

Debian 不仅持续自我推广，其用户在扩散方面也居功甚伟，口耳相传其名声。

这些方法运作的不错，在自由软件的各个层面都有 Debian 粉丝：从本地 'Linux 用户社区' LUGs 组织的安装会 (协助新手安装系统的工作坊)，到 Linux 相关的技术会议等。

Volunteers make posters, brochures, stickers, and other useful promotional materials for the project, which they make available to everyone, and which Debian provides freely on its website and on its wiki:

Debian 从开始就以源代码的概念组织起来，每个软件包都有维护者。随时出现新的工作团队，于子计划内形成新的团队，确保基础建设的管理，以及流程运作不会被特定的软件包绑住 (品质保证、Debian 政策、安装器等)。