Contributing to Spring Batch

I have some code I'm working on that I'd eventually like to contribute to Spring Batch. I read your FAQs on how to do so:
http://static.springframework.org/spring-batch/faq.html

I understand that you build using JDK 1.5, with compatibility for JDK 1.4.

Can you elaborate on what third-party libraries you allow your base classes to use? I see in the pom.xml that among other libraries you use commons-logging, commons-lang, and commons-io. I'm most interested in using some commons-lang classes, but want to make sure I'm not introducing a library dependency that you don't want to impose on end-users. Searching through the m4 codebase there aren't many references to commons-lang classes.

With respect to code-formatting, I see in the samples project, a jalopy-customized.xml file. There's a version 14 element contained within it. Is the team using Jalopy to do their formatting? If so, is it Jalopy the commercial version (from Triemax), or the open-source version? Jalopy 1.7 (commercial version) doesn't appear to like the format of version 1.4.

Thanks.

As far as contributions go, you may want to wait until the 1.0 release to ensure compatibility. There is a code formatting template in the form of "spring-eclipse-code-conventions.xml" that you can use in Eclipse. As far as external libraries, remember that anything you use must be compatible with the Spring Batch license if it has any hope to be distributed as part of the framework. As of right now, it is licensed under the Apache 2.0 license.

I'm not sure to what extent the Jalopy configuration is used, as it is located in the samples package.

Perhaps someone with more insight could respond with more detail.