Evaluating open-source projects is always tricky. Here's what I've been doing:

  1. Check online documentation. User guide? Architecture? Javadocs? Tutorials?
  2. Download binary and source.
  3. Run demo.
  4. Click through demo.
  5. Scan the source code. Check the package layout.

At this stage, I usually have a pretty good idea of how healthy the project is.

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