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The design contest will proceed in two phases: first sketches and then working code. You are invited to submit to either phase, or both phases. For each phase, our panel of judges will recognize the best submissions. All qualifying entries will receive an EFF Tor T-shirt (subject to availability). The best sketches and working implementations will be published on the Tor website.

Sketches: the goal of this phase is to produce a mock-up of a functioning interface. This should include design documents describing how the interface should function. If you want, it should also include graphical elements that can be used by programmers.

A qualifying sketch will present an informal specification for a design. That is, it will present with some degree of thoroughness all of the major interfaces that we might expect to encounter, all of the major functionality for the interface, and a reasonable story about how it would be integrated into currently-existing tools (if, indeed, it would be). One example, with more detail than we would require, is the NetBeans UI for JUnit. Note that it walks through multiple interfaces, highlighting the features and functions of the various buttons.

• Most featureful interface will be awarded to the graphic design that would provide usable, clear access to the most aspects of the Tor system, covering many or most of the categories on the "useful features" list.
• Most usable experience will be awarded to the graphic design that would provide the most unobtrusive Tor experience while still covering all criteria (working, perhaps, on the "no news is good news" theory).
• Clearest implementation guidance will be awarded to the graphic design that provides the cleanest package of graphic elements and design documentation to aid would-be implementers.

Code: the goal of this phase is to produce a working implementation. You may use any of the sketches, graphics, or ideas from the first phase (with appropriate credit to their authors), or you can make your own. See the Contest Samples wiki page for some other images you can reuse.

An acceptable entry will be a package of free software that builds and runs. It can be a stand-alone application, or it can act as an extension or plugin to other broadly-available free software. The entry will demonstrate the points in the Goals section: that is, it will be able to control, display, and maintain awareness as discussed above.

• Most featureful interface will be awarded to the application that provides usable, clear access to the most aspects of the Tor system, covering many or most of the categories on the "additional" list.
• Most usable experience will be awarded to the application that provides the most unobtrusive Tor experience while still covering all criteria (working, perhaps, on the "no news is good news" theory).
• Most flexible will be awarded to the best system that runs smoothly on all three of Windows, Linux, and OS X; extra points will be awarded for additional systems.

We reserve the right to award other awards as the entries deserve.