Organisations could benefit from the improvements in collaborative learning and increased control gained by the use of open source software. EtherPad enables simultaneous updates on a shared document from remotely located participants. We discuss the adoption life-cycle of this open source tool in the context of a strategic intervention, with a focus on a learning agenda to guide the installation and configuration processes, and to reduce the learning curve involved in the adoption experience.
Software Product Line (SPL) and Open Source Software (OSS) haveemerged as successful modes of developing software. Although they appear todiffer in terms of development principles and processes, researchers andpractitioners have been increasingly emphasising the need to achieve synergiesby exploiting the ever growing repositories of OSS components for developingSPLs. While there have been calls for the SPL community to accelerate thewidespread use of OSS in SPL, less attention has been paid to how OSScommunities could increase the use of OSS components in SPL. Sincearchitectural issues are considered critical in the SPL community, we proposethat an increased attention on architectural aspects of OSS components mayprovide the confidence that organizations need in order for them to choose anduse OSS components in SPL. We identify a number of architectural practiceswhich are followed by the SPL community and discuss the possibilities for andpotential benefits of incorporating those practices in OSS developmentprocesses.
Distribution is a multifaceted concept and one aspect concerns the adoption of ideas from a combination of methods for project management. Such distribution imposes new demands on project management and coordination since the project management aspect is an integral part of information systems development methods. This paper reports from a case study of coordinating project management practices in a commercial development method and an in-house method for project management. In order to conduct the study of how methods are combined and utilized, one of the researchers followed a development project for six months. The general aim of the project under study is to replace the numerous system registers in use with one general register, which will aid in making system maintenance more efficient. The project also has two organisational goals: to give the team members an opportunity to use RUP in a real project setting; and to introduce new technology and a new development tool. The study highlights the importance of taking a start in current work practice as opposed to focusing on the new method as such. In summary, we stress the importance of taking a start in the work practice in terms of a method in use as opposed to method proponents’ push for new methods. Any long term change in work practices has to be internalised by the stakeholders in the practical context of method use. Hence, the case study presented here adds to the body of knowledge which distinguishes between the method as used and the method as prescribed by its proponents.
Computer games and virtual worlds are increasingly used throughout our society with people playing on the bus, at home and at work. Computer games thus affect larger and larger number of people and areas in the society of today. There are even scholars who advocate that games or virtual environments create better environments for learning than traditional classrooms. This situation motivates the use of games and game technology for additional purposes, e.g. education, training, health care or marketing.
Computer games are increasingly used throughout our society with people playing on the bus, at home and at work. Computer games thus affect larger and larger number of people and areas in the society of today. There are even scholars who advocate that games create better environments for learning than traditional classrooms. This situation motivates the use of games and game technology for additional purposes, e.g. education, training, health care or marketing.
Component-Based Software Development is a conventional way of working for software-intensive businesses and OpenSource Software (OSS) components are frequently considered by businesses for adoption and inclusion in softwareproducts. Previous research has found a variety of practices used to support the adoption of OSS components, in-cluding formally specified processes and less formal, developer-led approaches, and that the practices used continue todevelop. Evolutionary pressures identified include the proliferation of available OSS components and increases in thepace of software development as businesses move towards continuous integration and delivery. We investigate workpractices used in six software-intensive businesses in the primary and secondary software sectors to understand currentapproaches to OSS component adoption and the challenges businesses face establishing effective work practices to eval-uate OSS components. We find businesses have established processes for evaluating OSS components and communitiesthat support more complex and nuanced considerations of the cost and risks of component adoption alongside matterssuch as licence compliance and functional requirements. We also found that the increasing pace and volume of softwaredevelopment within some businesses provides pressure to continue to evolve software evaluation processes.
Reproducible builds (R-Bs) are software engineering practices that reliably create bit-for-bit identical binary executable files from specified source code. R-Bs are applied in someopen source software (OSS) projects and distributions to allow verification that the distrib-uted binary has been built from the released source code. The use of R-Bs has been advo-cated in software maintenance and R-Bs are applied in the development of some OSS secu-rity applications. Nonetheless, industry application of R-Bs appears limited, and we seekto understand whether awareness is low or if significant technical and business reasonsprevent wider adoption. Through interviews with software practitioners and business man-agers, this study explores the utility of applying R-Bs in businesses in the primary and sec-ondary software sectors and the business and technical reasons supporting their adoption.We find businesses use R-Bs in the safety-critical and security domains, and R-Bs are valu-able for traceability and support collaborative software development. We also found thatR-Bs are valued as engineering processes and are seen as a badge of software quality, butwithout a tangible value proposition. There are good engineering reasons to use R-Bs inindustrial software development, and the principle of establishing correspondence betweensource code and binary offers opportunities for the development of further applications.
Software interoperability is commonly achieved through the implementation of standards for communication protocols or data representation formats. Standards documents are often complex, difficult to interpret, and may contain errors and inconsistencies, which can lead to differing interpretations and implementations that inhibit interoperability. Through a case study of two years of activity in the Apache PDFBox project we examine day-to-day decisions made concerning implementation of the PDF specifications and standards in a community open source software (OSS) project. Thematic analysis is used to identify semantic themes describing the context of observed decisions concerning interoperability. Fundamental decision types are identified including emulation of the behaviour of dominant implementations and the extent to which to implement the PDF standards. Many factors influencing the decisions are related to the sustainability of the project itself, while other influences result from decisions made by external actors, including the developers of dependencies of PDFBox. This article contributes a fine grained perspective of decision-making about software interoperability by contributors to a community OSS project. The study identifies how decisions made support the continuing technical relevance of the software, and factors that motivate and constrain project activity.
Open hardware and open source software platforms bring benefits to both implementers and users in the form of system adaptability and maintainability, and through the avoidance of lock-in, for example. Development of the \riscv\ Instruction Set Architecture and processors during the last ten years has made the implementation of a desktop computer using open hardware, including open processors, and open source software an approaching possibility. We use the SiFive Unmatched development board and Ubuntu Linux, and the recorded experiences of system builders using the Unmatched board to explore the extent to which it is possible to create an open desktop computer. The work identifies current limitations to implementing an open computer system, which lie mainly at the interface between the operating system and hardware components. Potential solutions to the challenges uncovered are proposed, including greater consideration of openness during the early stages of product design. A further contribution is made by an account of the synergies arising from open collaboration in a private-collective innovation process.
The majority of contributions to community open source software (OSS) projects are made by practitioners acting on behalf of companies and other organisations. Previous research has addressed the motivations of both individuals and companies to engage with OSS projects. However, limited research has been undertaken that examines and explains the practical mechanisms or work practices used by companies and their developers to pursue their commercial and technical objectives when engaging with OSS projects. This research investigates the variety of work practices used in public communication channels by company contributors to engage with and contribute to eight community OSS projects. Through interviews with contributors to the eight projects we draw on their experiences and insights to explore the motivations to use particular methods of contribution. We find that companies utilise work practices for contributing to community projects which are congruent with the circumstances and their capabilities that support their short- and long-term needs. We also find that companies contribute to community OSS projects in ways that may not always be apparent from public sources, such as employing core project developers, making donations, and joining project steering committees in order to advance strategic interests. The factors influencing contributor work practices can be complex and are often dynamic arising from considerations such as company and project structure, as well as technical concerns and commercial strategies. The business context in which software created by the OSS project is deployed is also found to influence contributor work practices.
Professionals contribute to open source software (OSS) projects aspart of their employment. Previous research has addressed motivationsof individuals and the ways they engage with OSS projects.However, there is a lack of research which examines and explainswork practices used by companies in their engagement with projects.Work practices used by companies to contribute to five establishedOSS projects are investigated through examination of the actions ofemployees in public communication channels and draw on our experienceswhen analysing engagement with the same projects. Wefind that companies utilise work practices for contributing whichare congruent with the circumstances and their capabilities thatsupport their short and long term needs. We find that companiescontribute to OSS projects in different ways, such as employing coreproject developers, making donations, and joining project steeringcommittees in order to advance strategic interests.
This book constitutes the refereed proceedings of the 12th International IFIP WG 2.13 International Conference on Open Source Systems, OSS 2016, held in Gothenburg, Sweden, in May/June 2016. The 13 revised full papers presented were carefully reviewed and selected from 38 submissions. The papers cover a wide range of topics related to free, libre, and open source software, including: organizational aspects of communities; organizational adoption; participation of women; software maintenance and evolution; open standards and open data; collaboration; hybrid communities; code reviews; and certification.
The publication and preservation of doctoral dissertations is fundamental to progression of research in a field. It allows future generations to 'stand on the shoulders of giants'.
Archiving dissertations requires to store them in a way that they will be accessible even when technologies change. Classical paper publications fulfill those requirements but have disadvantages such as the need for physical storage or distribution. An increasingly popular alternative is to store dissertations as electronic documents such as PDF files.
In this study, we analyze the extent to which electronically available doctoral dissertations published in Sweden fulfill the basic requirements of standard conformance and applicability for long-term archiving.
We find that only a small proportion of dissertations' electronic publications follow the Swedish National Archive's requirements to conform to standards made for long-term archiving. Only at one Swedish university, a significant number of electronic publications does conform to PDF/A-1b. Interestingly, conformance to PDF/A-1b correlates to properly setting the title of a PDF document and choosing a paper format different from A4 (ISO 216). This suggests that the consequences of missed compliance for long-term archiving are not commonly known and authors have to make a conscious choice for PDF/A-1b compliance.
In the context of long-term archival of digital assets, file formats that are standardized and designed for longevity such as PDF/A are preferred. However, due to the complexity of and ambiguities in PDF standards, it is far from trivial to either create standard-conformant files or check the conformance of any given file. This study investigates the challenges when checking real-world PDF files from public sector organizations meant for long-term archival for PDF/A conformance. Results show that only a small set of PDF files claims to conform to the PDF/A-1b specification variant and even fewer files pass conformance checks by various conformance checking tools. Challenges for conformance checking tools include both ambiguities in the standards’ technical specifications and limitations in the implementation.
File formats that are standardized and designed for longevity, such as PDF/A, are preferred in the context of long-term archival of digital assets. However, it is far from trivial to either create standard-conformant files or check the conformance of any given file due to the complexity and ambiguities in PDF standards. This study aims to investigate challenges when checking PDF/A conformance for real-world PDF files from public sector organizations that are intended for long-term-archival. Findings show that only a small proportion of the PDF files claim to conform to the PDF/A-1b specification and even fewer files pass conformance checks performed through the use of various conformance checking tools. Challenges for conformance checking tools include both ambiguities in the technical specifications of standards and limitations in the implementation of software.
In the context of long-term archival of digital assets, file formats that are standardized and designed for longevity such as PDF/A are preferred. However, due to the complexity and ambiguities in PDF standards, it is far from trivial to either create standard-conformant files or check the conformance of any given file. This study aims at investigating the challenges when checking real-world PDF files from public sector organizations meant for long-term archival for PDF/A conformance. Results show that only a small set of PDF files claims to conform to the PDF/A-1b specification variant and even fewer files pass conformance checks by various conformance checking tools. Challenges for conformance checking tools include both ambiguities in the standards’ technical specifications and limitations in the implementation.
The use of appropriate fonts and file formats for long-term maintenance of digital assets is a challenge for organizations in the public sector. The article reports from a study which investigated the PDF/A conformance and font usage in PDF files provided by Swedish public sector organizations (PSOs). This article presents an analysis of the PDF files’ properties and font usage including a categorization of fonts’ licenses. This study is motivated by the PDF/A-1 standard’s requirement that ‘only fonts that are legally embeddable in a file for unlimited, universal rendering shall be used.’ Analyzing PDF sets from three PSOs, the finding shows that the proportion of files that claim or succeed at conforming to PDF/A greatly varies among the sets despite similar backgrounds. Although the most popular way to make use of fonts is by embedding a subset of the font data, for some fonts expected to be ‘always available,’ a considerable proportion of PDF files does not include any font data. This puts the onus of locating this data on the PDF reader which is problematic for long-term archival
Introduction. The study describes the conditions for long-term preservation of the content of the institutional repositories of Swedish higher education institutions based on an investigation of how deposited files are managed with regards to file format and how representatives of the repositories describe the functions of the repositories.
Method. The findings are based on answers to a questionnaire completed by thirty-four institutional repository representatives (97% response rate).
Analysis. Questionnaire answers were analysed through descriptive statistics and qualitative coding. The concept of information infrastructures was used to analytically discuss repository work.
Results. Visibility and access to content were considered to be the most important functions of the repositories, but long-term preservation was also considered important for publications and student theses. Whereas a majority of repositories had some form of guidelines for which file formats were accepted, very few considered whether or not file formats constitute open standards. This can have consequences for the long-term sustainability and access of the content deposited in the repositories.
Conclusion. The study contributes to the discussion about the sustainability of research publications and data in the repositories by pointing to the potential difficulties involved for long-term preservation and access when there is little focus on and awareness of open file formats.
Digital signatures are important in order to ensure the integrity and authenticity of information communicated over the Internet involving different stakeholders within and beyond the borders of different nations. The topic has gained increased interest in the European context and there is legislation and project initiatives aiming to facilitate use and standardisation of digital signatures. Open standards and open source implementations of open standards are important means for the interoperability and long-term maintenance of software systems implementing digital signatures. In this paper we report from a study aiming to establish the availability and effectiveness of software provided under an open source license for digital signing and validation of PDF documents. Specifically, we characterise the use of digital signatures in Swedish Governmental agencies, report on the interoperability of open source and proprietary licensed software for digital signatures in PDF documents, and establish the effectiveness of software provided under an open source license for validation of digital signatures in PDF documents.
Novel results concerning influences between ICT standards and their implementations in open source software (OSS) are presented in this paper. Findings draw from observations and analysis related to the ITU-T H.264 standard and two OSS projects (OpenH264 and x264) that implement the standard. The study reports on a characterisation of organisations that influence and control the H.264 standard, organisations that influence and control OSS projects implementing the H.264 standard, and influences between contributors involved with the H.264 standard and OSS projects that implement the standard. Furthermore, projects for standardisation and implementation of H.264 are contrasted with respect to the mix of contributing organisations, and findings are put in relation to organisational strategies of contributing organisations and previous research.
Many organisations have requirements for long-term sustainable software systems and associated communities. In this paper we consider long-term sustainability of Open Source software communities in Open Source projects involving a fork. There is currently a lack of studies in the literature that address how specific Open Source software communities are affected by a fork. We report from a case study aiming to investigate the developer community around the LibreOffice project, which is a fork from the OpenOffice.org project. The results strongly suggest a long-term sustainable community and that there are no signs of stagnation in the project 15 months after the fork. Our analysis provides details on the LibreOffice developer community and how it has evolved from the OpenOffice.org community with respect to project activity, long-term involvement of committers, and organisational influence over time. The findings from our analysis of the LibreOffice project make an important contribution towards a deeper understanding of challenges regarding long-term sustainability of Open Source software communities.
The overarching goal in this paper is to investigate organisational engagement with an ICT standard and open source software (OSS) projects that implement the standard, with a specific focus on the multimedia field, which is relevant in light of the wide deployment of standards and different legal challenges in this field. The first part reports on experiences and insights from engagement with standards in the multimedia field and from implementation of such standards in OSS projects. The second part focuses on the case of the ITU-T H.264 standard and the two OSS projects OpenH264 and x264 that implement the standard, and reports on a characterisation of organisations that engage with and control the H.264 standard, and organisations that engage with and control OSS projects implementing the H.264 standard. Further, projects for standardisation and implementation of H.264 are contrasted with respect to mix of contributing organisations, and findings are related to organisational strategies of contributing organisations and previous research.
This paper presents novel results concerning influences between ICT standards and their implementations in open source software (OSS). Specifically, findings draw from observations and analysis related to the ITU-T H.264 standard and the two OSS projects OpenH264 and x264 that both implement the standard. The study reports on a characterisation of organisations that influence and control the H.264 standard, organisations that influence and control OSS projects implementing the H.264 standard, and influences between contributors involved with the H.264 standard and OSS projects implementing that standard. Further, projects for standardisation and implementation of H.264 are contrasted with respect to mix of contributing organisations, and findings are related to organisational strategies of contributing organisations and previous research.
Over the years, a number of open standards have been developed and implemented in software for addressing a number of challenges, such as lock-in, interoperability and longevity of software systems and associated digital artefacts. Understanding organisational involvement and collaboration in standardisation is important for informing any future policy and organisational decisions concerning involvement in standardisation. The overarching goal of the study is to establish how organisations contribute to open standards development through editorship. Specifically, the focus is on open standards development in W3C. Through an analysis of editorship for all W3C recommendations we contribute novel findings concerning organisational involvement and collaboration, and highlight contributions from different types of organisations and countries for headquarter of each organisation. We make three principal contributions. First, we establish an overall characterisation of organisational involvement in W3C standardisation. Second, we report on organisational involvement in W3C standardisation over time. Third, we establish organisational collaboration in W3C standardisation through social network analysis.
Open source software (OSS) projects are provided under different open source licenses and some projects use other conditions (in addition to licensing terms) for contributors to adhere to. Licensing terms and conditions may affect community involvement and contributions, and are perceived differently by different stakeholders in different OSS projects. The study reports from an exploratory analysis of licensing terms and other conditions for 200 widely used OSS projects, and an investigation of the relationship between licensing terms and other conditions for contributing. We find that strong copyleft licenses are most common and are used in the majority of the projects. Further, a clear majority of the OSS projects use no specific other condition for contributing in addition to the license terms. However, a clear majority of the OSS projects supported by foundations use other conditions for contributing in addition to the license terms. Finally, use of no specific other conditions in addition to the license terms is more common for projects using strong copyleft licensing compared to projects using non-copyleft licensing.
Over time, a number of open standards have been developed and implemented in software for addressing a number of challenges, such as lock-in, interoperability and longevity of software systems and associated digital artefacts. An understanding of organisational involvement and collaboration in standardisation is important for informing any future policy and organisational decisions concerning involvement in standardisation. The overarching goal of the study is toestablish how organisations contribute to open standards development through editorship. Specifically, the focus is on open standards development in the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C). Through an analysis of editorship for all W3C recommendations we contribute novel findings concerning organisational involvement and collaboration, and highlight contributions from different types of organisations and countries. We make five principal contributions. First, we establish an overall characterisation of organisational involvement in W3C standardisation. Second, we report on organisational involvement in W3C standardisation over time. Third, we establish how different organisations, organisation types, and countries are involved in W3C technologies. Fourth, we report on organisational involvement in relation to standard development time. Fifth, we establish how organisations collaborate in W3C standardisation through social network analysis.
Legacy file formats is an increasing concern for organisations. Therefore it is important for any company to develop sustainable strategies for data curation in order to maintain valuable digital assets. In this paper we report from a case study conducted in a company context aiming to investigate the feasibility of using Open Source approaches for curation of corporate digital assets kept in proprietary legacy file formats to open file formats. We consider different aspects of openness in a corporate strategy for maintaining digital assets. An important aspect concerns activity and company influence in an Open Source tool-chain, another concerns support for data curation of digital assets actually offered by the tool chain. We find that organisational concern over legacy file formats continues to be an issue, and that strong commercial influence on Open Source projects is no guarantee for success.
Many organisations are dependent upon long-term sustainable software systems and associated communities. In this paper we consider long-term sustainability of Open Source software communities in Open Source software projects involving a fork. There is currently a lack of studies in the literature that address how specific Open Source software communities are affected by a fork. We report from a study aiming to investigate the developer community around the LibreOffice project, which is a fork from the OpenOffice.org project. In so doing, our analysis also covers the OpenOffice.org project and the related Apache OpenOffice project. The results strongly suggest a long-term sustainable LibreOffice community and that there are no signs of stagnation in the LibreOffice project 33 months after the fork. Our analysis provides details on developer communities for the LibreOffice and Apache OpenOffice projects and specifically concerning how they have evolved from the OpenOffice.org community with respect to project activity, developer commitment, and retention of committers over time. Further, we present results from an analysis of first hand experiences from contributors in the LibreOffice community. Findings from our analysis show that Open Source software communities can outlive Open Source software projects and that LibreOffice is perceived by its community as supportive, diversified, and independent. The study contributes new insights concerning challenges related to long-term sustainability of Open Source software communities.
Software reference implementations of ICT standards have an important role for verifying that a standard is implementable, supporting interoperability testing among other implementations, and providing feedback to the standard development process. Providing reference implementations and widely used implementations of a standard as Open Source Software also promotes wide deployment in software systems, avoidance of different lock-in effects, interoperability, and longevity of systems and associated digital assets. In this paper results are reported on the availability of reference implementations and widely deployed implementations provided as Open Source Software for standards issued by different standards setting organisations. Specifically, findings draw from observations and analyses related to software implementations for identified standards issued by ETSI, IEC, IEEE, IETF, ISO, ITU-T, OASIS, and W3C.
Software reference implementations of ICT standards have an important role for verifying that a standard is implementable, supporting interoperability testing among other implementations, and providing feedback to the standard development process. Providing reference implementations and widely used implementations of a standard as Open Source Software promotes wide deployment in software systems, interoperability, longevity of systems and associated digital assets, and avoidance of different lock-in effects. In this paper results are reported on the availability of, and perceptions and practices concerning, reference implementations and widely deployed implementations provided as Open Source Software for standards issued by different standards setting organisations. Specifically, findings draw from observations and analyses related to software implementations for identified standards and policy statements, issued by ETSI, IEC, IEEE, IETF, ISO, ITU-T, OASIS, and W3C.
In this paper novel results are reported on engagement with ICT standards and their implementations in open source software (OSS). Specifically, findings draw from observations and analyses related to the ITU-T H.265 standard and five OSS projects (x265, libde265, SVT-HEVC, Kvazaar, and Turing codec) implementing the standard. The study reports on a characterisation of organisations that engage with standard development for the H.265 standard and organisations with declarations for H.265 in the ITU-T patent database in relation to standard development for H.265, and how OSS projects implementing H.265 are related to standard development for H.265.
Web analytics technologies provide opportunities for organisations to obtain information about users visiting their websites in order to understand and optimise web usage. Use of such technologies often leads to issues related to data privacy and potential lock-in to specific suppliers and proprietary technologies. Use of open source software (OSS) for web analytics can create conditions for avoiding issues related to data privacy and lock-in, and thereby provides opportunities for a long-term sustainable solution for organisations both in the public and private sectors. This paper characterises use of and engagement with OSS projects for web analytics. Specifically, we contribute a characterisation of use of OSS licensed web analytics technologies in Swedish government authorities, and a characterisation of organisational engagement with the Matomo OSS project for web analytics.