UPGRADE: Vol. VI, Issue no. 3, June 2005 (Libre Software as A Field of Study)

Note from the Editorial Team of UPGRADE: this is the third monograph that UPGRADE, jointly with the Spanish journal Novática, has dedicated to this field since its creation in 2000; they appeared in 2001 and 2003. Novática published another one as early as in 1997. (See <http://www.upgrade-cepis.org/pages/pastissues.html> and <http://www.ati.es/novatica/indice.html>, respectively.)

About Closed-door Free/Libre/Open Source (FLOSS) Projects: Lessons from the Mozilla Firefox Developer Recruitment Approach [PDF: 5 pages, 280 KB]
Sandeep Krishnamurthy
Abstract: In this paper, the notion of a "closed-door open source project" is introduced. In such projects, the most important development tasks (e.g. code check-in) are controlled by a tight group. I present five new arguments for why groups may wish to organize this way. The first argument is that developers simply do not have the disposable time to evaluate potential members. The next two arguments are based on self-selection- by setting tough entry requirements the project can ensure that it gets high quality and highly persistent programmers. The fourth argument is that expanding a group destroys thefun. The fifth argument is that projects requiring diverse inputs require a closed door approach.

The Challenges of Using Open Source Software as A Reuse Strategy [PDF: 5 pages, 298 KB]
Christian Neumann and Christoph Breidert
Abstract: This paper compares the benefits of adapting open source software to internal and commercial reuse strategies. We propose a course of action that can be used for technical and economical evaluation. The advantages, disadvantages, and risks of these basic strategies are investigated and compared.

Jesús M. González-Barahona teaches and researches at the Universidad Rey Juan Carlos, Madrid, Spain. He started working in the promotion of libre software in the early 1990s. Since then he has been involved in several activities in this area, such as the organization of seminars and courses, and the participation in working groups on libre software. He currently collaborates in several libre software projects (including Debian), and participates in or collaborates with associations related to libre software. He writes in several media about topics related to libre software, and consults for companies on matters related to their strategy regarding these issues. His research interests include libre software engineering and, in particular, quantitative measures of libre software development and distributed tools for collaboration in libre software projects. He is editor of the Free Software section of Novática since 1997 and has been guest editor of several monographs of Novática and UPGRADE on
the subject. <jgb AT gsyc DOT escet DOT urjc DOT es>

Stefan Koch is an Assistant professor of Information Business at the Vienna University of Economics and Business Administration, Austria. He received a MBA in Management Information Systems from Vienna University and Vienna Technical University, and a Ph.D. from Vienna University of Economics and Business Administration. His research interests include libre software development, effort estimation for software projects, software process improvement, the evaluation of benefits from information systems and ERP systems. He is also the editor of the book “Free/Open Source Software Development”, published by IGP in 2004. <stefan DOT koch AT wuwien DOTac DOT at>.

UPENET (UPGRADE European NETwork) [PDF: 16 pages, 547 KB]

From Pliroforiki (CCS, Cyprus)
Informatics Law
Security, Surveillance and Monitoring of Electronic Communications at The Workplace
Olga Georgiades-Van der Pol

This paper was first published, in English, by Pliroforiki (issue no. 11, June 2005, pp. 10-16). Pliroforiki, (“Informatics” in Greek), a founding member of UPENET (UPGRADE European NETwork), is a journal published, in Greek or English, by the Cyprus CEPIS society CCS (Cyprus Computer Society).

Abstract: This article, which is an extract from the author’s book "PRIVACY: Processing of Personal Data, Obligations of Companies, Surveillance of Employees, Privacy on the Internet", has as its main objective to offer a first approach to the security obligations of companies in relation to the personal information they hold about their employees. It also gives an overview of the rights and obligations of the company when monitoring its employees for the purpose of ensuring the security of its systems.

From Mondo Digitale (AICA, Italy)
Evolutionary Computation
Evolutionary Algorithms: Concepts and Applications
Andrea G. B. Tettamanzi

This paper was first published, in its original Italian version, under the title “Algoritmi evolutivi: concetti e applicazioni”, by Mondo Digitale (issue no. 3, March 2005, pp. 3-17). Mondo Digitale, a founding member of UPENET (UPGRADE European NETwok), is the digital journal of the CEPIS Italian Society AICA (Associazione Italiana per l'Informatica ed il Calcolo Automatico).

Abstract: Evolutionary algorithms are a family of stochastic problem-solving techniques, within the broader category of what we might call “natural-metaphor models”, together with neural networks, ant systems, etc. They find their inspiration in biology and, in particular, they are based on mimicking the mechanisms of what we know as “natural evolution”. During the last twenty-five years these techniques have been applied to a large number of problems of great practical and economic importance with excellent results. This paper presents a survey of these techniques and a few sample applications..

1 Foreword

Libre (free, open source) software has evolved during the last decade from an obscure, marginal phenomenon into a relatively well-known, widely available, extensively used set of applications. Libre software solutions are even market leaders in some segments and are experiencing huge growth in others. Products such as OpenOffice.org, Linux, Apache, Firefox and many others are part of the daily experience of many users. Companies and public administrations alike are paying more and more attention to the benefits that libre software can provide when used extensively. However, despite this increasing popularity, libre software is still poorly understood. Perhaps because of this, in recent years the research community has started to focus some attention on libre software itself: its development models, the business models that surround it, the motivations of the developers, etc. In this context, we (invited by UPGRADE and Novática, two journals that have shown for years a serious interest in this field (1) felt that the time was ripe to put together this monograph on "Libre Software as A Field of Study". Consequently, we issued a call for contributions, which led to a process in which each proposal was reviewed by at least two experts in the field.

2 Definitions

The term "Libre Software" is used in this introduction, and in the title of this special issue, to refer to both "free software" (according to the Free Software Foundation, FSF, definition) and "open source software" (as defined by the Open Source Initiative, OSI). "Libre" is a term well understood in romance languages (i.e. from Latin origin), such as Spanish, French, Catalan, Portuguese and Italian, and understandable in many others. It avoids the ambiguity of "free" in English, since "libre" means only "free as in free speech", and the term is used in Europe in particular, although its first use can be traced to the United States (2).

Libre software is distributed under a license that complies with the "four freedoms", as stated by Richard Stallman in "The Free Software Definition":

The freedom to run the program for any purpose (freedom 0).
The freedom to study how the program works and adapt it to your needs (freedom 1). Access to the source code is a precondition for this.
The freedom to redistribute copies so you can help your neighbour (freedom 2).
The freedom to improve the program and release your improvements to the public, so that the whole community benefits (freedom 3). Access to the source code is a precondition for this.

Therefore, libre software is defined by what users can do when they receive a copy of the software, and not by how that software was developed, nor by whom, nor with
what intentions.

However, although there is nothing in the definition about how the software has to be produced or marketed to become "libre", the four freedoms enable some development and business models while making others difficult or impossible. This is why we often talk about "libre software development models" or "libre software business models". Both terms are not to be understood as "models to be followed to qualify as libre software", but simply as models which are possible, perhaps common, in the world of libre software.

3 Aspects of Study

Taking this definition as our framework, there has been a great deal of research in recent years about development and business models for libre software, about the
motivations of developers producing that software, and about the implications (economic, legal, engineering) of this new approach. In other words, libre software has become in itself a subject for study; a new field in which different research approaches are being tried in order to increase our understanding of it. How is libre software actually being produced, what room for improvement is still left, which best practices can be identified, what implications does libre software have for users and producers of software, how can libre software development be improved, which ideas and processes can be transferred to the production of proprietary software, what insights can be gained into open creation processes and user integration, etc. are just some of the questions being addressed by this research. Some of them are standard questions only now being put to the libre software world; others are quite specific and new.

4 Papers in This Monograph

This monograph issues contains seven papers that cover several of the topics mentioned above and make use of a great variety of empirical and theoretical approaches. The first paper, by Andrea Deverell and Par Agerfalk, is about the CALIBRE (Co-ordination Action for LIBRE Software) project, funded by the European Commission to improve European research in the field of libre software.

After this comes a paper entitled "Libre Software Movement: The Next Evolution of The IT Production Organization?", written by Nicolas Jullien, which discusses the dissemination of libre software. It argues from a historical perspective that libre software constitutes the next evolution in industrial IT organization.

The next few papers deal with workings within libre software projects. Juan-José Amor-Iglesias, Jesús M. González-Barahona, Gregorio Robles-Martínez and Israel Herráiz-Tabernero, in their paper "Measuring Libre Software Using Debian 3.1 (Sarge) as A Case Study: Preliminary Results", show empirical results from one of the most popular and largest projects in existence, based on an analysis of source code. Charles M. Schweik tries to identify design principles leading to a project’s success or failure; in his paper "An Institutional Analysis Approach to Studying Libre Software ‘Commons’" he presents a framework for analysing the institutional design of commons settings to be applied to libre software projects. Finally, Sandeep Krishnamurthy, using Mozilla Firefox as an example, challenges the view that in libre software projects, anyone can participate without hindrance. He coins the term "closeddoor project" for projects with a tight control and explains why such a strategy might be adopted in his paper "About Closed-door Free/Libre/Open Source (FLOSS) Projects: Lessons from the Mozilla Firefox Developer Recruitment Approach".

The issue concludes with two papers which aim to put libre software and its development in the context of ‘mainstream’ software engineering practices. Alberto Sillitti and Giancarlo Succi in their paper "Agility and Libre Software Development" evaluate the relationship and commonalities between agile software development methodologies, in particular eXtreme Programming, and libre software development. Christian Neumann and Christoph Breidert present a framework for comparing different reuse strategies in software development. In their paper titled "The Challenges of Using Open Source Software as a Reuse Strategy" they give special consideration to the required technical and economical evaluation.

Acknowledgements

As with any work, this monograph would not have been possible without the help of several people. Naturally, the most important work was carried out by the authors themselves, and the reviewers also devoted their time to help in selecting and improving the submissions. In total, 16 authors contributed submissions, and 16 people provided valuable feedback and assistance by helping with the reviewing. Following the ideals of libre software development, these reviewers are named here in order to give special recognition of their contribution: Olivier Berger, Cornelia Boldyreff, Andrea Capiluppi, Jean Michel Dalle, Rishab Ghosh, Stefan Haefliger, Michael Hahsler, George Kuk, Björn Lundell, Martin Michlmayr, Hans Mitloehner, Martin Schreier, Ioannis Stamelos, Ed Steinmueller, Susanne Strahringer, and Thomas Wieland. The cooperation of the team in the CALIBRE project has also been very useful, both in providing ideas and in collaborating with their effort. Finally, we would also like to acknowledge the help, assistance and guidance of Rafael Fernández Calvo, Chief Editor of UPGRADE and Novática, during the entire process of preparing and assembling this special issue.

Footnotes
(1) Novática, in addition to have a section dedicated to this field since 1997, has published three monographs on it – 1997, 2001, and 2003 – jointly with UPGRADE in the last two cases (see <http://www.ati.es/novatica/indice.html> and <http://www.upgrade-cepis.org/pages/pastissues.html>).

(2) For a brief study of the origins of the term "libre software", visit <http://sinetgy.org/jgb/articulos/libre-software-origin/>.
.

Useful References on Libre Software as A Field of Study

TIn addition to the references included in the papers that make part of this monograph, readers who wish to understand the libre (free, open source) software phenomenon in greater detail may be interested in consulting the following sources.

Books

C. DiBona, S. Ockman, and M. Stone (eds.). Open Sources: Voices from the Open Source Revolution. O’Reilly and Associates, Cambridge, Massachusetts, 1999. Available at <http://www.oreilly.com/catalog/opensources/book/toc.html>.
J. Feller and B. Fitzgerald. Understanding Open Source Software Development. Addison-Wesley, London, 2002.
J. Feller, B. Fitzgerald, S.A. Hissam, and K.R. Lakhani (eds.). Perspectives on Free and Open Source Software. The MIT Press, Boston, Massachusetts, 2005.
J. García, A. Romeo, C. Prieto. La Pastilla Roja, 2003. ISBN: 84-932888-5-3. <http://www.lapastillaroja.net/>. (In Spanish.)
S. Koch (ed.). Free/Open Source Software Development. Idea Group Publishing, Hershey, PA, 2004.
V. Matellán Olivera, J.M. González Barahona, P. de las Heras Quirós, G. Robles Martínez (eds.). Sobre software libre. Compilación de ensayos sobre software libre. GSYC, Universidad Rey Juan Carlos, 2003. Available at <http://gsyc.escet.urjc.es/~grex/sobre-libre/>. (In Spanish.)
E.S. Raymond. The Cathedral and the Bazaar: Musings on Linux and Open Source by an Accidental Revolutionary. O’Reilly and Associates, Sebastopol, California, 1999.
R.M. Stallman. Free Software, Free Society: Selected Essays of Richard M. Stallman. GNU Press, Boston, Massachusetts, 2002. Also avalaible at <http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/fsfs/rmsessays.pdf >.

Web Sites

Opensource, a collection of publicly accessible papers about libre software. <http://opensource.mit.edu>.
Slashdot, the community site for the worldwide libre software community. <http://slashdot.org>.
Sourceforge, the largest hosting site for libre software projects. <http://sourceforge.net>.
Free Software Foundation. <http://fsf.org>.
Open Source Initiative (OSI). <http://opensource.org>.
BarraPunto, the community site for the Spanish libre software community. <http://barrapunto.com>.