Choosing The Right Open Source Project

Scott Leslie, Edutools.info

SFU, July 28, 2005

You are here?

Outer Hebrides?

The Hype

• Depending on who you ask Open Source

represents

• Greatest thing since sliced bread

• The cure to all your ills

• The Next ‘Insanely Great’ Thing

• Salvation

• The ONLY Way Forward

• A threat to the Canadian way of life

Promises of Open Source

• Get the solution you want; greater pedagogical

flexibility

• Avoid Vendor Lock-in

• No Perpetual License Costs

• Control over Product Development/Release Cycle

• Increase Operating System and Other Platform

Flexibility

• Non-Proprietary/Open Standards

What this Presentation Isn’t• Not a presentation on the value of adopting open

source• For some good work in this regard refer to

• Chris Coppola, “Will Open Source Unlock the Potential of eLearning?” http://www.campus-technology.com/news_article.asp?id=10299&typeid=155

• Randy Metcalfe, “Software Choice: Decision Making in a Mixed Economy,” http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue42/metcalfe/

• Patricia Gertz, “Open Your Eyes: Open Architecture, Open Source, Open Projects,” http://www.educause.edu/content.asp?page_id=666&ID=MAC0510&bhcp=1

• Coppola and Neely, “Open source - opens learning,” http://www.opensourcesummit.org/open-source-200408.pdf

What this presentation is

• ‘Open Source’ is a moniker applied to a HUGE variety of

software projects

• Not all Open Source projects are equally suitable to

every institution

• Details an effort to develop a framework to understand

OS project suitability in relation to institutional capacities

• Want to help people in choosing the right/appropriate OS

projects

About Edutools – http://www.edutools.info

• Site dedicated to assisting decision makers in higher education

• Past claim to fame the CMS comparison site

• Originated with BC-developed ‘Landonline’ site

• Redeveloped in 2001-2 with funding from Hewlett foundation

• Scope expanded to include comparative analysis of e-learning policies & other student service technologies, and recently Learning Object Repository technology

Defining Open Source

• Fundamental to definitions of Open Source are a set of freedoms enabled by a software license

• Freedom to• View and learn from source code• Distribute copies• Use the software for any purpose• Modify and Share the modifications

• Cf. OSI’s Definition of ‘Open Source’ - http://www.opensource.org/docs/definition.php

Definition very much centers around freedoms of what you can do with the code

BUT…

The irony is that…

OPEN SOURCE CODE

-

OPEN SOURCE COMMUNITY

=

Conventional, in-house, ad hoc legacy software

Development/Acquisition Evolution

BUY

SHAREBUILD

VS.

BUY

VS.

3rd Try…

Open Source can be defined as always having

the right to ‘fork’ the source code

BUT

Exercising that right to ‘Fork’ is fraught with

challenges and often not desirable

For the most part, part of the definition is that ongoing participation is VOLUNTARY

Suitability = Maturity vs. Capability

Organization’s Capability for Development

‘Maturity’ of Project / Community

‘Freeloading’Very Mature

Immature

Low High

ProjectOriginator

Real Risk of Failure

Low Risk Decisions

OS ‘Sweet Spot’What makes OS communities thrive

Group Qualities of Organizations and Projects around…

• Initial Development

• Deployment and Integration

• Ongoing Maintenance and Support

• Overall Institutional or Project Attributes

DevelopmentOrganizational Factors• Project-based Developer

Resources• experience with specific

technologies• willingness to learn; interest in

specific technologies under consideration

• willingness of institution to support learning through development

• Existing Software Development Process and Environment

Project Factors• Age of project• Number of releases• Project Reputation (for

stability, rapidity of bug fixes)• Number of existing

developers• extent to which OS

development roles are explicit and filled

• Activity within the development community, forums and mailing lists

Deployment and IntegrationOrganizational Factors• Existing framework,

architecture or e-learning infrastructure into which new project must fit• existing open source

components in use• exiting commercial

components in use

Project Factors• Dependencies/

Standards• open source

dependencies• commercial dependencies• support of open standards• existence within a larger

suite of OS applications or architecture

• Well documented API • 3rd party support for

deployment

Ongoing Maintenance and Support

Organizational Factors• Ongoing Developer

Resources• Institutional Support

Structures• Existing Bug tracking, testing

and fixing processes• Institutional Tolerance for

Beta Products

Project Factors• Documented procedure for

becoming a new developer• Developer documentation /

support community• Explicit and implicit

developer education and socialization paths

• End-user documentation / support community

• 3rd party support providers / vendors

Overall Institutional or Project Attributes

Organizational Factors• Institution Type/Size• Preferred Project Management

Style• Past Experience with Open Source

projects• History of being risk takers or risk

adverse

• Related Institutional Networks and affiliations

• Desire to commercialize or otherwise spin off derivative or related works

Project FactorsGovernance Model• One guiding leader (cf. Moodle) • Hierarchical with different captains• Inner circle (cf. Sakai, http://

kb.indiana.edu/data/anlz.html?cust=731846.98763.30) • None?• others…Licensing Model• BSD-like• GPL-like• Apache, Linux-like• Educational Community License• others… (cf. http://www.opensource.org

/licenses/)

Open source “market share”

Suitability = Maturity vs. Capability

Organization’s Capability for Development

‘Maturity’ of Project / Community

Very Mature

Immature

Low High

Real Risk of Failure

#1

“Low Risk Choice”

#2

“Adoption, not adaptation”

#3 “Major Boost”#4 “Good Luck!”

Goal of Decision Tool

• Provide a means of self-identification for institutional decision makers to recognize their capabilities and the projects they are well suited to

• Identify areas of likely risk in choosing particular kinds of projects in an effort to address them before the projects are engaged

Final Thoughts

• Beyond this question of ‘suitability’ there do seem to be some essential qualities of OS aligned with higher ed• in relying on local innovation rather than market forces to

drive progress, it fosters diversity / increases pedagogical innovation

• often results in increased learning for staff within institution• “The collaborative nature of open source has a strong

cultural affinity to higher education and its mission to advance and share knowledge for the greater public good” Coppola, http://www.campus-technology.com/news_article.asp?id=10299&typeid=155