October 18, 2006
Yunwen Ye
(Meta-)Designing for Continuous Evolution
through Sustained Participation in Open Source Software
Abstract
Because an OSS project is unlikely to sustain
a long-term success unless there is an associated community that provides the
platform for developers, users, and user-turned-developers to collaborate with
each other, understanding the well-observed phenomenon that OSS systems experience "natural
product evolution" cannot be complete without understanding
the structure and evolution of their associated communities. This talk examines
the structure of OSS communities and the co-evolution of OSS systems and communities
based on case studies. Although OSS systems and communities generally co-evolve,
they co-evolve differently depending on the goal of the system and the structure
of the community. A systematic analysis of the differences leads us to propose
a classification of OSS projects into three types: Exploration-Oriented, Utility-Oriented,
and Services-Oriented. Practical implications of realizing the co-evolution and
recognizing the different types of OSS projects are discussed to provide guidance
for OSS practitioners and the (meta)design of other participative software systems
meant to be evolved at the hands of participting users.
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