Collaborative development software sourceforge

Determining the scope of collaboration is often the most challenging aspect of starting an open-source project. The key challenge is to understand the areas of technology that are a core business value of the organization.

Based on previous experiences in the software industry, OSS tends to lead to two logical strategies for collaboration:. Globalization and government regulation have increased the importance of industry standards and protocols.

There are many examples of consortiums that define standards and protocols for specific technologies or specific industries. Open-source software provides an effective mechanism for creating a common implementation that drives the adoption of these standards; the Apache HTTP Web server is a great example of driving the httpd standard.

A similar case can be made for IT organizations that need to implement specific industry standards and protocols. The actual implementation of these standards provides very little benefit to the core business of an organization. Today, IT organizations typically rely on ISVs or internal development groups to implement these standards and thus incur the costs of sourcing the implementation.

The drive for collaboration is propelled by the need for IT organizations to quickly and efficiently implement new regulations or standards for their business. Organizations within the same industry can join together as a software-innovation network to create a shared implementation of a standard.

A common implementation would mean that the cost is shared and the common deployments would result in greater interoperability. Creating a common industry platform can address the IT challenge of integrating solutions from different vendors and help accelerate the growth of a fragmented market. A consistent requirement of IT organizations is the need to integrate solutions from different vendors.

For instance, CRM systems often need to be integrated with e-mail systems; financial institutions need to integrate data feeds from many providers; and large-scale manufacturers, such as automotive or aerospace OEMs, have extensive supply chains that need to integrate across the product lifecycle. Typically, the integration is a cost of doing business, not a core value, so creating a common platform that is adopted by a number of industry players effectively streamlines the integration requirements.

Establishing a common platform in a fragmented market of providers can help grow the entire industry. In fragmented markets, significant investment is often duplicated across solution providers but provides no real customer value. In addition, a valuable market ecosystem cannot develop because the market share of each provider is not big enough to sustain investment on one particular platform.

Therefore, if multiple players agree to collaborate on a common platform, it can reduce the barriers for increasing the size of the overall market. Open-source software development provides a proven model for creating shared implementations, however, the ultimate goal of a software innovation network is to increase business value. Therefore, we need to consider several aspects of OSS that allow for value creation and value capture when establishing a collaboration amongst equal partners.

The success of OSS development in facilitating collaborative development is in an open-development process. Most major open-source communities, such as Apache, Eclipse and Linux , work on the following principles:.

All successful long-term organizations require a set of rules that establish a governance model for setting policies and strategies. Governance becomes even more important if the organization is a collaboration among competitors.

It is, therefore, critical that the governance model not allow a single player to control or influence the organization. The perception or reality that a single participant controls the overall community can inhibit the participation of others. Intellectual-property management is a critical consideration when you are creating a shared technology base.

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