Software Research and the Industry - Page 2 of 49 - Dirk Riehle's blog on everything computer science and more

2018-12-192018-12-14

Upcoming Talk on Ten Years of Inner Source Case Studies at UC Santa Cruz

Abstract

Inner sourcing is the use of open source best practices within companies to improve engineering productivity. In 2006, I introduced inner source to SAP. After becoming a professor, my group helped further companies introduce inner source to their engineering organizations. Using three generations of projects, we report about our experiences and how we are turning those into a practical handbook for inner source governance.
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2018-12-182018-12-19

Upcoming Talk on Industry Best Practices for Corporate Open Source Governance of Software Supply Chains at UC Santa Cruz

Abstract

Almost all software products today incorporate open source software either directly or through software supply chains, but many companies are not properly governing their use of open source, incurring potential risks. Since 2016, I have been researching industry best practices and processes around open source governance, focusing on software supply chains. I have interviewed 20+ experts from industry-leading companies to derive their best practices. We are currently implementing some of these best practices at three companies that serve as case studies for our research. In this talk I will cover the results of our study and share some best practices with you.
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2018-12-172018-12-17

Agile Design Thinking With Zalando at IAV in The AMOS Project (WS 2018/19)

Thank you, Vivekanand Jayakrishnan of Zalando, for teaching us! And thank you IAV DigiLab Berlin, for hosting us!

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2018-12-162018-12-29

Alternative Definition of Theoretical Saturation in Qualitative Research

Theoretical Saturation: The mental state of a researcher wanting to finish up the work and go home for the holidays.

2018-12-152018-12-15

Is Elsevier Getting Desperate?

I received five somewhat random review requests this morning, from the same journal, suggesting to me that the editor finds it hard to acquire reviewers for submissions. I pity the editor and feel bad for them (but they really should stop working for Elsevier). In any case, I five times essentially provided the same response, which is:

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2018-12-142018-12-14

My Top Three Trends for Open Source in 2019 (3/3)

The most important long-term trend, and my number #3 for the foreseeable future, is the sponsorship and management of open source software development by users, not vendors. The trend towards ubiquitous digitalization is leading users of software to take their software fate into their own hands, establishing informal communities or incorporating as non-profit user consortia to manage the development of the software they need. The Eclipse Foundation has been picking up this trend, supporting it with what they call Industry Working Groups; the Linux Foundation is also supporting this. Open source like this will not remove the need for commercial support, but it will reduce the effects of vendor lock-in, because products that are built on community open source can be switched more easily. Continue reading “My Top Three Trends for Open Source in 2019 (3/3)”

2018-12-132018-12-13

My Top Three Trends for Open Source in 2019 (2/3)

Trend #2 for 2019 in my book is making single-vendor open source, also known as the open core model a.k.a. neo-proprietary open source, work in the world of cloud computing. In this model, a software vendor goes to market using an intellectual property strategy that combines open sourcing of the product with an aggressive copyleft license. This approach nudges potential customers to moving from the free version to a paid-for proprietary version. In 2018, it visibly broke down when industry consensus emerged that cloud providers aren’t affected by copyleft licenses. Software vendors are now working on licenses that close this (so perceived) loophole. Thankfully, the Open Source Initiative remains the main arbiter of what constitutes a valid open source license. While some scoff at this business model, I think it is an important part of the overall open source community as it is the main way to channel venture capital into the creation of open source components.

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2018-12-122018-12-13

My Top Three Trends for Open Source in 2019 (1/3)

Trend #1 that took root in 2018 and will continue in 2019 is the clean-up of the open source supply chain. According to some lawyers, there is little legally valid software left, mostly because of unclear copyright and licenses of open source code in products and components. To clean up this mess, all open source code that makes it into products needs to be labeled and tracked correctly along the supply chain, so that the final product has a chance of being license-compliant. The OpenChain and related projects of the Linux Foundation are trying to do this. This mess is less plastic (pardon the pun) than the garbage pile in the pacific and on our beaches, but probably equally big.

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2018-12-032018-12-29

How my Ph.D. Students Work With Supporting Students (Hint: Not Scrum)

As mentioned in a previous blog post, my Ph.D. students are often experienced software developers who take on the role of a chief programmer in the development of the software system supporting their research. In this work, at any point in time, each of my Ph.D. students is typically supported by 2-7 Bachelor and Master students who contribute to the system under development. Taking a long-term perspective, my Ph.D. students develop quality software rather than throw-away prototypes.

The chief programmer idea is key to making such work successful. While I usually conceive and direct the research, the size of my group has led me to let my Ph.D. students take care of any actual development themselves. (Usually…) In this role, as the chief programmer, they become the central point of coordination and integration of engineering work. In academia, this is a necessity, because an engineering dissertation is typically a multi-year project, while final thesis students, the main source of junior programmers supporting the chief engineer, are only around for six months. Thus, the chief programmer becomes the central technical hub and provider of sustained knowledge of the system under development.

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2018-12-012018-12-29

Chief Programmer Teams Alive And Well in Academia

According to Wikipedia, “a chief programmer team is a programming team organized in a star around a “chief” role, granted to the software engineer who understands the system’s intentions the best. Other team members get supporting roles.” Amusingly, this set-up is alive and well in academia, and for good reason. At least my research group is using it and it works well for us.

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