The patch-flow method for measuring inner source collaboration

Inner source (IS) is the use of open source software development (SD) practices and the establishment of an open source-like culture within an organization. IS enables and requires developers to collaborate more than traditional SD methods such as plan-driven or agile development. To better understa...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:2018 IEEE/ACM 15th International Conference on Mining Software Repositories (MSR) pp. 515 - 525
Main Authors: Capraro, Maximilian, Dorner, Michael, Riehle, Dirk
Format: Conference Proceeding
Language:English
Published: New York, NY, USA ACM 28.05.2018
Series:ACM Conferences
Subjects:
Collaboration
Companies
General and reference > Cross-computing tools and techniques > Empirical studies
General and reference > Cross-computing tools and techniques > Measurement
General and reference > Cross-computing tools and techniques > Metrics
General and reference > Document types > General conference proceedings
inner source
inner source measurement
inner source metrics
internal open source
open collaboration
open source
Open source software
patch-flow
Software and its engineering > Software creation and management
Software and its engineering > Software creation and management > Collaboration in software development > Open source model
Software and its engineering > Software creation and management > Software development process management
software development collaboration measurement
Software measurement
patch-flow
open source
inner source metrics
internal open source
software development collaboration measurement
inner source
inner source measurement
open collaboration
ISBN:9781450357166, 1450357164
ISSN:2574-3864
Online Access:Get full text
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Description
Summary:Inner source (IS) is the use of open source software development (SD) practices and the establishment of an open source-like culture within an organization. IS enables and requires developers to collaborate more than traditional SD methods such as plan-driven or agile development. To better understand IS, researchers and practitioners need to measure IS collaboration. However, there is no method yet for doing so. In this paper, we present a method for measuring IS collaboration by measuring the patch-flow within an organization. Patch-flow is the flow of code contributions across organizational boundaries such as project, organizational unit, or profit center boundaries. We evaluate our patch-flow measurement method using case study research with a software developing multi-industry company. By applying the method in the case organization, we evaluate its relevance and viability and discuss its usefulness. We found that about half (47.9%) of all code contributions constitute patch-flow between organizational units, almost all (42.2%) being between organizational units working on different products. Such significant patch-flow indicates high relevance of the patch-flow phenomenon and hence the method presented in this paper. Our patch-flow measurement method is the first of its kind to measure and quantify IS collaboration. It can serve as a base for further quantitative analyses of IS collaboration.
ISBN:9781450357166
1450357164
ISSN:2574-3864
DOI:10.1145/3196398.3196417