DPS909 Winter 2009 Paper

Introduction

Open source projects, communities, and technologies are often discussed as though they were all the same, but each one has its own unique technical, social, and political characteristics. In this course some students are working with the Eclipse WTP project, and others with OpenOffice.org. Both projects have strong industry backing (i.e., IBM and Sun) and community involvement. One project is aimed at end-users, the other at developers. There are differences in the way contributions are made, the choice of tools, the make-up and geography of the communites, etc.

You will compare and contrast these two projects, paying careful attention to what "open source" means in each context, and how it manifests itself practically for the two communities.

Requirements

Your report must be 2,500 words and include:

• General discussion of OpenOffice.org and Eclipse WTP:
  • How is each project setup in terms of governance/control?
  • How do the technologies used in each differ?
  • What is the project's workflow (e.g., fixing a bug)?
• Analysis of each project's interpretation of open source. They may not mention it explicitly anywhere. You must try to read between the lines.
• Comparison of the two project:
  • In what ways are the two projects similar, when it comes to their practice of open source?
  • How are they different?
• Analysis of the effectiveness of each project's practice of open source
  • What are the practices, choices, technologies, etc. that one project employs that would be good for the other to consider?
  • How could one or both of the projects improve their open source practice?

Submission

Due Date March 12th. Please submit your work via the wiki (i.e., no paper copy required) by adding a link to your report below. Note: It would be a good idea to put your paper under your personal page and username like so: http://zenit.senecac.on.ca/wiki/index.php/User:Dominic/DPS909_Paper to decrease the use of generic article names.

Student Reports

• Student Name, Link to paper with Title

...add your name/link here...