How can development metrics help to take decisions about free software?

Talk at Zentyal Summit, Zaragoza, October 4th 2012. On development and community metrics, how and why they can be useful, and some examples from the work done by Bitergia.

Transcript

1. How can development metrics help to take decisions
   about free software?
   Jesus M. Gonzalez-Barahona
   jgb@bitergia.com
   http://identi.ca/jgbarah http://twitter.com/jgbarah
   Bitergia
   GSyC/LibreSoft, Universidad Rey Juan Carlos
   Zentyal Summit, Zaragoza, October 4th, 2012
   Jesus Gonzalez-Barahona (Bitergia) How can development metrics help to take decisions about free software?
   Zentyal Summit 2012 1 / 14
   

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2. c 2012 Bitergia
   Some rights reserved. This presentation is distributed under the
   “Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0” license, by Creative Commons, available at
   http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/
   Jesus Gonzalez-Barahona (Bitergia) How can development metrics help to take decisions about free software?
   Zentyal Summit 2012 2 / 14
   

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3. Free software is (in many cases) special
   Source code available
   Open development model (usually)
   Many details about the internals of the development
   process
   Intense use of tools for coordination
   Lots of information is tracked, and available
   Developers & users communities are important
   sustainability
   pooling of resources
   innovation
   Jesus Gonzalez-Barahona (Bitergia) How can development metrics help to take decisions about free software?
   Zentyal Summit 2012 3 / 14
   

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4. Metrics, metrics, metrics
   Information about code,
   community, development
   can be retrieved, organized,
   analyzed
   Jesus Gonzalez-Barahona (Bitergia) How can development metrics help to take decisions about free software?
   Zentyal Summit 2012 4 / 14
   

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5. Who benefits
   Quantitative, objective data: facts, not opinions
   Specific questions can be answered
   Even simple analysis may help stakeholders:
   Developers:
   Understanding, improving development processes
   Users, integrators:
   Long-term sustainability, evolution, reaction to issues
   Investors:
   Attraction of external resources, growth rate
   Jesus Gonzalez-Barahona (Bitergia) How can development metrics help to take decisions about free software?
   Zentyal Summit 2012 5 / 14
   

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6. Analyzing Zentyal (basic analysis)
   Source code management repositories:
   git: git://git.zentyal.org/zentyal
   From: 2005-06-27
   To: 2012-09-10
   Mailing lists:
   Development
   Users
   Announcements
   http://lists.zentyal.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/
   From: 2010-09-01
   To: 2012-09-30
   http://blog.bitergia.com/2012/10/03/basic-analysis-of-zentyal/
   Jesus Gonzalez-Barahona (Bitergia) How can development metrics help to take decisions about free software?
   Zentyal Summit 2012 6 / 14
   

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7. Zentyal: Git repository (parameters per month)
   Jesus Gonzalez-Barahona (Bitergia) How can development metrics help to take decisions about free software?
   Zentyal Summit 2012 7 / 14
   

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8. Zentyal: Mailing lists (Developers, Users)
   Jesus Gonzalez-Barahona (Bitergia) How can development metrics help to take decisions about free software?
   Zentyal Summit 2012 8 / 14
   

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9. Who is developing OpenStack?
   Core projects / all projects (Folsom release cycle, 2012)
   Jesus Gonzalez-Barahona (Bitergia) How can development metrics help to take decisions about free software?
   Zentyal Summit 2012 9 / 14
   

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10. How is KDevelop closing tickets?
    Time
    0.99 (black) / 0.95 (green) / 0.5 (red) / 0.25 (blue)
    2000 2002 2004 2006 2008 2010 2012
    2 3 4 5 6
    Time in minutes, log 10 scale
    Jesus Gonzalez-Barahona (Bitergia) How can development metrics help to take decisions about free software?
    Zentyal Summit 2012 10 / 14
    

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11. Sidenote: the history of OpenOffice.org / LibreOffice
    [Very preliminary, as found in the LibreOffice repository, 2000-2012]
    Commits
    Committer 0
    Month
    200
    400
    600
    800
    1000
    50
    100
    150
    0
    0 20
    40
    60
    80
    [Contributions of more than 1,000 commits trimmed]
    Jesus Gonzalez-Barahona (Bitergia) How can development metrics help to take decisions about free software?
    Zentyal Summit 2012 11 / 14
    

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12. In summary
    FLOSS development repositories have a wealth of
    information
    Their analysis is potentially interesting to any
    stakeholder
    Getting the data out of the repository is not that
    difficult...
    ...but analysis may be
    We’re interested in deep analysis
    We’re interested in working with developers,
    managers, users
    What would you like to know about your pet project?
    Jesus Gonzalez-Barahona (Bitergia) How can development metrics help to take decisions about free software?
    Zentyal Summit 2012 12 / 14
    

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13. Bitergia: an spin-off
    Started operations in July 2012
    Builds the experience of LibreSoft R&D group
    Offering professional products and services
    Focused on:
    Metrics about software developent
    (including community metrics)
    Specialized support for development forges
    (including metrics for projects)
    http://bitergia.com
    Jesus Gonzalez-Barahona (Bitergia) How can development metrics help to take decisions about free software?
    Zentyal Summit 2012 13 / 14
    

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14. This is the end
    Have you learned something
    useful?
    [I would love to know what interested you the most]
    [...and the least]
    Jesus Gonzalez-Barahona (Bitergia) How can development metrics help to take decisions about free software?
    Zentyal Summit 2012 14 / 14
    

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