Kris Ven

Should You Adopt Open Source Software

Many organizations use open source infrastructure software such as Linux, and open source software (OSS) is generally considered a viable technology. Both professional and academic literature devote much attention to the OSS phenomenon. However, decision makers considering the adoption of OSS face a plethora of books, research papers, and articles highlighting OSSs advantages and disadvantages. Different articles attach different levels of importance to these advantages or factors related to the adoption decision. Reasons for adopting OSS vary from the pragmatic. Organizations must consider the advantages and disadvantages of open source software before adopting it.

Challenges and strategies in the use of Open Source Software by Independent Software Vendors

Open Source Software (OSS) has already been adopted by a large number of organizations. An important - but sometimes neglected - group of OSS users are Independent Software Vendors (ISVs). ISVs often develop their applications on top of OSS platform software. Frequently, this requires making several extensions and modifications to these OSS components. We identify a number of challenges that ISVs face in handling these extensions and modifications. Next, we describe several strategies ISVs can follow in maintaining these modifications. Finally, we suggest an opportunity for a closer collaboration between OSS projects and ISVs which could be mutually beneficial.

Towards evolvable software architectures based on systems theoretic stability

In todays increasingly volatile environments, evolvability is quickly becoming the most desirable characteristic of information systems. Current information systems still struggle to provide these high levels of evolvability. Based on the concept of stability from systems theory, we require that information systems should be stable with respect to a set of anticipated changes in order to exhibit high evolvability. This requires that information systems should be free from so‐called combinatorial effects. Combinatorial effects occur when the impact of a change is dependent on the size of the information system. To eliminate these combinatorial effects, we propose four theorems that are constraints on the modular structure of software architectures. The theorems are prescriptive and ensure that stable information systems are built, thereby guaranteeing high evolvability. We further present five higher level modular structures called elements. These elements provide the core functionality of information systems and comply fully with the stringent constraints implied by the four theorems. The internal structure of these elements is described by design patterns which are eligible for automatic code generation. These design patterns offer a constructive proof that it is possible to build information systems in practice by applying this set of theorems. Copyright

The transformation of requirements into software primitives: Studying evolvability based on systems theoretic stability

Evolvability is widely considered to be a crucial characteristic of software architectures, particularly in the area of information systems. Although many approaches have been proposed for improving evolvability, most indications are that it remains challenging to deliver the required levels of evolvability. In this paper, we present a theoretical approach to how the concept of systems theoretic stability can be applied to the evolvability of software architectures of information systems. We define and formalize the transformation of a set of basic functional requirements into a set of instantiations of software constructs. We define this transformation using both a static and a dynamic perspective. In the latter perspective, we formulate the postulate that information systems should be stable against new requirements. Based on this postulate, we derive a number of design theorems for software implementation. Using this transformation we use theoretical arguments to derive that these theorems contribute to achieving stability.

The Impact of Ideology on the Organizational Adoption of Open Source Software

Previous research has shown that the open source movement shares a common ideology. Employees belonging to the open source movement often advocate the use of open source software within their organization. Hence, their belief in the underlying open source software ideology may influence the decision making on the adoption of open source software. This may result in an ideological—rather than pragmatic—decision. A recent study has shown that American organizations are quite pragmatic in their adoption decision. We argue that there may be circumstances in which there is more opportunity for ideological behavior. We therefore investigated the organizational adoption decision in Belgian organizations. Our results indicate that most organizations are pragmatic in their decision making. However, we have found evidence that suggests that the influence of ideology should not be completely disregarded in small organizations.

The Organizational Adoption of Open Source Server Software by Belgian Organizations

This study reports on five case studies in Belgian organizations that currently use open source server software. Respondents were asked about their motivation to use open source server software. Our results indicate that the lower cost, high reliability and availability of external support are the prime reasons why organizations use open source software. The often claimed advantage of open source software of having access to the source code was found relevant only for those organizations who perform development based on open source software. Some factors that were found relevant in previous studies (such as the support of standards) were however deemed less important by the organizations in our sample.

The Importance of External Support in the Adoption of Open Source Server Software

IT managers seem to be hesitant to adopt OSS in the absence of professional support. Previous qualitative studies have indeed suggested that the availability of external support is important for the adoption of OSS. Therefore, we feel it is interesting to gain more insight into the role of external support in the adoption process. To this end, we performed a web survey involving 95 Belgian organizations. Our data suggests a balanced picture. As expected, our results show that the majority of organizations in our sample rely on commercial support such as vendor or third party support. Even organizations that have deployed OSS to a large extent—and that are therefore likely to have some experience and familiarity with OSS—rely on commercial support. Nevertheless, a considerable proportion of organizations indicated not to rely on commercial support, which suggests that internal expertise can be sufficient for successful adoption. Finally, and most surprisingly, we have found that the OSS community is used by a large proportion of organizations. This indicates that the OSS community is a valuable source of external support for organizations. Nevertheless, it appears that it is primarily used by organizations with a rather strong background in IT.

Aligning the constructs of enterprise ontology and normalized systems

Literature suggests that, due to their complexity, organizations need to be designed in order to be effective and evolvable. Recently, two promising approaches have been introduced that are relevant in this regard. Enterprise Ontology creates essential models that are implementation-independent. Normalized Systems is concerned with the development of information systems with proven evolvability. In this paper, we combine both approaches. To this end, we express the transaction pattern—a central construct of Enterprise Ontology—using the constructs of Normalized Systems. By aligning these constructs, we attempt to introduce traceability between the Enterprise Ontology level and the Normalized Systems level. The resulting artefact exhibits the benefits of both Enterprise Ontology and Normalized Systems. We illustrate the application of the artefact in the context of enterprise architectures.

The Introduction of OpenOffice.org in the Brussels Public Administration

Open source software is increasingly used by public administrations as an alternative to commercial software. In this paper we present a case study of the transition of the ministerial cabinets of the Brussels-Capital Region towards OpenOffice.org. In this case, the decision to use open source software was taken by the Government of the Brussels-Capital Region. The goal of the paper is to outline the implementation trajectory followed and to compare our findings to previous studies in this field as well as other Information Systems literature. Additionally, we discuss how OpenOffice.org was received by end users as well as the IT department that was responsible for the migration. Our findings indicate that although a migration towards OpenOffice.org is feasible, a number of difficulties still remain. For example, end user perceptions of OpenOffice.org are not always favorable and migration costs (document conversion and training) can be significant.

The use of open source software platforms by Independent Software Vendors: issues and opportunities

The Cast4All Content Conductor Platform is an integration and provisioning suite to manage data broadcasting networks in general and digital cinema networks in particular. The framework makes extensive use of open source components and contains several extensions and modifications to those components. It is a typical case of an Independent Software Vendor (ISV) building application software on top of open source platform software. In the spirit of the open source movement, the extensions or modifications to the open source components could be contributed back to the community. However, in this paper we discuss several issues that companies face in such a situation. They extend far beyond the obvious decision whether to keep the developed code proprietary, and should not be neglected. It is argued that a closer collaboration between open source projects and independent software vendors would be beneficial to all.