Open-source Software: Adoption and Challenges

© ASEE 2015Adopting open-source software (OSS) can help reduce the cost of personal computers for individuals as well as the cost of information technology infrastructure for companies. Many studies corroborated the superiority of Linux (open-source operating system) when compared to Windows. Linux, or any other open-source software, offers robustness, flexibility on top of a homogeneous solution and a support from a huge community. The purpose of this paper is to study the adoption open source software, mainly Linux. The discussion will encompass the growth of the open source community, the horizons, and the obstacles. The study also aims to cover the feasibility of the adoption of the open-source software at a Research and Development environment, where reducing the cost of the information technology infrastructure opens doors for more scalability and increase in performance

Concurrentie, innovatie en intellectuele eigendomsrechten in software markten

This study analyzes under which circumstances it may be desirable for the government to stimulate open source software as a response to market failures in software markets. To consider whether policy intervention can increase dynamic efficiency, we discuss the differences between proprietary software and open source software with respect to the incentives to innovate and market failures that may occur. The document proposes guidelines to determine which types of policy intervention may be suitable. Our most important finding is that directly stimulating open source software, e.g. by acting as a lead customer, can improve dynamic efficiency if (i) there is a serious customer lock-in problem, while (ii) to develop the software, there is no need to purchase specific, complementary inputs at a substantial cost, and (iii) follow-on innovations are socially valuable but there are impediments to contractual agreements between developers that aim at realizing such innovations. This publication is in Dutch.

Barriers to innovating with open government data: Exploring experiences across service phases and user types

Open government data (OGD) can enable outbound open innovation (OI) that is beneficial to society. However,\ua0innovation barriers hinder OGD users from generating value. While previous studies have detailed a large number of such\ua0barriers, little is known of how different types of OGD users are affected, and when the barriers appear in their innovation\ua0processes. To this end, this paper describes a case study of distributed service development in the Swedish public transport\ua0sector. The contribution to extant research is twofold. Firstly, based on an inductive analysis, three OGD user archetypes are\ua0proposed: employees, entrepreneurs and hobbyists. Secondly, the study finds that the significance of distinct innovation barriers\ua0varies across phases of the services’ lifecycles and depending on the OGD users’ motivation, objective, pre-conditions and\ua0approach. Drawing on these insights, we propose that OGD initiatives aimed at facilitating outbound OI to a greater extent\ua0should address the barriers that appear during diffusion of innovations, the barriers that are not directly related to the OGD\ua0provision, and the barriers that are experienced by non-obvious OGD user groups

Dispositional Gratitude at Work Predicts Job Satisfaction of Software Developers

Software developers can suffer from negative emotions at work and low job satisfaction. Less is known about how positive emotions at work impact software developers. Gratitude is one positive emotion that has predicted job satisfaction in other studies. The purpose of this quantitative correlational study was to explore how gratitude at work predicts job satisfaction among software developers. The broaden-and-build theory of positive emotions and the find-remind-and-bind theory of gratitude guided the study. Participants included 146 software developers who were recruited via LinkedIn using purposive sampling. Participants completed an online survey, including the Gratitude Questionnaire-Six Item Form and the Appreciation in Relationships scale. The results of a multiple regression analysis revealed that a model of five independent variables of gratitude at work statistically significantly predicted job satisfaction. Dispositional gratitude at work was the only individual statistically significant predictor of job satisfaction. The results align with previous studies that show gratitude at work can boost the job satisfaction of software developers. Recommendations for future research and for practitioners are included

Assessing Canada's Copyright Law in the Digital Context: Digital Locks, Open Licenses, and the Limits of Legislative Change

This dissertation examines Canadas copyright law reform in the information age. The overarching theme of my research underscores the importance of considering the purpose(s) of copyright law and the public interest while navigating the copyright law reform process. Additionally, I advocate that in regulating the influence of technology in the copyright system, the default approach should aim to objectively balance the interests of stakeholders to the extent possible. Ultimately, recognizing that stakeholders will continue to develop pragmatic responses to the changing landscape through private contracting and technological measures, I suggest that embracing regulatory pluralism is the most promising path towards achieving balanced copyright in the digital age. I develop these arguments over six chapters

Assessing Canada\u27s Copyright Law in the Digital Context: Digital Locks, Open Licenses, and the Limits of Legislative Change

This dissertation examines Canadas copyright law reform in the information age. The overarching theme of my research underscores the importance of considering the purpose(s) of copyright law and the public interest while navigating the copyright law reform process. Additionally, I advocate that in regulating the influence of technology in the copyright system, the default approach should aim to objectively balance the interests of stakeholders to the extent possible. Ultimately, recognizing that stakeholders will continue to develop pragmatic responses to the changing landscape through private contracting and technological measures, I suggest that embracing regulatory pluralism is the most promising path towards achieving balanced copyright in the digital age. I develop these arguments over six chapters

Modeling and Recognition of Contextual Information and User Intentions for In-Car Infotainment Systems

Aktuelle Fahrzeuginformationssysteme bieten ihren Nutzern eine Vielfalt an Funktionen, wie die Auswahl eines gewünschten Radiosenders, das Abspielen einer Musikplaylist oder das Starten einer Navigation. Aktuell steht Nutzern dabei zu jeder Zeit der volle Funktionsumfang des Systems zur Verfügung. Um die wachsende Anzahl an Funktionen für den Nutzer bedienbar zu halten, müssen zukünftige Fahrzeuginformationssysteme in der Lage sein, die vom Nutzer gewünschte Funktion zu erkennen und den Nutzer dabei zu unterstützen diese Funktion schnell zu erreichen. Die vom Nutzer gewünschte Funktion kann dabei von der aktuellen Situation in der sich der Nutzer befindet abhängen, weshalb das Fahrzeuginformationssystem in der Lage sein muss die aktuelle Situation zu erkennen und sein Systemverhalten entsprechend zu adaptieren. Im ersten Teil der vorliegenden Arbeit wird gezeigt, wie Fahrzeuginformationssysteme im Rahmen eines Modell-basierten Entwicklungsprozesses und unter Zuhilfenahme von Ontologien, basierend auf einer Vielzahl an Kontextinformationen ein Situationsverständnis erhalten können. Der zweite Teil der Arbeit zeigt anschließend auf, wie Bayes’sche Netze genutzt werden können um individuelle Bedürfnisse und Gewohnheiten der Nutzer dabei zu berücksichtigen. Die vorgestellten Ansätze und Technologien werden auf die zu Beginn erhobenen Anforderungen hin evaluiert. Die implementierten Verfahren werden hinsichtlich ihrer Leistung untersucht, mit dem Ziel die Leistungsfähigkeit der Modelle zu maximieren und so für ein bestmögliches Laufzeitverhalten zu sorgen.Current in-car infotainment systems offer their users a variety of functions such as selecting a radio station, playing music from a playlist, or starting a navigation. Currently, every feature the infotainment system may offer is available for a user at any time. Future in-car infotainment systems have to be able to recognize functions the user may want to use, to scale with an increasing amount of features. This recognition depends on the current situation of the user. Hence, the in-car infotainment has to be able to detect the current situation and adapt its behavior accordingly. The first part of this thesis shows how model-based development and ontologies can be used to develop context-aware in-car infotainment systems. The second part shows how Bayesian Networks can be used to consider individual needs and habits of users. Both parts will be evaluated by analyzing them with respect to beforehand identified requirements. Presented implementations will be analyzed with respect to their performance, to increase efficiency of the models