Stefano Mazzocchi
Track: Emerging Topics
Date: Wednesday, July 28
Time: 11:35am - 12:20pm
Location: Eugene
TrackBack
The models that have been applied to open source software programming tend to paint the situation of an existing project, but normally fail to describe its dynamics. Community engineering of an open source project is therefore considered a lucky event or black magic.
This session aims at shading some light on the topic by introducing a model to software programming that is mediated from the theory of evolution proposed by Charles Darwin for biological systems. You’ll learn how this model not only explains why some open source projects are successful and others are not, but you’ll also receive a metric to understand what moves might have a potentially beneficial impact in increasing the efficiency and long-term stability of even successful projects.
You’ll also learn how the Darwinian model can be applied to other modern software programming practices like eXtreme Programming and indicate how the two converge toward maximizing the darwinian benefits. Finally, you’ll learn what ways the traditional software programming methodologies fail to follow the Darwininan model and, for this reason, cannot compete in terms of efficiency and quality with those successful projects that follow the model.
