Ask Slashdot: What Defines Success In an Open Source Project?

rbowen writes "Nine years ago, Slashdot readers discussed what makes an Open Source project successful. The answers were varied, of course. An academic paper summarized the results, agreeing (albeit with more precision) that motivations for Open Source projects are varied. Has anything changed since then? In the era of mobile apps, social media, and Google Ad revenue, have the definitions of Open Source project success changed at all? Have your reasons changed for being involved in Open Source?"

When it's better than you alone could make it.

[Dr. Manhattan]

I'd say, when your open-source project is better because you made it open-source, it's successful. My own minor projects have been improved by testing, bug reports, bug fixes, and new feature contributions through the years. Certainly they are more useful to me now than they would have been if I was the only one working on them.

The Production of Meaningful, Useful Documentation

[Petersko]

...and what a wasteland of failure lies before us... :)

Re:Usage

[tlhIngan]

I think widespread usage is a good metric and not just gloating over profit like the Apple fans like to do. "Apple derived the most profit from the cell phone industry." they say, to put down Android's usage gains. By that metric, IIS is totally killing Apache and Nginx in the web server space, but most folks consider Apache beats IIS. Which of this is true?

Both are metrics. Android vs. iOS, profit is a good metric - but so is usage. Android usage is under-reported because it's going by official Google Android numbers, and misses AOSP numbers. It's why the #2 tablet is the Kindle Fire, but isn't really seen in the Android listings. And there are many Android AOSP based phones out there (mostly in China) running nice "alternative" app stores. Profit's also a good metric too - after all, if Apple is making the most profit, it means that despite Android having a much larger marketshare (or usage), when combined with profits from non-smartphones, Apple is making more money then all of them combined. It helps explain why Nokia/RIM/Samsung are opposing any and all Apple proposals (money money money...)

As for Apache and IIS - I believe Apache actually has a larger marketshare over IIS (at least it did when all those IIS exploits were floating around), and quite possibly, the Apache-based ecosystem is far more profitable than the IIS ecosystem. But that's because of the licensing and support and many other factors.

In the end, success is whatever you want to define it. Some people consider success as making profits. Others may consider having someone else use the software a success. And others may define it as having most marketshare. Or maybe it's the entire economic profit of the software and its ecosystem. The only person that can judge the success of open-source software are the developers.

Heck, another definition of success may be the original creator can step down and see their software continue to evolve instead of becoming abandoned.