Location
Online
Event Website
https://hicss.hawaii.edu/
Start Date
3-1-2023 12:00 AM
End Date
7-1-2023 12:00 AM
Description
Open source software relies on the contributions of developers who participate voluntarily in projects. While prior research has investigated social characteristics, relations, and connections that influence a developer’s participation, we argue that the technical relations and connections of projects, which emerge through dependencies between packages in software ecosystems, play a focal role in that decision as well. We empirically test these assertions by applying stochastic actor-oriented models to an affiliation network in the JavaScript software ecosystem. Our results show that while the number of dependencies of a project does not influence participation, developers are more likely to participate in projects to which their own projects have dependency relations. This study thereby contributes to the understanding of antecedents that influence developers’ participation decisions by highlighting the importance of project interdependencies in software ecosystems.
Recommended Citation
Müller, Mario and Rosenkranz, Christoph, "The Role of Dependency Networks in Developer Participation Decisions in Open Source Software Ecosystems: An Application of Stochastic Actor-Oriented Models" (2023). Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences 2023 (HICSS-56). 6.
https://aisel.aisnet.org/hicss-56/cl/distributed_collaboration/6
The Role of Dependency Networks in Developer Participation Decisions in Open Source Software Ecosystems: An Application of Stochastic Actor-Oriented Models
Online
Open source software relies on the contributions of developers who participate voluntarily in projects. While prior research has investigated social characteristics, relations, and connections that influence a developer’s participation, we argue that the technical relations and connections of projects, which emerge through dependencies between packages in software ecosystems, play a focal role in that decision as well. We empirically test these assertions by applying stochastic actor-oriented models to an affiliation network in the JavaScript software ecosystem. Our results show that while the number of dependencies of a project does not influence participation, developers are more likely to participate in projects to which their own projects have dependency relations. This study thereby contributes to the understanding of antecedents that influence developers’ participation decisions by highlighting the importance of project interdependencies in software ecosystems.
https://aisel.aisnet.org/hicss-56/cl/distributed_collaboration/6