News

Linux Foundation Publishes Enterprise Open Source Guides

• By David Ramel
• November 6, 2017

The Linux Foundation added to its collection of enterprise guides for the development and use of open source software with three new offerings.

The 17-year-old nonprofit organization is tasked with supporting open source communities and as part of that mission in September published six Open Source Guides for the Enterprise touching on subjects ranging from recruiting developers to using open source code.

More recently, the foundation published three more guides, all in collaboration with the open source specialist, TODO Group (Talk Openly, Develop Openly).

The series of guides was created to help enterprise staffers at multiple levels -- executives, open source program managers, developers, attorneys and other decision-makers -- learn how to best benefit from the open source movement.

The organization described the three new offerings thusly:

• Improving Your Open Source Development Impact, by Ibrahim Haddad, Samsung Research America. This guide covers a number of practices that enterprises can adopt to help grow their footprint in large open source projects.
• Starting an Open Source Project, by Christine Abernathy, Facebook; Ibrahim Haddad; Guy Martin, Autodesk; John Mertic, The Linux Foundation; Jared Smith, Capital One. This guide helps enterprises already well versed in open source learn what they need to know to start their own open source projects.
• Open Source Reading List. A collection of 21 must-read books for open source program managers, compiled with input from TODO Group members.

The six guides published in September include:

• Creating an Open Source Program: Learn how to establish a program to manage internal open source use and external contributions.
• Open Source Management Tools: Discover the range of tools available for tracking and managing open source projects.
• Measuring Your Open Source Program's Success: Read more about the ways that top organizations are evaluating ROI of their open source programs and contributions.
• Recruiting Developers: Learn how companies can recruit developers, or build internal talent, by creating an open source culture and contributing to open source projects.
• Participating in Open Source Communities: Understand the importance of devoting internal developer resources to open source participation, and how to best approach it.
• Using Open Source Code: Ensure that your organization meets its legal obligations when integrating open source code in your commercial products.

More guides are on the way, and they will be published along with their predecessors at the aforementioned Linux Foundation site and on GitHub.

The TODO Group has also published four complementary case studies, detailing the experiences of Autodesk, Comcast, Facebook and Salesforce in building out their open source programs. More of those are planned, too.