The Effects of Open Source License Choice on Software Reuse

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dc.contributor.authorBrewer, John VIIIen
dc.contributor.committeechairFrakes, William B.en
dc.contributor.committeememberKulczycki, Gregory W.en
dc.contributor.committeememberEgyhazy, Csaba J.en
dc.contributor.departmentComputer Scienceen
dc.date.accessioned2014-03-14T20:36:52Zen
dc.date.adate2012-06-08en
dc.date.available2014-03-14T20:36:52Zen
dc.date.issued2012-05-04en
dc.date.rdate2012-06-08en
dc.date.sdate2012-05-14en
dc.description.abstractPrevious research shows that software reuse can have a positive impact on software development economics, and that the adoption of a specific open source license can influence how a software product is received by users and programmers. This study attempts to bridge these two research areas by examining how the adoption of an open source license affects software reuse. Two reuse metrics were applied to 9,570 software packages contained in the Fedora Linux software repository. Each package was evaluated to determine how many external components it reuses, as well as how many times it is reused by other software packages. This data was divided into subsets according to license type and software category. The study found that, in general, (1) software released under a restrictive license reuse more external components than software released under a permissive license, and (2) that software released under a permissive license is more likely to be reused than software released under a restrictive license. However, there are exceptions to these conclusions, as the effect of license choice on reuse varies by software category.en
dc.description.degreeMaster of Scienceen
dc.identifier.otheretd-05142012-215203en
dc.identifier.sourceurlhttp://scholar.lib.vt.edu/theses/available/etd-05142012-215203/en
dc.identifier.urihttp://hdl.handle.net/10919/32778en
dc.publisherVirginia Techen
dc.relation.haspartBrewer_John_t_2012.pdfen
dc.rightsIn Copyrighten
dc.rights.urihttp://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/en
dc.subjectOpen Source Licenseen
dc.subjectSoftware Reuseen
dc.subjectDependency Analysisen
dc.subjectPackage Repositoryen
dc.titleThe Effects of Open Source License Choice on Software Reuseen
dc.typeThesisen
thesis.degree.disciplineComputer Scienceen
thesis.degree.grantorVirginia Polytechnic Institute and State Universityen
thesis.degree.levelmastersen
thesis.degree.nameMaster of Scienceen

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