Developer experience · Registered-report, mixed project case study

Public sector open source software projects—How is development organized?

Empirical Software Engineering · 2025

Linåker, Johan, Lundell, Björn, Servant, Francisco, Gamalielsson, Jonas, Muto, Sachiko, Robles, Gregorio

Summary

Public-sector projects show concentrated roles: in OS2Forms the top five covered about 90% of commits and 75% of bug reports.

For your marketing

Possible founder application

Track concentration and role overlap as bus-factor risks when building a community-led product.

Reported result

What the study found

Public-sector projects show concentrated roles: in OS2Forms the top five covered about 90% of commits and 75% of bug reports.

Research question

What the authors investigated

How does the study’s stated design explain its reported outcome in this setting?

Design

Registered-report, mixed project case study

Sample and setting

Public-sector projects EnergyPlus and OS2Forms; OS2Forms had at most 21 contributors.

Scope and transfer

Limitations to keep in view

Abstract/page evidence limits detailed sample and external-validity assessment.

Research sources

full_text

Study strength

4/5 Research record provides a clear design and context; apply the finding within its stated limits.

How this was assessed

The 1–5 evidence-check score is a practical reading aid, not a formal peer review or a probability that a conclusion is true. It combines design strength (2 points), sample reporting (1), comparison/control clarity (1), and how much of the paper could be checked (1). Access affects how confidently this directory can assess a study, not the study's underlying quality. Blinding is reported separately because it is not relevant to every design.

Design transparency · 2/2

Based on the reported study design in the retrieved source.

Sample and setting · 1/1

The sample context is stated; a numerical count is preserved only when reported.

Outcome clarity · 1/1

The finding is summarized from publisher or article metadata.

Access for checking · 1/1

Full text was identified.

Double-blind? The retrieved publisher record does not establish whether participants or outcome assessors were blinded.