Open Source - Why should I care as a Usability Professional?

Open source is a set of principles on how to write software - the most important of which is that the source code is freely obtainable and thereby available for the public to install, modify, or redistribute. "Open Source" often implies a number of practices that impact the development process. For usability professionals, the following are of special interest:

Geographically Distributed Teams. Working in geographically distributed teams challenges the development of new communication skills which may be of growing importance for one’s professional career.
Quick Release Cycles. As suggested by the Eric S. Raymond's famous phrase “release early, release often'', short release cycles are a principle of OSS development. This supports iterative development, and therefore provides a playground for developing skills in e.g. Agile development techniques.
Flat hierarchies. The flat hierarchy often found in OSS projects facilitates the implementation of innovative solutions and the adoption of leadership roles.
Leadership Skills. Coordinating usability efforts in geographically distributed and often large (50+) developer teams poses new challenges to usability professionals.
Pressure-Free Environment. Most OSS projects registered on OpenUsability provide an environment to probe innovative solutions free of pressure.
Peer Review Principles. In OSS projects, any submission is peer-reviewed by fellow project members. With regard to programming, this ensures a high quality of code. With regard to user interface solutions, young usability professionals learn to create realisable design solutions.

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Become a usability mentor! Transfer your knowledge and skills to young usability professionals by mentoring a student project in the scope of our Season of Usability programme. To register informally or get more information, and send a mail to This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it

Published on Tuesday, January 1th 2008 at 05:18 pm in Information for Usability Professionals

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