A Contribution Management Framework for Firms Engaged in Open Source Software Ecosystems -- A Research Preview

Abstract: Context and motivation: Contribution Management helps firms engaged in Open Source Software (OSS) ecosystems to motivate what they should contribute and when, but also what they should focus their resources on and to what extent. Such guidelines are also referred to as contribution strategies. The motivation for developing tailored contribution strategies is to maximize return on investment and sustain the influence needed in the ecosystem. Question/Problem: We aim to develop a framework to help firms understand their current situation and create a starting point to develop an effective contribution management process. Principal ideas/results: Through a design science approach, a prototype framework is created based on literature and validated iteratively with expert opinions through interviews. Contribution: In this research preview, we present our initial results after our first design cycle and consultation with one experienced OSS manager at a large OSS oriented software-intensive firm. The initial validation highlights importance of stakeholder identification and analysis, as well as the general need for contribution management and alignment with internal product planning. This encourages future work to develop the framework further using expert and case validation.