Variant Forks - Motivations and Impediments

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dc.contributor.authorBusinge, John
dc.contributor.authorZerouali, Ahmed
dc.contributor.authorDecan, Alexandre
dc.contributor.authorMens, Tom
dc.contributor.authorDemeyer, Serge
dc.contributor.authorDe Roover, Coen
dc.date.accessioned2023-02-05T15:26:44Z
dc.date.available2023-02-05T15:26:44Z
dc.date.issued2022
dc.description.abstractSocial coding platforms centred around git provide explicit facilities to share code between projects: forks, pull requests, cherry-picking to name but a few. Variant forks are an interesting phenomenon in that respect, as they permit for different projects to peacefully co-exist, yet explicitly acknowledge the common ancestry. Several researchers analysed forking practices on open source platforms and observed that variant forks get created frequently. However, little is known on the motivations for launching such a variant fork. Is it mainly technical (e.g., diverging features), governance (e.g., diverging interests), legal (e.g., diverging licences), or do other factors come into play? We report the results of an exploratory qualitative analysis on the motivations behind creating and maintaining variant forks. We surveyed 105 maintainers of different active open source variant projects hosted on GitHub. Our study extends previous findings, identifying a number of fine-grained common motivations for launching a variant fork and listing concrete impediments for maintaining the co-existing projects.en_US
dc.identifier.citationBusinge, J., Zerouali, A., Decan, A., Mens, T., Demeyer, S., & De Roover, C. (2022). Variant Forks - Motivations and Impediments. In Proceedings of the 29th IEEE International Conference on Software Analysis, Evolution and Reengineering (SANER 2022) (pp. 867-877). (Proceedings - 2022 IEEE International Conference on Software Analysis, Evolution and Reengineering, SANER 2022). IEEE. https://doi.org/10.1109/SANER53432.2022.00105en_US
dc.identifier.other10.1109/SANER53432.2022.00105
dc.identifier.urihttps://nru.uncst.go.ug/handle/123456789/7572
dc.language.isoenen_US
dc.publisherIEEEen_US
dc.subjectMainlinesen_US
dc.subjectVariantsen_US
dc.subjectGitHuben_US
dc.subjectSoftware ecosystemsen_US
dc.subjectMaintenanceen_US
dc.subjectVariabilityen_US
dc.titleVariant Forks - Motivations and Impedimentsen_US
dc.typeOtheren_US
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