@article {1805,
	title = {Stigmergic coordination in FLOSS development teams: Integrating explicit and implicit mechanisms},
	journal = {Cognitive Systems Research},
	year = {2015},
	month = {12/2015},
	abstract = {The vast majority of literature on coordination in team-based projects has drawn on a conceptual separation between explicit (e.g. plans, feedbacks) and implicit coordination mechanisms (e.g. mental maps, shared knowledge). This analytical distinction presents some limitations in explaining how coordination is reached in organizations characterized by distributed teams, scarce face to face meetings and fuzzy and changing lines of authority, as in free/libre open source software (FLOSS) development.

Analyzing empirical illustrations from two FLOSS projects, we highlight the existence of a peculiar model, stigmergic coordination, which includes aspects of both implicit and explicit mechanisms. The work product itself (implicit) and the characteristics under which it is shared (explicit) play an under-appreciated role in helping software developers manage dependencies as they arise. We develop this argument beyond the existing literature by working with an existing coordination framework, considering the role that the codebase itself might play at each step. We also discuss the features and the practices to support stigmergic coordination in distributed teams, as well as recommendations for future research. {\textquotedblleft}Not everything that implicitly exists needs to be rendered explicit{\textquotedblright} (Sloterdijk, 2009, p. 3).},
	keywords = {Coordination mechanisms, distributed teams, FLOSS teams, Stigmergic coordination},
	issn = {13890417},
	doi = {10.1016/j.cogsys.2015.12.003},
	url = {http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1389041715000339},
	attachments = {https://flosshub.org/sites/flosshub.org/files/COGSYS-RS-\%28HHS\%29-\%282015\%29-\%283\%29.pdf},
	author = {Bolici, Francesco and Howison, James and Kevin Crowston}
}
@article {flosswp405,
	title = {Self-organization of teams for free/libre open source software development},
	journal = {Information and Software Technology Journal},
	volume = {49},
	number = {564-575},
	year = {2007},
	note = {"First, the data from these projects that we needed for analysis had to be publicly available (ruling out projects that limit access to their email lists or trackers). Second, we chose the projects that had more than 7 members"..."projects that have attracted numerous developers beyond the initial project founders, are continuing to release software, have numerous downloads and have an active user community that provides feedback"
"3 FLOSS projects were selected for analysis, namely Gaim, eGroupWare and Compiere ERP."

all had sourceforge hosting

Data: "The primary data used for our study were interactions on the main developer communication forum, either a developer mailing list or web-based discussion forum."

Analysis: "For this project, we inductively content-analyzed developer email interactions to identify the task assignment mechanisms used in the process. We coded each instance of task assignment identified on three dimensions: who assigned the task, to whom, and how"
},
	abstract = {This paper provides empirical evidence about how free/libre open source software development teams self-organize their work. Following a case study methodology, we examined developer interaction data from three active and successful FLOSS projects using qualitative research methods, specifically inductive content analysis, to identify the task-assignment mechanisms used by the participants. We found that "self-assignment" was the most common mechanism across three FLOSS projects. This mechanism is consistent with expectations for distributed and largely volunteer teams. We conclude by discussing whether these emergent practices can be usefully transferred to mainstream practice and indicating directions for future research.},
	keywords = {case study, compiere, coordination, DESIGN, distributed teams, egroupware, email, email archives, forum, free/libre open source software development, gaim, INTERNET, mailing list, metadata, qualitative research methods, self-organizing teams, sourceforge, SYSTEMS, task assignment, WORK},
	attachments = {https://flosshub.org/sites/flosshub.org/files/task_assignment_final.pdf},
	author = {Kevin Crowston and Li, Qing and Kangning Wei and Eseryel, U. Yeliz and Howison, James}
}
