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Success-Abandonment-Classification

Workflow Entry: Success-Abandonment-Classification

Created at: 06/02/08 @ 14:35:42 Last updated: 02/07/08 @ 17:15:25

Version 3 (latest) (of 3)

Version created on: 06/02/08 @ 14:35:41 by: Andrea Wiggins | Revision comments Expand

Last edited on: 02/07/08 @ 17:15:25 by: Andrea Wiggins

Title: Success-Abandonment-Classification

Type: Taverna 1

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Description

Retrieves data from FLOSSmole and from the Notre Dame SourceForge repository to compute project statistics based on releases, downloads and project lifespan. Project statistics are then used to classify projects according to the criteria set up in English & Schweik, but comparison criteria are parameterized so that a different set of criterion thresholds can be used to evaluate the project characteristics.

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Workflow Components

Inputs (1)

Name	Description
sf_unixname	List of SourceForge unixnames for the projects of interest; accesses data for time periods through mid-2005.

Processors (18)

Name	Type	Description
mortality_threshold	stringconstant	Length of time for a project to be considered abandoned, if no releases have been made by this time. Unit: days, integer values only.
release_lag_threshold	stringconstant	Desired time between releases so that the releases are not made "too fast" for a sustainable rate of growth. Unit: days, integer values only.
download_threshold	stringconstant
initiation_age_threshold	stringconstant	The threshold for how long a project may remain in the "initiation" stage without having produced a release, and still be considered not abandoned. Unit: days, integer values only
release_rate_type	stringconstant	Allows switching between three versions of deriving the release rate values for comparison to a threshold to determine whether the releases are too frequent for sustainable growth; integer values should be 1 for first_last, 2 for recent_density, or 3 for average_rate.
release_count_threshold	stringconstant	Minimum number of releases to be considered a success.
delist_classtypes	local	Takes classtype output from iterated procedure out of list format and into CSV instead.
delist_stages	local	Takes stage output from iterated procedure out of list format and into CSV instead.
Stages_Analysis	rshell	Author: Andrea Wiggins Provides simple proportions for the stages of projects as output from the classification.
classifier	beanshell	Author: Andrea Wiggins Uses the output of several criterion tests to determine the classification for a given SourceForge project. The if/else statements form a truth table of possible values based on the classification scheme in the English & Schweik article.
classification_csv	beanshell	Author: Andrea Wiggins Assembles outputs of analysis procedures with raw criterion data and creates a single CSV file to record all of the relevant variables in a single file.
Class_Analysis	rshell	Author: Andrea Wiggins Provides simple proportions for the classes of projects as output from the classification.
release_count_test	beanshell	Author: Andrea Wiggins For each project, determines whether the number of releases meets the threshold value for minimum number of releases.
growth_stage_test	beanshell	Author: Andrea Wiggins For each project, determines whether the lifespan of the project (aggregate data from FLOSSmole: data collection date minus founding date) meets the threshold between initiation phase and growth phase.
release_lag_test	beanshell	Author: Andrea Wiggins For each project, determines whether the amount of time over which a given number of releases has occurred exceeds a threshold, which is intended to indicate an appropriate amount of time between releases for sustainable project activity, i.e. not too fast. There are three different methods to compare release rate and the lag threshold, based on: 1) "first_last" time elapsed between first and most recent release, 2) "recent_density" time elapsed between last X releases (where X is the workflow variable to indicate minimum number of releases for success), and 3) "average_releases" average time between each release since the first one. Note that method 3 will have a significantly different appropriate value for the release_lag_threshold variable, as it is based on average time between individual releases rather than aggregate time between several releases.
downloads_test	beanshell	Author: Andrea Wiggins For each project, determines whether the number of aggregate downloads for the project exceeds a minimum threshold for usefulness. This would be an interesting place to substitute a scaling function option for the download_threshold value, perhaps adjusting the threshold according to the project's lifespan or number of releases.
mortality_test	beanshell	Author: Andrea Wiggins For each project, determines whether the time between the last release and the date of data collection is within a threshold limit that indicates whether the project is active or inactive.
GetData	workflow	Author: James Howison Procedure to fetch data from FLOSSmole and the Notre Dame SourceForge dumps based on the SourceForge unixname for a given project. Input is a list of project SourceForge unixnames, and a threshold value for the "recent release density" value. Not currently suited for running large batches of projects.

Outputs (3)

Name	Description
Class_Output	Proportions of each class of project in the sample. Potential values include: SG (success-growth), TG (tragedy-growth), IG (indeterminate-growth), TI (tragedy-initiation), II (indeterminate-initiation), unclassifiable (has 0 downloads, 0 releases, and a non-SourceForge web site), and other (cannot be classified.) Any project producing an "other" value should be closely scrutinized to determine why it does not fit into the classification scheme; the most likely reason would be the presence of null values due to missing data from one of the repositories.
Stages_Output	Proportions of projects classified as being in the growth or initiation phase.
Classification_Data	CSV output of all the data used for classification, the classification criterion values, and the final class assigned to each project. Suitable for use with R or Excel for later ad-hoc analysis.

Links (43)

Sink	Source
classification_csv:downloads_list	GetData:downloads
downloads_test:downloads	GetData:downloads
classification_csv:time_last_first_list	GetData:first_last_release
classification_csv:lifespan_list	GetData:lifespan_days
growth_stage_test:lifespan	GetData:lifespan_days
classification_csv:release_count_list	GetData:num_releases
release_count_test:num_releases	GetData:num_releases
classification_csv:release_density_list	GetData:recent_release_density
release_lag_test:recent_release_density	GetData:recent_release_density
classification_csv:time_last_current_list	GetData:time_since_last_release
mortality_test:time_since_last_release	GetData:time_since_last_release
classification_csv:has_sf_url_list	GetData:web_site
classifier:web_site	GetData:web_site
classification_csv:classification_list	classifier:classtype
Stages_Analysis:stages	delist_stages:concatenated
downloads_test:download_threshold	download_threshold:value
classification_csv:downloads_test_list	downloads_test:usage
classifier:usage	downloads_test:usage
classification_csv:stages_list	growth_stage_test:stage
classifier:stage	growth_stage_test:stage
delist_stages:stringlist	growth_stage_test:stage
growth_stage_test:initiation_threshold	initiation_age_threshold:value
classification_csv:mortality_test_list	mortality_test:release_mortality
classifier:release_mortality	mortality_test:release_mortality
mortality_test:mortality_threshold	mortality_threshold:value
classifier:releases	release_count_test:releases
classifier:release_rate	release_lag_test:release_rate
release_lag_test:release_lag_threshold	release_lag_threshold:value
release_lag_test:release_rate_type	release_rate_type:value
GetData:sf_unixname	sf_unixname
classifier:downloads	GetData:downloads
release_lag_test:first_last_release	GetData:first_last_release
release_lag_test:num_releases	GetData:num_releases
delist_classtypes:stringlist	classifier:classtype
Class_Analysis:classtypes	delist_classtypes:concatenated
classification_csv:sf_unixname_list	sf_unixname
classification_csv:release_count_test_list	release_count_test:releases
GetData:release_density_threshold	release_count_threshold:value
release_count_test:release_count_threshold	release_count_threshold:value
classification_csv:release_lag_test_list	release_lag_test:release_rate
Class_Output	Class_Analysis:analysis_output
Stages_Output	Stages_Analysis:analysis_output
Classification_Data	classification_csv:out_csv

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Taverna 1 workflow

Information Original Uploader

Andrea Wiggins

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All versions of this Workflow are licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 License.

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Statistics

818 viewings

2115 downloads

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Version History

Earliest Version:
[1] - FLOSS Success-Abandonment Classification

Created on: Wednesday 06 February 2008 @ 14:35:41 (GMT)

Created by: Andrea Wiggins

Last edited on: Monday 11 February 2008 @ 16:50:39 (GMT)

Last edited by: Andrea Wiggins

Revision comments:

None

Previous Versions:
[2] - Success-Abandonment-Classification

Created on: Wednesday 06 February 2008 @ 14:35:41 (GMT)

Created by: Andrea Wiggins

Last edited on: Thursday 19 June 2008 @ 02:14:31 (BST)

Last edited by: Andrea Wiggins

Revision comments:

This version of the classifier is fully functional, drawing on data from FLOSSmole and the Notre Dame SourceForge repositories. The thresholds for classification decisions are set as string constants, which you can change as you like.

In addition, this workflow offers three versions of the recent release rate classification: the original version (first_last) based on the time between first and last releases; an averaged version (average_rate) which uses the average time between releases, and a version suggested by English & Schweik as future work (recent_density), which uses the time between the last X releases where X is the threshold number of releases to be considered successful.

Latest Version:
[3] - Success-Abandonment-Classification

Created on: Wednesday 06 February 2008 @ 14:35:41 (GMT)

Created by: Andrea Wiggins

Last edited on: Wednesday 02 July 2008 @ 17:15:25 (BST)

Last edited by: Andrea Wiggins

Revision comments:

This revision replaces the large RShell classifier component with a series of Beanshell components that execute the pre-classification criterion comparisons, do the project classification, and assemble a nice CSV output for ad-hoc analysis.