Developer Matrix

I took a closer look at the developer role model introduced at previous blog post Developers – refers to what? I started to think about a matrix which would present all the options where a developer could be located. Of course matrix would represent simplified model of the reality and would not apply to every developer or situation. Nevertheless, forming such simple matrix raised (or more like made visible) one new developer motiovation mode to ’24/7′. Just to remind the reader, these ideas and models are based on the interviews for my PhD about open source ecosystem described here. Let’s take a look at the model.

In the previous post I identified two extremes in motivation to participate. First is ’24/7′ which refers to enthusiastic developers who spend ‘their life’ in development. Their work and freetime overlap or/and in some cases mix together; there is no separation between work and freetime. Second extreme is ’9 to 5′ developer, which in turn refers to developer who does development as work only (to get paid). There are lots of differentiating factors between the two extremes, but that discussion is worth another blog entry. As I was rethinking the two extremes and the shades of gray between the two, I noticed that this isn’t so simple as I first thought. First of all, the above are not opposite extremes. The latter (’9 to 5′) is one of the extremes, but the first (’24/7′) is not. It belongs to gray area. Why? Let’s take a look at simple matrix and the combinations.

Developer Matrix

In the first option, developer is a typical ’9 to 5′ person. In this option developer is involved just to get paid, has or has not interest towards the goals or product under work. In the example above, developer is involved only in App development.

Second and third options represent the two types of ’24/7′ developer motivations. I had to separate two different kind of ’24/7′ types: focused and spread (not the best ones and not the last versions of the names). Both of the types represent enthusiastic developers who are involved both as worker and as volunteer. What searates the two, is their focus. ‘Focused 24/7′ is (again just an example) interested only about application development. In the example ‘spread 24/7′ is working with core and contributing in application development. Keep in mind that contributing refers to wide variety of items and tasks such as bug reporting, graphics desing, application logic implementation and testing. In the example above, ‘spread 24/7′ is possibly also contributing to tools development.

The last option is named as ‘Active user/ hobby’. Developer in this category does not work for the project (for example MeeGo as paid developer). Instead he or she is contibuting to development. As it was stated before, contributing can have several forms.

Of course there can be a lot of different variations where developer might ‘tick’ in the model. Some might even be working with core and tools, some might be contributing to apps and core/different layers in platform.

Questions raised

Formulating this simple matrix raised several questions. What are the percentages of each options in open source ecosystems? How likely is it that there are contributors in core development, since according to interviewed that is mostly in the hands of corporations (paid developers)? Are all users part of active users /hobby category? If not, what separates them from each other?

Content is available under 2011, Jarkko Moilanen. CC BY-NC-SA 3.0

Related posts:

1. Developers – refers to what?