Fat tails, long memory, maturity and ageing in open-source software projects

Damien Challet; Sergi Valverde

1st International ICST Workshop on Physics Inspired Paradigms for Wireless Communications and Network

Research Article

Fat tails, long memory, maturity and ageing in open-source software projects

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@INPROCEEDINGS{10.4108/ICST.WIOPT2008.3219,
    author={Damien Challet and Sergi Valverde},
    title={Fat tails, long memory, maturity and ageing in open-source software projects},
    proceedings={1st International ICST Workshop on Physics Inspired Paradigms for Wireless Communications and Network},
    publisher={IEEE},
    proceedings_a={PHYSCOMNET},
    year={2008},
    month={8},
    keywords={open source csv activity fat tails long memory ageing maturity},
    doi={10.4108/ICST.WIOPT2008.3219}
}

Damien Challet
Sergi Valverde
Year: 2008
Fat tails, long memory, maturity and ageing in open-source software projects
PHYSCOMNET
IEEE
DOI: 10.4108/ICST.WIOPT2008.3219

Damien Challet^1,2^,*, Sergi Valverde^3,4^,*

1: Institute for Scientific Interchange, Viale S. Severo 65 10113 Turin, Italy.
2: Departement de Physique, Universite de Fribourg, ch. du Musee 1700 Fribourg, Switzerland.
3: ICREA-Complex Systems Lab, Pompeu Fabra University, Dr. Aiguader 80 08003 Barcelona, Spain.
4: Centre de Recherches sur la Cognition Animale, CNRS-UMR 5169, Universite Paul Sabatier, 118, route de Narbonne 31062 Toulouse Cedex 04 France.

*Contact email: challet@isi.it, svalverde@imim.es

Abstract

We report activity data analysis on several open source software projects, focusing on time between modifications and on the number of files modified at once. Both have fat-tailed distributions, long-term memory, and display systematic non-trivial cross-correlations, suggesting that quiet periods are followed by cascading modifications. In addition the maturity of a software project can be measured from the exponent of the distribution of inter-modification time. Finally, the dynamics of a single file displays ageing, the average rate of modifications decaying as a function of time following a power-law.

Keywords: open source csv activity fat tails long memory ageing maturity

Published: 2008-08-01
Publisher: IEEE
Modified: 2010-05-16

: http://dx.doi.org/10.4108/ICST.WIOPT2008.3219