[EAS]Open Source Quality

[pjk]

Subject:   Open Source Quality

(from Edupage, February 21, 2003)

STUDY SAYS OPEN-SOURCE CODE IS HIGHER-QUALITY CODE
Reasoning, a consulting firm that offers software inspection services,
found fewer errors in the networking TCP/IP code in Linux than in five
other closed-source operating systems. Per 1,000 lines of code, the
Linux defect rate was 0.1, compared to between 0.6 and 0.7 for
general-purpose operating systems (two of three were UNIX versions)
and between 0.1 and 0.3 for two embedded operating systems. Reasoning
obtained access to proprietary software for the test but would not
disclose the names of the operating systems that were compared to
version 2.4.19 of the Linux kernel. Offered through Red Hat and SuSE,
Linux competes with Microsoft Windows and UNIX-based operating systems
such as Sun Microsystems' Solaris, IBM's AIX, and Hewlett-Packard's
HP-UX. The study bolsters the view that open-source software is better
than proprietary code because it allows for wider scrutiny, which
translates to quicker identification and resolution of software
problems.
CNET, 19 February 2003
http://news.com.com/2100-1001-985221.html


MICROSOFT OFFERS GRANTS, PROGRAMMING TOOLS TO UNIVERSITIES
Microsoft this week announced a series of grants to two dozen academic
research projects. The grants total $3.5 million, including one to a
professor at the Georgia Institute of Technology who is studying the
uses of mobile computing devices in "nonmobile" situations, such as in
an office. The software company also announced a new, academic version
of Visual Studio.Net that individuals can purchase for $99. The
academic version of the programming tool will include Assignment
Manager, an application that helps manage workflow of student
assignments. Microsoft said it will make the source code for
Assignment Manager available to academics.
CNET, 20 February 2003
http://news.com.com/2100-1001-985305.html