What do you look for when selecting an open source solution for the task at hand?
Question by lobster1234
This could get quite confusing if there is a wider range of tools that fit the need – like logging in Java. In general, what would you, as fellow developers consider the so-called litmus test before making a selection between available open-source tools/libraries?
I can think about developer velocity, code documentation, the release frequency, committers’ reputation to name a few. Wanted to reach out to the community and get some more data points.
I apologize if this question belongs to programmers.stackexchange.com, I found that there are more questions tagged with open-source here than there.
Answer by thorsten müller
An active user base is often a good sign. If there is a forum or a mailing list, have a look, how many people use it, if there are recent posts and what kind of problems people have. When developing web sites with Ruby on Rails I had to choose a lot of OSS tools and an active community and answers to problems by the developers are a good sign. People are obviously still using it and problems are solved.
Answer by Starx
My main reason is the resources that are available on the internet.
- Open Source solution, have good documentation.
- Tips and Tricks or Tutorial are easily available.
- Forums and discussion board are maintained in order to support.
