(possibly) Frequently
Asked Questions
The following paragraphs give an
overview about some questions that might come up concerning this
survey, the questionnaire and the generated data. If something should
be missing, feel free to contact me at the email-address stated at
the bottom of the page.
1. About the survey
in general
1.1 Who are you?
My name is Tobias Escher, I am a student of the MA
Globalization & Communications at the University
of Leicester, Great Britain. My supervisor is Dr.
Gillian Youngs at the Centre
for Mass Communication Research. I
have a background in Communication Sciences and Computer Science that I
both studied at the Freie
Universität Berlin, Germany. If someone wishes to contact me
by good old paper mail, that can be done via the office of the Centre:
CMCR, attn. Tobias Escher
University of Leicester
University Road
LE1 7RH, Leicester
United Kingdom
1.2 What kind of
survey is this?
This survey is part of my Master-thesis for the MA
Globalization & Communications at the University
of Leicester. I am interested in the political motivations of
computer programmers in general and this survey is aimed in
particular at GNU/Linux developers. My thesis deals with the question
of whether computer experts have political motivations for
writing software. GNU/Linux-development is particular interesting in
that context
as it is often perceived by the public as a counter-culture to huge
transnational companies like Microsoft or capitalist market ideology
itself.
Furthermore, GNU/Linux is often applied in developing countries for
various reasons, among them lower costs and greater adaptation
possibilities.
1.3 Who should take
part in this survey?
This survey is aimed at people who have developed or are
developing free software or open source software for GNU/Linux
systems. That not only means the kernel but all kinds of software
that can be used on a system with a Linux-kernel. As a rule of thumb:
if software you contributed to is part of a GNU/Linux-distributions
you are exactly the target group of this research.
1.4 Will the results
of the survey be available online?
Yes. From 16th August 2004 onwards the results of the survey will be
available on this website together with my complete thesis. That's my
submission date so if anyone wants to read my draft before to have the
chance that his/her suggestions will be recognized for the final draft
and help me to be more accurate, just drop me an email.
2. About the
questionnaire - Content
2.1 What does
"proprietary" software mean?
Proprietary software is software to which one or more of the
following conditions apply:
- The source code of the software is
not freely available.
- Copying the program is restricted or
not allowed
- Modification of the software is
restricted or not allowed.
- Redistribution of the software is restricted or not allowed.
2.2 What do you mean
by "contribution" to a software
project?
A contribution to a software project can be either contributed
code or ideas that influenced the software. Furthermore, if you are
an administrator or the only developer of a FS/OSS-project, you have
contributed as well. In the context of this survey, bug reports are
not considered as contribution as this survey looks particular for
people who develop software rather than "merely" test it.
2.3 What does
"FS/OSS" mean that you use all the time?
"FS" is the abbreviation of "Free Software",
according to the definition
of the Free Software Foundation.
"OSS" is a abbreviation
for "Open Source software" according to the definition
of the Open Source Initiative.
I use the term "FS/OSS"
as an abbreviation to refer to all software that is either Free
Software or Open Source software according to the respective
definition.
2.4 What does "N/A"
stand for?
N/A stands for "not applicable" or alternatively "not
available". In the context of this questionnaire it signifies
that the question was not (yet) answered.
2.5 Did you do all
this alone? OR: Hey, some of the questions look familiar to me
According to Eric S. Raymond's second rule in "The
Cathedral and the Bazaar",
"2.
Good programmers know what to write. Great ones know what to rewrite
(and reuse)." ,
I would similarily argue
that great researchers know what to reuse. Ok, I am not a great
researcher but there are a lot of great researchers out there making
big surveys and agonising about the right formulation of the questions.
This research has profited enormously from other surveys.
Some of their questions are simply good, and so I decided to use
them with no or only slight changes. Of course, not without giving
proper credit! So whenever you see one of the following symbols next to
the name of a variable, it signals that the question was first used in
the respective survey:
2.6 What do
symbols like * or # or + next to the variable names denote?
Please see the preceeding question for the answer!
3. About the
questionnaire - Look & Technical Stuff
3.1 Can I use the
Back-button of my browser?
in short: You may do so, if
you want to have a look for the answers you have given. As long as you
have not completed the survey, you can also change entries you've made
already. However, it is suggested not to alter more than the page
previous to the one you are currently working at.
in detail: In general, it is
no problem to change all the entries you've made so far. There is only
one small pitfall that could lead to the deletion of information you
already entered: After you altered a previously edited form, you have
to press the "Go to next Page"-button in order to store the altered
information. Additionally, this will also direct you to the next form
in order - but as your browser has to reload it from the server, this
form will be cleared, that means the form does not show anymore the
entries you already made. However, you data is still stored - as long
as you do not hit the "Go to the next Page"-button again - then the
current entries in the form will be stored - that means the data you
entered is deleted. This problem can be circumvented by simply using
the Forward-button of your browser to navigate to the page of the
questionnaire you want to fill in or, but that is not very tempting, by
simply filling in the forms again.
3.2 Can I alter the
answers I have given already?
As long as you have not finished the survey, you may do so by using the
Back-button of you browser to navigate through the questions you've
answered already. However, it is suggested not to alter more than the
page previous to the one you are currently working at. Please refer to
the previous question for a more detailed answer for what you should
take care of.
3.2 Why do the pages
look so ugly?
There are mainly two options. You should be able to determine easily
which one
applies to you: Is the background kind of blue? If yes,
option one applies, otherwise option two:
- option 1: The design I chose doesn't look beautiful on your
monitor or at the screen resolution you use. Or you simply don't like
my taste. Fortunately the design is mostly managed by a stylesheet and
you should be able to switch it off in your browser. That will also
help if the page loads deadly slow.
- option 2: You don't use my stylesheet for the pages. Maybe you
should tell your browser not to use your default styles but the
stylesheets the website suggests.
3.3 Why does the page
need so long to load?
I would assume that the background image and the formatting stuff take
its toll. Maybe you want to switch off the stylesheet to get only the
basic page.
3.4 What software do
you use?
For realising the webpage and the online-questionnaire, only free
software is used. The
basic is a Zope server. For
the questionnaire I use Martijn Faassen's
Formulator framework. The data processing is done with some
Python-scripts that read the data out of the forms and store it in a
text-file. This text-file can later be imported to SPSS which is unfortunately not free
or open source software but I'm looking into free software alternatives
for SPSS.
4. About the data
stored and anonymity
4.1 What kind of data
is stored?
Apart from the data you enter in the forms, some additional
information is stored:
- the time you finished the form
– This should not bother anyone
- the name you used to log on
– The name you used to log-on to the
survey-website can not be used to identify you as this name is used by
all people on the same mailing list you received this email from. This
information is only included to get an idea about how many people from
one mailing list responded compared to the overall size of the list.
This information will not be published in any form.
- your browser and operating
system – This is out of curiosity
what kind of operating system and what browser FS/OSS – developers use.
Not that I expect to big surprises. I do not consider this information
as too private to be stored and published.
4.2 What happens with
the data?
The data that is entered in the forms is stored in a file on the
server in a format that enables the easy import to a statistics
program. Furthermore, if you agree so at the end of the survey, the
data you entered will be available – fully anonymous – to the
public. This happens in order to apply the idea of Free Software /
Open Source to this research and to share information with other
people who might be interested. The data will be published under the
Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial
License. This license ensures that no one is allowed to use
the data for commercial purposes without asking me (and I will most
probably say no!).
4.3 Why will the data
not be available under a GNU or Open Source
License?
At first sight it might seem odd to write and research about Free
Software and Open Source and than make the data not available under
one of these licenses. The point here is that these licenses apply
mostly to software and documentation. In the case of this survey, the
generated data is provided by individuals who – as I assume –
would not all give willingly the same data to some company or market
research agency. The key issue is that I do not want to make your
(even anonymous) data available to someone who is earning money with
it by, let's say, selling it to others or refining its advertisement
strategy to convince more FS/OSS-developers to buy his or her
product. The Free Software Foundation recommends the Creative Commons
licenses for cases to which the GNU licenses do not seem appropriate.
For this reason I decided for the Creative Commons
Attribution-NonCommercial
License. It allows everyone to use the data as long as the
source is stated and it is not used for commercial purposes.
4.4 Will my
information be anonymous?
Yes, no information is stored that allows to connect the data to
your identity. As already stated above, only the information you
entered in the questionnaire will be published together with the time
you finished the survey and the browser and operating system you
used.
4.5 What about the
cookie you store on my computer?
The cookie does only contain a random number that is used to
identify you while you fill in the survey. As soon as you complete
the questionnaire or an error occurs, the cookie is deleted.
Furthermore, it expires after the session is closed.
5. I cannot find an
answer to my question
I am sorry that something remained unclear. I would be grateful if
you could contact me about your concerns at the email-address stated
at the bottom of this page. Thanks a lot!
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