Introduction to Open Source

Carl Eric Mols

Mateo Davis

Copyright Sony Mobile Communications AB

CC Attribution 4.0 (see last page)

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Agenda

• General Overview
• What is it?
• Why it Works
• Open Source Licensing Basics

• Open Source at Sony Mobile

• History
• Strategy
• Intellectual Property
• Open Source Processes

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Why are we here??

• Sony Mobile’s History/Transition – Share lessons learned:

• Engineers/Developers - have tremendous opportunities, but with that comes

responsibility

• Lawyers and Engineers need to work together – legal and technical issues
overlap

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What is Open Source Software?

• Computer Software that provides its source code under a license with
the rights to study, change, and distribute the software to anyone
and for any purpose

• OSI Definition: 10 Freedoms – http://opensource.org/osd-annotated

• Is it widely used?

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Wildly Successful

Apache
Google
Chrome

• More Stable
• Faster Development Time
• More Secure
• It is everywhere:
• 3 billion people own a smartphone, full of Open Source
• Internet, web services, medical equipment, cars and likely your fridge too.
• Even the US DoD is a major user of Open Source … think ARPAnet …

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Open Source is exploding today!

Reference: Black Duck Software Inc Reference: Black Duck Software Inc

Reduce Cost & TTM Global Development IoT Merge of domains

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The Cathedral vs The Bazaar – Why it Works

• Linus’ Law: with enough eyeballs, all bugs are shallow

• Release early, release often (bleeding edge vs. stable releases)
• Users = Co-Developers: users become testers, and testers become contributors
• Skilled developers wandering through your architecture
• Self-selection of developers
• Public - your work is on display (and the criticism can be brutal)
• Meritocracy + Democracy/little management
• Crowd Power – crowd decision-making works in the context of code development
• Why developers volunteer: reputation, experience, scratch an itch/solve a problem
• Why developers are paid: shared support and maintenance makes it cost efficient
and more reliable
See Eric S Raymond, The Cathedral and the Bazaar: http://w w w.catb.org/esr/writings/cathedral-bazaar/cathedral-bazaar/

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Licensing Basics - Copyright

• Copyright attaches to every novel expression of an idea (e.g., software)

• Exclusive Right to:

• Copy
• Modify
• Distribute

• Time Limited – 50+ years

• License – grants defined rights

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Patents

• An exclusive right to an invention for a limited period of time (in

exchange for detailed disclosure of the invention).
• Must be:
• Novel
• Useful
• Non-obvious
• 20 years exclusivity (most jurisdictions)

Software patents are a very controversial issue,

especially within the open source community

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 Copyleft

Richard M Stallman

Reciprocity

Distribution = trigger

Changing the code/combining with other

code = need to provide changes/combination
to the downstream recipient

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 Open Source Licensing Overview

Copyleft Permissive

GPLv2 Mozilla Public Apache 2.0 MIT

(+ v3) BSD
(+ Affero)

Derivative Modifications Patent protection Notice

work to files only

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 License Interpretation (Re Copyleft)

• GPL uses very technical language (+ is a manifesto on software liberty

as much as a license)
• Glosses on licenses created by old message board discussions/FAQs
• E.g, Linus Torvald’s interpretaion of the GPL as it applies to Linux
• Stallman/FSF’s FAQ pages about the GPL
• What is a derivative work often becomes very technical
• Widely recognized exceptions/interpretations by the community –
shims, sockets, remote procedure calls, etc.

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 Open Source Community

• Free Software Foundation – Stallman founded

• Software Freedom Law Center – Eben Moglen
• Apache Foundation
• Linux Foundation
• gpl-violations.org
• McHardy litigations in Germany

Relationship with the community is crucial. A company’s reputation with

the community is worth billions (e.g., Google vs. Microsoft).

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 Open Source at Sony Mobile

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 The Sony Mobile Open Source journey
- a timeline on OS for mobiles
2002 2008 2009 2010 2011 2016

FirefoxOS
Own R&D
developed
Today’s R&D engagement

From 2011: Only Android (Linux )

2010: Only Open Source OS

2009: Open Source is formally adopted
Entry
2008: Open Source appears in strategy

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 Different Open Source Activities within Sony Mobile

+ Miscellaneous
+ New frontiers

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 Official Strategy

As a result: with close to 4.000 contributions over ten years,

Sony Mobile is the largest external contributor to Android.

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 Fundamental objectives for Android contributions

• Reduce Cost of Maintenance

Contributions reduce the patch mountain.

• Improve Time-To-Market
Fewer patches means faster bring ups.
Feedback from Google shows insights to roadmaps/strategic direction.

• Disrupt Competitors
By contributing, we force competitors to re-adjust their set of patches.

• Get Closer to Google

Create engineer-to-engineer relationships that can be leveraged to drive the business.
Influence Android strategy.

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 Contribution Strategy chart
High Strategic
Alliances
& Investments
Business Impact / Uniqueness

Control
Platform / focus
Leverage Strategic

TTM
focus
Cost
focus
Product /
Standard Bottleneck
Low High
Control Complexity
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 Major groupings
High
Business Impact / Uniqueness

= Contribute

Platform /
Leverage Strategic

= Keep closed, but

enablers should be
contributed.
Product /
Standard Bottleneck
Low High
Control Complexity
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 Intellectual Property Rights and Contributions
• Patent Strategy
To reduce royalty payments and to ensure that products are the most appealing.
• IPR Dept
Checks contributions for conflict with IPR goals and objectives.
• Modify
If there are patent issues, IPR Dept can often suggest alteration of a proposal to allow for
contributions. It is extremely rare a contribution proposal is fully rejected!
• Document
Track all submitted contribution proposals and their status.

Do not Self-Censor!
Try it, and if (when!) getting an approval from Open Source Board = IPR is cleared to
contribute.

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 Open Source Processes

• 2 Corporate Directives
• Intake – Open Source Software Directive
• Output – Open Source Software Contribution Directive
• Open Source Board – Decision making body for contributions of Open
Source. Maintains the Open Source Directives. Members:
• Legal
• IPR
• Open Source Operations
• Research & Incubation
• Software Dev
• Business & Partner Dev

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 OSS Intake
Open Source
Software

Governance of business decision

5. Reject / Accept
SW Engineer

Business Manager / 4. Recommendation

1. Initiate
Sourcing Officer*
OSS Evaluation

Open Source
2. Prepare
SW Operations
3. Review
Guiding principal:
In line with intake of 3rd party Legal IPR
commercial SW components
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 Classification of Contributions

Trivial contribution
A Trivial contribution is a rather small and simple change to already existing open source
software. No new functionality added. No significant improvement in performance.
• E.g., bug fixes

Medium contribution
A Medium Contribution is larger than a Trivial Contribution. It can contain both substantially
changed functionality and completely new functionality.
• E.g., new Linux device drivers (support for new hardware)

Major contribution
A Major Contribution involves substantial amounts of code, with significant Intellectual Property
value, and is the result of considerable internal development efforts.
• E.g., DRM Framework

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 Scheme on OSS Contribution
- Trivial contribution Open Source
Software

CTO / Executive
Management

Sony IPD
Open Source Board
Parental Approval

If Android
Note that Trivial contributions only requires
Business Manager’s approval!

Business Manager /
Contribution Officer

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Public
USE ONLY
 Scheme on OSS Contribution
- Medium contribution Open Source
Software

CTO / Executive
Management

Sony IPD Accepted

Open Source Board
Parental Approval
Yes Representation in the
No Open Source Board
Patent
Clause? • Legal
1. Contribution • IPR
Proposal • Open Source Operations
• Research & Incubation
Business Manager / • Software Dev
Contribution Officer 2. Approve / Reject • Business & Partner Dev

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Public
USE ONLY
 Scheme on OSS Contribution
- Major contribution Open Source
Software

CTO / Executive
2. Assess and Management
recommend

Sony IPD Accepted 3. Approve / Reject

Open Source Board
Parental Approval
Yes
Representation in the
Patent No
Open Source Board
Clause? • Legal
1. Contribution
• IPR
Proposal
• Open Source Operations
Business Manager / • Research & Incubation
Contribution Officer • Software Dev
4. Notify
• Business & Partner Dev

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Public
USE ONLY
 Conclusions

• Engineers empowered, but need to take responsibility

• Legal and Developers/Engineers need to work together

• Open Source is simple (but hard) –understand the consequences and

handle code accordingly

• Process/Administration – needed to ensure compliance/good

citizenship

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 The Future
• Even the most hardware oriented products offerings are facing
to be “servitized” by a combination of AI/ML, Big Data, Cloud
and IoT. Those technologies are entirely entrenched by
Open Source.
• Open Data & Open Hardware = Open Source Philosophy
and Development applied to New Areas

• We are already engaged in “Beyond Smartphone”

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Further reading on the use of Open Source in the industry

The management book “Scaling a

Software Business” was launched by
Springer the summer of 2017 and is
available as a free eBook at Vinnova.
• Contains two chapters on the Open
Source Scenarios.
The handbook on an Open Source
Program for Industrials, “Principles for
Industrial Open Source”, was released
this summer as a free eBooklet!
• Contains detailed descriptions on 27
identified Open Source patterns.

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 Attributions
Copyright Sony Mobile Communications AB 2018.

License:
This Presentation is provided under the terms of Creative Commons Attribution 4.0
(see https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode), except as provided below:

• The picture of Richard M. Stallman on Slide 9 is in the Public Domain. See

https://stallman.org/media.html and https://stallman.org/Portrait_-_Denmark_DTU_2007-3-31.jpg.
• The Logos on slide 5 are the Trademarks of their respective owners, none of which are Sony
Mobile Communications AB (“Sony Mobile”).
• Images on slide 8 (copyright logo), slide 10 (reverse copyright/copyleft logo), slide 17 (puzzle), slide
18 (puzzle), slide 21 (“I love Patent Portfolios”) and slide 28 (“You will be assimilated”) are not the
property of Sony Mobile (“Non-Sony Mobile Images”).

The Logos and Non-Sony Mobile Images have been used by Sony Mobile for educational purposes
only and therefore Sony Mobile Communications AB believes such use falls within the “fair use”
exception. Your use of the presentation may differ, and thus not fall within such exception.

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