Our scope of services
Free and Open-Source Software (FOSS) has established itself as an innovation driver in the digital economy. FOSS has long been more than just free: Transparency and openness are driving its proliferation, especially for use in dynamic and sovereign data spaces. Companies benefit from FOSS not only as users, but also by making it available and building communities.
At Fraunhofer ISST, digital innovations are realized, among other things, through the development and deployment of FOSS. In cooperation with industry and research, collaborative solutions are created for the implementation of digital ecosystems. FOSS enables the joint development of technologies for sovereign data exchange and makes the development process and source code transparently visible. This transparency and openness combined with a FOSS license not only increases trust in the technologies, but also enables adaptability and flexibility as needed. But FOSS also brings significant risks and multiple challenges. An open source position cannot be revoked and requires careful planning and concrete design along with an open source strategy. The open-source strategy guides the selection of technologies and projects, the sustainable development of open-source communities and includes a suitable open-source business model. This is accompanied by legal aspects and the technical implementation, such as the use of platforms like GitHub and suitable tools.
Picture: OpenSource - ©Skórzewiak - AdobeStock
The range of services offered by Fraunhofer ISST includes consulting on strategic development as well as support for practical implementation and the expansion and maintenance of international FOSS projects in particular with the help of innovative and established tools and methods.
Development of FOSS
- Eclipse Dataspace Components (software library for building sovereign dataspaces), contains among others the Connector component and trust-building technologies, as well as an implementation of the IDS1 Dataspace protocol.
- Support of the practical implementation with suitable tools and methods for collaborative software development
- Collection and preparation of best practices and tools
- Targeted development of open-source communities
- Focus on an international multi-stakeholder environment
Strategic use of FOSS
- Analysis on the strategic use of FOSS to achieve specific business objectives
- Design and risk analysis of FOSS activities
Use of FOSS
- Working with FOSS source code
- Selection, deployment and evaluation of usage licenses
Available software/applications
- Eclipse Dataspace Connector (Sovereign Cloud Data Connector)
- Dataspace Connector (Open Source IDS Connector reference implementation)
- IDS Messaging Services (Java library for simplified IDS Connector development)
- DIVA (Data Inventory and Valuation Approach)
- Nucleus (Java framework for modeling domain models)
Industries
Free and open-source software contributes to solving demanding challenges in various industries. Whether in the domains of energy, logistics or mobility, FOSS projects offer new opportunities for the release and reputation of existing and established products and the collaborative development of innovative and complex software solutions, especially in the area of sovereign data ecosystems.