Our scope of services
Free and Open-Source Software (FOSS) has become a driver of innovation 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 use of FOSS. In collaboration with industry and research, collaborative solutions are created for the implementation of digital ecosystems. The sovereign exchange of data within these is particularly emphasized and supported by collaborative work and open and transparent development. This guarantees trust at both the human and technical levels. But FOSS also brings significant risks and multiple challenges. An open source position cannot be revoked and requires careful planning and concrete design of the open-source strategy. These include organizational aspects such as licenses and the organization of developer communities and the selection of a suitable business model, as well as technical details and the use of platforms such as GitHub
Picture: OpenSource - ©Skórzewiak - AdobeStock
The range of services offered by Fraunhofer ISST includes both consulting on strategic development and support for practical implementation, as well as the expansion and maintenance of international FOSS projects in particular, with the help of innovative and established tools and methods.
Development of FOSS
- Establishment and maintenance of FOSS projects
- 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.