Getting Started with Open Source Development
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Appendix A - Solutions to review questions 109<br />
5. Typical installation steps for open source software are – understanding the system<br />
configuration, compiling the source code and finally executing the installation file.<br />
Given below is the sequence of commands to accomplish these three steps in a<br />
UNIX® based system:<br />
# ./configure<br />
# make<br />
# make install<br />
The first command is executed from the location where the software package is<br />
extracted. It invokes a tiny program called configure (generally included <strong>with</strong>in the<br />
package) to detect the hardware and software specifications of the machine and<br />
create a Makefile containing the set of instructions to complete the installation<br />
process. The make command compiles the source code of the software as dictated<br />
by the Makefile. And finally make install reads the configuration specifications of<br />
the computer from the Makefile and installs the software into it. Although the first<br />
two commands can be executed by any normal user, the last one needs root<br />
access to the system.<br />
6. B. .zip is the valid format for Microsoft® Windows® packages. Whereas, .tar and<br />
.gz are specific to UNIX® platform.<br />
7. A. Unified Modeling Language (UML) is a widely accepted standard used for<br />
software design purpose. It allows a designer to describe the structure, behavior,<br />
and interactions among different sub units of the system <strong>with</strong> the help of various<br />
simple diagrams.<br />
8. C. ‘myproduct’ is the name of the software. ‘3’, ‘4’ and ‘5’ are the “major”, “minor”<br />
and “micro” components of the release number respectively.<br />
9. D. A and C. Make and Ant are two build automation software. Whereas, Apache is<br />
an open source Web server and Darcs is a decentralized version control tool.<br />
10. B. "Fixed" is not a state in the life cycle of an issue.<br />
Chapter 5<br />
1. It is ranked based on number of downloads, and community activity such as<br />
opening defects, checking in code, making feature requests, etc.<br />
2. A leader performs functions that are not too different from a company's CEO:<br />
- He is the one making tough decisions<br />
- In big projects he is in charge of coordinating many of the project subdivisions.<br />
3. In the early years of OSS, documentation was particularly important because<br />
working <strong>with</strong> OSS was not that straight forward. Only those who had the patience<br />
and skill could get this software working. Today, documentation is still very<br />
important since community members often rotate software development positions.
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