Onyct

Planning Considerations

Some points to be considered before starting a substantial open-source project:

Target framework (.NET Framework 1.0, 1.1, 2.0, 3.0, Mono, DotGnu) - the choice determines who would be interested in the application and which communities might adopt it. Choosing a framework like Mono gives us the Unix and Mac communities puts us behind the times technology speaking;
License (GPL, LGPL, Mozilla, BSD, etc.) - restricts who can use it and how, will also cause endless debates amongst license nerds;
Name - can make a difference;
Release plan - a plan of major and minor releases with clearly defined deadlines;
Tools - NAnt, NUnut, NDoc, ... what else?
Libraries - log4net, Microsoft-style .config files - or do our own;
Coding standards - have to have some kind of standards or everything will go pear-shaped;
Hosting for code and website (FAQs, wiki, mailing list, source code control, bug tracking, etc.) - SourceForge?
Internationalisation - must be designed to permit internationalised resources (where necessary);
Code and documentation internationalisation - XML comments can be "imported" from language-specific files allow international documentation to be generated (although unless there are tools this is obviously going to be a pain in the @rse).
Language - should identifiers, documentation and comments be in British, US or international English (I know which I prefer)?
Which technologies should be supported (MySQL, PostgreSQL, WinFX, Apache, ...);
Build process - how "complete" the build process should be;
Scope - related to the release plan: what features we intend to implement and when;
Management structure - Apache-style management by committee or Linux-style benevolent dictator?
Architecture - obviously a fundamental part of any project, but a policy needs to be agreed up-front so that decisions can be made semi-independently without conflict;
Patterns - common "patterns" and design features should be agreed and documented as required;
Release process - alpha, beta, gamma and all that; when does status change, who decides and what do we call it?
Document formats - OpenOffice, Word, PDF, HTML, Text, RTF, choices, choices;
As well as a name, logos, colour schemes and so on seem to be quite popular;

Resources

Tools

Planning Considerations

Further Reading:

Complete list of Open Source licenses:

Some example roadmaps:

Project management:

Contact

Copyright