An Empirical Study of Open Source Software Usability: The Industrial Perspective
This addresses usability challenges for industry users of open source software, but it is incremental as it builds on existing user-centered design concepts.
The study analyzed industry users' perceptions of usability factors like understandability and learnability in open source software, finding that these key factors significantly impact OSS usability based on data from 105 users.
Recent years have seen a sharp increase in the use of open source projects by common novice users; Open Source Software (OSS) is thus no longer a reserved arena for software developers and computer gurus. Although user-centered designs are gaining popularity in OSS, usability is still not considered as one of the prime objectives in many design scenarios. In this paper, we analyze industry users perception of usability factors, including understandability, learnability, operability and attractiveness, on OSS usability. The research model of this empirical study establishes the relationship between the key usability factors and OSS usability from industrial perspective. In order to conduct the study, a data set of 105 industry users is included. The results of the empirical investigation indicate the significance of the key factors for OSS usability.