Devops for Growth

We define InnerSource as:

The use of open source principles and practices for software development within the confines of an organization.

InnerSource takes the lessons learned from developing open source software and applies them to the way companies develop software internally. As developers have become accustomed to working on world-class open source software, there is a strong desire to bring those practices back inside the firewall and apply them to software that companies may be reluctant to release.

For companies building mostly closed source software, InnerSource can be a great tool to help break down silos, encourage and scale internal collaboration, accelerate new engineer on-boarding, and identify opportunities to contribute software back to the open source world.

Patterns are a way of describing a repeatable, proven solution to a problem within a context. Patterns follow a simple form that assists you during the implementation of a solution to understand the constraints of the problem, understand the forces you need to balance, and the resulting context - the situation created by applying the solution.

Patterns can provide a way for the InnerSource Commons participants to concisely share information, improving the practice of InnerSource. Patterns are divided into Title, Problem Statement, Context, Forces, and Solutions as their main sections.

• ​What are patterns? Youtube videos - Watch a set of 2-5 min youtube videos explaining InnerSource Patterns

• ​Pattern Discussion Webinar - We held a webinar 2017-03-16 to live-discuss a donut pattern (go to 24:30 for the discussion). This is an illustration of the review process we follow. Also see the June 1, 2017 O'Reilly Webinar on InnerSource Patterns.

• ​Pattern Template - View a skeleton inner source pattern to get an idea on what goes into a new pattern!

• ​Introduction to InnerSource Patterns (2016 Fall Summit presentation) - Tim Yao and Padma Sudarsan (PDF). Detailed pattern background and examples -- Get a detailed understanding of why and how to interact with our patterns. Also see the Introduction to InnerSource Patterns (2017 Fall Summit) Tim Yao and Bob Hanmer (PDF).