Open Source is disruptive tech for developers

Chandika Mendis, vice president and head of Global Technology Office, Virtusa in conversation with Abhigna from CIOL, speaks about the current relevance of open source technology for developers and virtusa's role in this domain

CIOL: Can you throw light on what Virtusa is doing in open source domain?

Chandika Mendis: Virtusa has been a pioneer in the development and use of free and open source software (FOSS). Our company is a strong contributor to the open source movement and has been utilizing Open Source widely to provide our clients with more optimal solutions.

We have a proven track record in contributing to the Open Source R&D, including significant contributions to projects such as Apache Web Services, OpenBRR, the Sahana Disaster Management project and OLPC. Our support to Sahana and OLPC projects has been part of our sustainability initiatives, which focus on making an impact in humanitarian and educational areas thereby helping to create a more digitally-inclusive society.

With our growing need for cost-effective software to support client services, we have launched and implemented innovative projects that offer distinct advantages. For example, we built a custom software configuration management solution, Keystone, leveraging open source software that helps us to track projects across various parameters including issue tracking, source code management, document management and global collaboration. We were able to save significant costs on licensing fee and acquisition costs, by adopting Keystone.

However, as a services company we are technology neutral and provide our clients with the right solution to meet their business needs.

CIOL: Many organizations are looking at Open Source software as the answer during tough times. What's your view on this?

CM: During difficult times, like the current economic downturn, open source systems are increasingly being adopted due to their significant cost advantages. Additionally open source software has moved up the value stack and has matured into horizontal enterprise grade solutions in segments such as Enterprise Content Management (ECM), Business Intelligence (BI), Business Process Management (BPM) and Customer relationship Management (CRM).

In these segments, Virtusa offers clients with open source alternatives. However, we encourage the client to do due diligence on assessing the maturity of open source software for their asset base. There are different maturity levels across open source and proprietary technologies, with respect to Intellectual Property Management, Quality of Code, Security, Support bases and Community strength. Open source projects can range from the massive multi-agency projects like Linux that get all the Open Source development benefits, to the lone unknown developer project which you really cannot be sure about.

Virtusa has been using open source maturity models and auditing the intellectual property for making a proper assessment of the software that is compatible with our client policies. Being one of the early contributors of assessments to OpenBRR (Open Source Business Readiness Rating), we are aware of the client IT maturity needs for a open source implementation to be successful.

CIOL: How open source helps software developer community during recession?

CM: Open Source can be considered as a disruptive technology, when compared with proprietary alternatives, and as a trend adoption will certainly continue to increase. For the developer community this means that more source code as well as frameworks, that accelerate their development life-cycle, will be publicly available for them to use. This will enable them to provide solutions without the traditional encumbrances of obtaining some of the proprietary SDKs.

CIOL: What kind of opportunities do you find in adopting open source software as against proprietary software?

CM: We have been using Open Source within our enterprise as well. One of the benefits to a technology services company like ours who has adopted usage of open source software is that such companies have the flexibility and the in-house skills to modify and tailor the code, to suite their specific environments. You must not necessarily assume open source as free, as you may still need to go for support agreements with the relevant companies for production assurance. 

We take this view to our customers as well, and have forged partnerships with premier open source companies to provide the necessary support options.  The real advantage with open source is that you don’t have to make such a commitment until you are convinced about the effectiveness of your overall solution and are ready to move into production. With proprietary software, you will find yourself making financial commitments even before you know the feasibility of your overall solution.

CIOL: What are the advantages you see in open source?

CM: Another advantage with open source, especially if you master the contribution aspect, is the control you have with the destiny of the road map of the software and the ability to do enhancements and defect fixes.. The core technical quality of the established open source software tends to be very high due to the nature of the developers who contribute as well as the openness of the process.

CIOL: What do you think is missing in the open source community as a whole?

CM: I think the open source community needs to be better organized in the quality of support. We often have to mediate and fix some of the bugs at Virtusa to ensure the right quality is delivered to the client as per their expectations.

You might also find that some of the usability or documentation aspects lacking in some open source software compared to the proprietary ones – even though they tend to have a strong technical core.  You need to be aware of these caveats on a case-by-case basis as they cannot be generalized. Still with prior experience, right partnerships and training, these can be easily overcome.

CIOL: Where do you see Indian companies adopting open source in coming days?

CM: Economic downturn, reduced budgets and focus on delivering more with lesser investments, are driving companies across the globe to look for alternative technologies including open source. Indian businesses with their integration into the global economy are not immune to the above challenges. The use of open source technology has been there for some time, but economic conditions are compelling businesses to speed up their investments in open source. For example, many companies in the financial sector use open source technologies as a core part of their operations.

The demand for free, open source systems is growing and we believe open source adoption will gain momentum across businesses, governments and other organizations in the future.

CIOL: If you look into future five years. Where do you see Virtusa going with open source?

CM: Virtusa has a strong commitment to open source and believe that open source will play an important role in the lean-IT enterprise of the future. We are already seeing some of our most mature customers taking this route and are helping others to get there.

Our internal strategies are firmly aligned to the increased use of open source in the future.  For example, we have a strong focus on certification and adoption of stringent assurance processes and tools around intellectual property compliance. We also have an internal strategy that promotes open source contributions by Virtusans. We have built and continue to build strong partnerships with open source providers.

All of these initiatives have put us in a strong position to take advantage of an explosive growth of open source usage in the future. Our technology-agnostic focus around key practice areas such as Enterprise Content Management, Business Process Management, Data Warehousing and Business Intelligence among others puts us in a unique position to be objective on our recommendations to our customers.