Measuring Software Popularity [closed] - open-source

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Does anyone have any ideas on measuring the popularity of an open source project? I thought it would be interesting to create a tools which would compare the popularity of similar open source projects.
The first metric that came to mind was to compare the number of Google results for each specific software, but it seems difficult to programmatically obtain this number (other than scraping it from the direct search page - this also runs into legal issues with Google I believe).
Any other metric ideas? I'd like the end product to be a tool, so metrics which are able to be accessed through code would be preferred.
Thanks,
Chris

If the projects are hosted by platforms like Sourceforge or Github, you can access the number of downloads...

SourceForge offer download statistics;
http://sourceforge.net/project/stats/detail.php?group_id=263007&ugn=dvwa&mode=week&type=prdownload
Google Code have activity ratings.
Maybe you could use those?

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Application notice software [closed]

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What is the name where the application shows messages of any updates available whenever the update is available?
Is it called web service?
For example, I have installed an antivirus (avast); sometimes a small popup message shows that an update is available.
I have very vague idea about it, it must be contacting the server periodically for checking the new updates are available or not.
I do not know what the application name is so I was not able to search.
It's called an auto-update software feature. It's part of the software itself usually - If you'd like to look at some API's regarding implementing them into your application, find out more here. WinSparkle is also something you could look into if your doing Windows development.
Those are vendor dependant solutions. It is usually not a separate software checking for updates. All they do is query a web service that replies with the 'current' version. At least as long as talking about MS-Windows. More elegant and efficient solutions exist in the Linux environment.

What are some good-practices to get an open-source project to have contributors? [closed]

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I am involved in a project which is meant to eventually become open-source and have a code contributor community. Is there any "right" way of doing this and what should/can I expect?
Thanks
There's a pretty good book on this topic, Producing Open Source Software by Karl Fogel, which is available for free online or in dead tree form if you prefer to read it that way. It would be hard to expand much on it in a single answer. Every project will, of course, be different, so I'd recommend reading that book, and then asking more specific questions about your particular project; answers will depend on the language and platform you use, how active an open source community there already is in your area, what your business model is, and many other factors.
I would recommand using Github or Google Project Hosting (subversion/mercurial), and of course use social media network to promote the project helps too.
You can start something like this - http://wxwidgets.org/develop/

How do You Come Up With New Ideas for Open Source project? [closed]

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You can see lots of briliant ideas in Open source projects. How authors found these ideas whey they don't exist yet?
Should I learn software dynamics, history and trends(Nothing new under the sun?) for that?
I don't want to start another github project called "API to xyz". What should I do??
Scratch an itch. Find something that you feel is a problem or annoying and write some code to solve that problem. Chances are you aren't the only person who is affected by that particular problem.
I believe a lot of software projects, open source or not, start as someone identifying a demand and working to supply it.
Think you're not satisfied with wherever photo management apps you found. Starting (or forking an existing one) with your needs in mind is an option.
What kind of software you would like to use but can find one that suits you? If yours needs are more or less supplied by already existing applications, why not working on improving one you like most?

What criteria do you use to quickly determine if a github project is finished/useable? [closed]

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When I browse github I have a hard time differentiating high quality code from half-finished crap without taking a serious look at the code. What are some good ways to quickly size up a project? Rubyforge allows people to designate a "Development Status". SourceForge has a "recommend" feature. Is there some feature that I've overlooked? I just look at the number of forks and watchers. Is there a better way? I don't see a checkout count, or any other measure of popularity.
I would check for documentation. Well advanced code should have associated documentation, while fledgling projects are too busy getting their code and architecture done to create documentation, which will probably have to change by the time they release anyway. Basically, writing documentation says to me that you think the code is stable and functional enough for users to be able to benefit from it.
Recent activity is a big one. If the project does not have recent developer commits or there are open bugs, tickets, issues, questions, etc without developer responses then move on.

Piwik Web Analytics - Anyone with experience of it? [closed]

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I'm considering trying to get more granular analytics for my sites than the free plan on my current provider, Clicky, provides.
Piwik looks like a strong contender in the analytics space (and I'm surprised I haven't heard about it before) but I want to be sure I'm not throwing the baby out with the bathwater by swapping to it.
Does anyone have any experience with this software and - in particular - are there any people out there who've tried customising the code or developing their own plugin?
To add to ghommey's response: we're also using Piwik right now and it fits the bill for our purposes. Separating IP ranges isn't really a concern for us as we use separate development and deployment servers.
As for customizing it, I've written a couple of Piwik plugins, one of which served to enable SSO for our (non-PHP) project. Writing the code itself has been relatively straightforward; however their authentication cookies violate the HTTP cookie RFCs (RFC2109 and RFC2068) in that they use illegal characters so there might be also other dragons in places.
AS of the latest release (q1 2010) filtering IPs is possible.