Login (DCU Staff Only)
Login (DCU Staff Only)

DORAS | DCU Research Repository

Explore open access research and scholarly works from DCU

Advanced Search

Crowded house: an analysis of how the virtual learning environment Moodle is built via bug tracker participants

Costello, Eamon orcid logoORCID: 0000-0002-2775-6006, Johnston, Keith and Wade, Vincent (2019) Crowded house: an analysis of how the virtual learning environment Moodle is built via bug tracker participants. Interactive Learning Environments, 31 (5). pp. 2583-2593. ISSN 1049-4820

Abstract
This research investigated how the bug tracker database of the Virtual Learning Environment (VLE) Moodle is developed as an application of crowd work. The bug tracker is used by software developers, who write and maintain Moodle’s code, but also by a wider public world of ordinary Moodle users who can report bugs. Despite many studies of the phenomenon of open source bug fixing and software building, much remains to be answered. Specifically, we sought to analyse the implications of this massively distributed collaborative development process for education and educational technology. The research examined the ways educators interface and contribute to the development of the VLE Moodle at the granular level of bug fixing as an example of a global crowdsourced activity. In this study, twenty community participants were interviewed, from fringe members, to key actors, including lead developers from the Open University, Moodle HQ and Moodle founder Martin Dougiamas. We uncovered rich stories of practices of community members. We found that projects are complex interplays of many actors assuming different roles and identities, and that brokers, or “kindly souls”, play a key role in activities such as filing reports on behalf of others, or inducting new members.
Metadata
Item Type:Article (Published)
Refereed:Yes
Uncontrolled Keywords:Crowdsourcing; open source; Virtual Learning Environment; Moodle
Subjects:UNSPECIFIED
DCU Faculties and Centres:Research Institutes and Centres > NIDL (National Institute for Digital Learning)
Publisher:Taylor & Francis
Official URL:http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/10494820.2019.1678488
Copyright Information:© 2019 The Authors.
ID Code:23912
Deposited On:06 Nov 2019 16:46 by Thomas Murtagh . Last Modified 14 Aug 2023 11:39
Documents

Full text available as:

[thumbnail of Crowded house an analysis of how the Virtual Learning Environment Moodle is built via bug tracker participants.pdf]
Preview
PDF - Requires a PDF viewer such as GSview, Xpdf or Adobe Acrobat Reader
Creative Commons: Attribution 4.0
1MB
Metrics

Altmetric Badge

Dimensions Badge

Downloads

Downloads

Downloads per month over past year

Archive Staff Only: edit this record