1

When writing open-source software, should the author(s) cite the sources they get help from?

This might make sense if an author forgets how to implement a basic data structure and winds up fetching the solution from the internet, but what if an author simply forgets the signature of a common function call?

Suppose IntelliSense isn't working and an author must look up the C# TotalMinutes function on Microsoft Docs or the Java FileReader object in Oracle Docs. Does the author need to cite usage in those cases? On one hand, I suppose if the author copies example code from online documentation pages, a citation would be needed. On the other, if only specifications are referenced from Microsoft, Oracle or Amazon Web Services documentation, a citation would be superfluous even though such specifications were used as a reference.

EDIT NOTE: Please pardon the massive edits. Many members of the community have encouraged me to narrow the scope of this question. Some comments may temporarily seem odd or out place while the fate and scope of this question is determined.

Improve this question
11
  • 1
    I don't know what anything means in the last paragraph, but who told you each file of an open-source program is an academic paper?
    – Azor Ahai -him-
    Oct 4, 2022 at 17:13
  • And this would seem to vary based on if you are implementing code to do science or if the point of the science is the code.
    – Azor Ahai -him-
    Oct 4, 2022 at 17:13
  • 2
    Please clarify your specific problem or provide additional details to highlight exactly what you need. As it's currently written, it's hard to tell exactly what you're asking.
    – Community Bot
    Oct 4, 2022 at 18:04
  • 2
    @ShawnEary Personally, I don't think what you described in your most recent comment is an academic activity, hence why I am pushing back on your question a little and trying to get you to narrow it down. If your goal is to publish an open source program, you might find better answers on what is necessary to reference on a different stack, compared to this one. For example, none of the things you mentioned would seem even remotely necessary to be referenced in an academic work describing a tool you are making available to the academic community. Is that what you are doing?
    – Azor Ahai -him-
    Oct 4, 2022 at 20:05
  • 2
    You don't need to attribute official documentation in your source code. That is done implicitly by using the framework (but using a framework could have requirements according to its license). You would need to include attribution if you derive (non-trivial) code, e.g., from an answer at Stack Overflow.
    – Roland
    Oct 5, 2022 at 6:17

1 Answer 1

Reset to default
1

You should. You are using an intellectual property of other(s) for your software. That is basic integrity.

People I know who wrote statistical packages for different programming languages also acknowledged the authors of books, papers and official documents, which they used for producing the code, in the documentation of the packages.

Improve this answer
1
  • 1
    There is a difference between giving references (as described in your second paragraph) and giving attribution according to a software license (as described in your first paragraph).
    – Roland
    Oct 5, 2022 at 6:20

You must log in to answer this question.

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged .