Problem
Research questions and friction points this paper is trying to address.
satellite software
open-source
ecosystem
development practices
systematic understanding
Characterizing the Landscape of Open-Source Satellite Software
🤖 AI Summary
研究通过分析22,286个GitHub卫星项目，系统地描绘了开源卫星软件的生态系统和发展实践，解决了对卫星软件缺乏全面理解的问题。
📝 Abstract
Satellites have become fundamental components of modern technological systems, supporting critical infrastructure in communication, navigation, Earth observation, and scientific research. As space exploration advances and demand for satellite-enabled services grows, reliance on complex, heterogeneous satellite software continues to increase. A systematic understanding of the satellite software landscape is therefore increasingly important, yet existing studies still lack a comprehensive empirical examination. To address this gap, we present the first characterization study of open-source satellite software, examining its ecosystem and development practices. We mine and analyze 22,286 satellite-related GitHub projects through three research questions on popularity trends (RQ1), software goals (RQ2), and development practices (RQ3). First, we characterize the temporal evolution of projects and active developers, revealing increasing popularity. Second, through manual inspection of 646 projects, we construct a taxonomy of 43 software-goal categories spanning conceptual design, datasets, system implementation, simulation, testing, and tools. Third, we conduct an in-depth analysis of projects with source code, revealing a highly heterogeneous and task-specialized ecosystem with 66 programming languages and diverse implementation strategies. Finally, we summarize key findings and derive actionable implications for satellite developers and researchers.
Innovation
Methods, ideas, or system contributions that make the work stand out.
Open-Source Satellite Software
Taxonomy of Software Goals
Heterogeneous Ecosystem
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