Background: While FLOSS projects espouse openness and acceptance for all, in practice, female contributors often face discriminatory barriers to contribution. Aims: In this paper, we examine the extent to which these problems still exist. We also study male and female contributors' perceptions of other contributors. Method: We surveyed participants from 15 FLOSS projects, asking a series of open-ended, closed-ended, and behavioral scale questions to gather information about the issue of gender in FLOSS projects. Results: Though many of those we surveyed expressed a positive sentiment towards females who participate in FLOSS projects, some were still strongly against their inclusion. Often, the respondents who were against inclusiveness also believed their own sentiments were the prevailing belief in the community, contrary to our findings. Others did not see the purpose of attempting to be inclusive, expressing the sentiment that a discussion of gender has no place in FLOSS. Conclusions: FLOSS projects have started to move forwards in terms of gender acceptance. However, there is still a need for more progress in the inclusion of gender-diverse contributors.

Context: Free/Libre Open Source Software (FLOSS) communities consist of different types of contributors. Core contributors and peripheral contributors work together to create a successful project, each playing a different role. One-Time Contributors (OTCs), who are on the very fringe of the peripheral developers, are largely unstudied despite offering unique insights into the development process. In a prior survey, we identified OTCs and discovered their motivations and barriers. Aims: The objective of this study is to corroborate the survey results and provide a better understand of OTCs. We compare OTCs to other peripheral and core contributors to determine whether they are distinct. Method: We mined data from the same code-review repository used to identify survey respondents in our previous study. After identifying each contributor as core, periphery, or OTC, we compared them in terms of patch size, time interval from submission to decision, the nature of their conversations, and patch acceptance rates. Results: We identified a continuum between core developers and OTCs. OTCs create smaller patches, face longer time intervals between patch submission and rejection, have longer review conversations, and face lower patch acceptance rates. Conversely, core contributors create larger patches, face shorter time intervals for feedback, have shorter review conversations, and have patches accepted at the highest rate. The peripheral developers fall in between the OTCs and the core contributors. Conclusion: OTCs do, in fact, face the barriers identified in our prior survey. They represent a distinct group of contributors compared to core and peripheral developers.

Successful Free/Libre Open Source Software (FLOSS) projects must attract and retain high-quality talent. Researchers have invested considerable effort in the study of core and peripheral FLOSS developers. To this point, one critical subset of developers that have not been studied are One-Time code Contributors (OTC) - those that have had exactly one patch accepted. To understand why OTCs have not contributed another patch and provide guidance to FLOSS projects on retaining OTCs, this study seeks to understand the impressions, motivations, and barriers experienced by OTCs. We conducted an online survey of OTCs from 23 popular FLOSS projects. Based on the 184 responses received, we observed that OTCs generally have positive impressions of their FLOSS project and are driven by a variety of motivations. Most OTCs primarily made contributions to fix bugs that impeded their work and did not plan on becoming long term contributors. Furthermore, OTCs encounter a number of barriers that prevent them from continuing to contribute to the project. Based on our findings, there are some concrete actions FLOSS projects can take to increase the chances of converting OTCs into long-term contributors.