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How can I show that a given open-source project does not exist yet? (feddit.org)

submitted 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) by [email protected] to c/ask_experienced_devs

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I work in research (uni) and am writing a framework for heat processes to optimize their costs. This goes both for private houses and industrial processes. The goal is to enable industry players to see that/when renewable energies and heat reuse with heat pumps are cheaper than fossil fuels. I do this using digital twins for components and on a system level.

My boss hesitates because he thinks this must already exist. I want to pursue that path with my research, so any insights there are welcome, too, but this is primarily about the open-source project.

I searched GitHub and came up empty, but that is only a subset of the search. Do you have any idea how I can find this, one way or another? It would also be great if I could show that it likely does not exist.

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[–] [email protected] 5 points 2 months ago (1 children)

It's not clear from your comment if your research is in theory about heat pump vs renewable or applied and practical applications of it. If it's the first you should have plenty of research papers to know who did what and if they shared source code, but if so it shouldn't matter since the main contribution is the theory and the knowledge created.

If you're studying and researching computer science, it's a totally different conversation and your focus is somewhere else. Maybe proving you can write a decent sized computer program, I assume. If so, there's no relevancy whether someone solved this problem before and whether it's commercially sold or open source.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 2 months ago (1 children)

My research is in energy informatics, so it could be related to algorithms to manage energy more efficiently. I know how to do literature reviews, which is relevant to the research part of my post. This open-source framework I am looking for is more like a means to achieve my goal. With it, I would focus on a less broad, highly specialized topic. For now, the framework would be a contribution to a digital-twin working group meeting, and of course, we would not want to reproduce something that exists already.

I do admit that I like to do good things for the climate (of Earth), and I am convinced that such a framework could help industries worldwide to decarbonize better and earlier.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 2 months ago (1 children)

The way I'd summarize is that you want to give something back to the world/your working group, and since you're fond of programming you're proposing writing a tool.

I like the idea, I think it has merits but I can't judge since I'm not qualified in your field. I'd just say, if you're a specialist there's a very big chance someone did an open source very similar to yours but not exactly and it's likely you're not going to find it because it was short lived.

I'd also say that writing software is the modern version of"write a book" in the adage "plant a tree, write a book". It's your unique way of expressing your ideas in a very specialized, niche, knowledge space, and sharing with other people less specialized in the area you are an expert. So there's merits in itself.

Re your boss's goals and expectations, no idea, but if you don't have his support it means it's a personal project, not a work/academic one.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 2 months ago (1 children)

That was wonderfully clear, insightful and timely. Thank you. I would like to meet you.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 2 months ago

I'm shy, I can take asynchronous chat though.