SECO-TransDX: Transparency in Software Ecosystems

• SECO-TransDX is a conceptual model that defines transparency as a developer-centered attribute mediating ecosystem procedures and overall experience.
• It employs UML-like diagrams, clear propositions, and a glossary to operationalize transparency across technical, social, and governance layers.
• Developed through Design Science Research and Delphi studies, the model offers actionable insights to enhance developer onboarding, trust, and long-term participation.

Searching arXiv for the exact topic and directly related SECO/DX papers. arXiv search query: "SECO-TransDX transparency software ecosystems developer experience" SECO-TransDX is a conceptual model for Transparency in Software Ecosystems from a Developer Experience Perspective. It frames transparency as a developer-centered, crosscutting property of software ecosystems (SECOs), and models how transparency conditions the quality of ecosystem procedures, which in turn shapes developer experience (DX) during contribution activities (Zacarias et al., 4 Sep 2025). The model is explicitly scoped to software ecosystems supported by a common technological platform and involving actors such as keystones, third-party developers, end-users, and other roles. It was built as a static, structural model with UML-like class diagrams, propositions, and a glossary of constructs, and it integrates earlier work on DX factors in SECOs, notably the 27-factor taxonomy derived from a systematic mapping study and Delphi study on third-party developers (Zacarias et al., 4 Sep 2025, Zacarias et al., 24 Jun 2025).

1. Conceptual foundations

SECO-TransDX is grounded in two linked concepts: developer experience and transparency. In the model’s theoretical basis, DX is treated as a multidimensional construct of how developers think, feel, and value their work, following the cognitive, affective, and conative framing associated with Fagerholm and Münch and later operationalized by Greiler et al. In software ecosystems, DX is manifested in developers’ perceptions of platform resources, practices, community interactions, motivations, and expectations for sustained participation (Zacarias et al., 4 Sep 2025).

Transparency is treated as a non-functional requirement that provides openness, clarity, and visibility of information, processes, and actions of software applications and platform operations. Within software ecosystems, the model emphasizes transparency as experienced in day-to-day developer interaction with portals, documentation, SDKs, repositories, governance disclosures, communication channels, and traceability of platform evolution. A central premise is that transparency is not automatic in digital settings; it must be deliberately designed and maintained (Zacarias et al., 4 Sep 2025).

The model’s motivation is the claim that transparency conditions trust, fairness, openness, and engagement, while the relation between transparency and DX in SECOs had remained underexplored. In this account, lack of transparency raises barriers to entry, generates misalignment and distrust, discourages participation, and threatens ecosystem sustainability. Conversely, transparent practices support predictable collaboration, learning, attraction of developers, and long-term retention (Zacarias et al., 4 Sep 2025).

SECO-TransDX therefore treats transparency as a mediator across three layers. At the technical layer, it concerns findability and accessibility of artifacts, usability of portal interfaces, auditability of processes, and visibility of project evolution. At the social layer, it concerns communication channels, community support, recognition, and knowledge sharing. At the organizational and governance layer, it concerns clarity of decision-making, requirements flow, data practices, moderation, and fairness (Zacarias et al., 4 Sep 2025).

2. Model structure and concept groups

SECO-TransDX is a static, structural conceptual model expressed through class-diagram-like elements, explicit propositions, and a glossary. Its final version comprises 63 concepts and is intended to apply to proprietary, open-source, and hybrid software ecosystems (Zacarias et al., 4 Sep 2025).

The model organizes its concepts into several interrelated groups.

Concept group	Role in the model	Examples explicitly named
SECO entities and roles	Core actors and ecosystem structure	Actor, third-party developer, keystone, hub, niche player, end-user, common technological platform, product
Information and boundary resources	Media through which developers perceive the ecosystem	Software ecosystem portal, alternative information channels, SECO information
Platform products	Technical artifacts and tools exchanged through the ecosystem	Source code, documentation, API specifications, platform requirements, architecture blueprints, SDKs, repositories
Transparency conditions and procedures	Mechanisms through which transparency is enacted and assessed	Conditioning factors CF1–CF8, common procedures P1–P7
DX and outcomes	Developer-facing effects and ecosystem-level consequences	DX factor categories, contribution activities, success factors BT1–BT5

The software ecosystem portal occupies a central position. It is modeled as the primary web interface for exchanging information and products of the common technological platform, while alternative information channels include forums, blogs, external tutorials, and videos. The platform’s products are divided into artifacts such as source code, documentation, API specifications, requirements, and architecture blueprints, and tools such as SDKs, repositories, and build or distribution tools (Zacarias et al., 4 Sep 2025).

Transparency itself is operationalized through conditioning factors, described as necessary but not sufficient conditions for achieving transparency in practice. SECO-TransDX names eight such factors: existence of communication channels between actors and keystone; accessible information about the platform; actors’ understanding of SECO information; quality of platform information provided by the keystone; usability of interfaces with platform documentation and portals; auditability of platform processes and information; visualization of project evolution in the ecosystem; and reliability of information provided by the keystone (Zacarias et al., 4 Sep 2025).

The model also formalizes common SECO procedures: access to documentation, source code, and tools; contribution to software repositories; communication between actors and keystone; governance actions; requirements flow; data collection, processing, and sharing practices; and access to ecosystem architecture information. These procedures are the immediate operational locus through which transparency affects DX (Zacarias et al., 4 Sep 2025).

3. Operational logic and propositions

SECO-TransDX is organized around eight propositions, labeled P1–P8, that define how transparency, procedures, and DX are linked (Zacarias et al., 4 Sep 2025).

P1 states that portals enable the exchange of information and products of the common technological platform, with variations by SECO type. This positions the portal not merely as a repository but as a socio-technical mediation point.

P2 states that third-party developers and other roles develop or consume products for end-users, while keystones control platform evolution. This ties ecosystem roles to the production and governance of extensions and services.

P3 states that contributions are supported by SECO information coming from portals or alternative channels and anchored in common procedures. Contribution therefore depends on both content access and process intelligibility.

P4 states that transparency is a non-functional requirement promoted through conditioning factors and that it enables access to, and learning about, platform processes and information. This is the model’s core definitional claim.

P5 states that transparency drives success factors such as attraction of more developers, harmonious development with peers, support for developer learning of ecosystem mechanisms and market, developer retention, and control over project information. These outcomes are explicitly connected to ecosystem sustainability (Zacarias et al., 4 Sep 2025).

P6 states that transparency can be analyzed from information, process, and software perspectives to assess impacts on procedure quality. The information perspective concerns openness, reliability, findability, and completeness; the process perspective concerns traceability and clarity of governance, requirements, and data handling; the software perspective concerns architectural decisions, interfaces, audit hooks, and telemetry on evolution (Zacarias et al., 4 Sep 2025).

P7 imports the prior four-part categorization of DX factors in SECOs: Common Technological Platform, Projects and Applications, Community Interaction, and Expectations and Value of Contribution. This categorization descends from a prior study that identified 27 DX factors via a systematic mapping study and Delphi evaluation (Zacarias et al., 4 Sep 2025, Zacarias et al., 24 Jun 2025).

P8 states the model’s principal mechanism: transparency affects the quality of common procedures, and procedure quality in turn influences DX factors during developers’ contributions. This makes procedure quality the direct mediating variable between transparency conditions and developer experience (Zacarias et al., 4 Sep 2025).

A notable feature of the model is that these propositions are directional and explanatory, not formal causal equations. Feedback loops are therefore implicit rather than mathematically specified. Improved transparency increases attraction and retention; increased participation can then motivate further investment in governance disclosure, portal quality, and documentation, reinforcing transparency and DX. This suggests a recursive ecosystem dynamic, even though the model itself is static (Zacarias et al., 4 Sep 2025).

4. Construction and validation

SECO-TransDX was developed through Design Science Research and explicitly follows theory-building steps associated with defining constructs, defining propositions, providing explanations, and determining scope. Its inputs combine three sources: prior work on transparency in SECOs, prior work on DX factors in SECOs, and the SECO meta-model used for vocabulary and structural alignment (Zacarias et al., 4 Sep 2025).

A key antecedent is the earlier DX study that analyzed 29 primary studies and then ran a Delphi study with 21 third-party developers to evaluate 27 DX factors influencing adoption and continued contribution in software ecosystems. That work ranked financial costs, desired technical resources, low barriers to entry into the applications market, and more financial gains as the strongest factors, and it provided the four DX factor categories later reused by SECO-TransDX (Zacarias et al., 24 Jun 2025).

The evaluation of SECO-TransDX itself used a two-round Delphi study with 30 experts from academia, industry, and independent practice. The expert panel included diverse academic qualifications and sectoral backgrounds. The questionnaire covered the eight propositions on a 5-point Likert scale and five model-quality criteria—ambiguity, explanatory power, parsimony, generality, and utility—on a 3-point Likert scale. Consensus thresholds were predefined as $IQR \le 1$ and $SD \le 1.5$, with agreement treated as more than 51% of responses at 4 or 5 on the 5-point scale (Zacarias et al., 4 Sep 2025).

In Round 1, propositions P1–P8 achieved high agreement, with medians at least 4, modes of 5, and $IQR = 1$ across all items. Consensus was achieved on all propositions. For the overall criteria, medians and modes were 5, with consensus already achieved for explanatory power, parsimony, and utility, though not yet for ambiguity and generality (Zacarias et al., 4 Sep 2025).

In Round 2, consensus was again achieved for propositions P1–P8, with medians of 5.0 except P3 at 4.0, modes of 5, $IQR$ between 0 and 1, and $SD$ between 0.63 and 0.94. The overall criteria also reached consensus, with medians and modes of 5, $IQR = 0$, and agreement of 80% for ambiguity and 93.3% for explanatory power, parsimony, generality, and utility (Zacarias et al., 4 Sep 2025).

The Delphi process also drove structural revisions. Among the enacted changes were removal of fuzzy “transparency characteristics” and “DX dimensions” constructs, clearer multiplicities, explicit modeling of the portal as an enabler, broader treatment of actor roles, clearer links among contributions, information, and channels, and explicit framing of transparency as a non-functional requirement of common technological platforms (Zacarias et al., 4 Sep 2025).

5. Practical application and measurement

SECO-TransDX is intended both as an analytical lens and as a design aid for platform owners, ecosystem managers, and researchers. Its practical interpretation is that improving DX in a software ecosystem requires interventions not only in tooling or incentives, but also in the transparency of the technical, social, and governance infrastructure surrounding those resources (Zacarias et al., 4 Sep 2025).

At the technical layer, the model points to centralized and versioned documentation, searchable portals, coherent API references, example-rich SDKs, architecture information, deprecation policies, migration guides, changelogs, and auditable repository processes. These measures correspond to DX factors such as desired technical resources, ease of configuration, ease of learning, documentation quality, and low barriers to entry. This practical reading aligns with the earlier DX study, which ranked financial costs, technical resources, services diversity, ease of learning, distribution methods, and low market-entry barriers among the strongest influences on adoption and continued contribution (Zacarias et al., 24 Jun 2025).

At the social layer, the model emphasizes official communication channels, forums, Q&A spaces, DevRel practices, recognition processes, mentorship, and knowledge-sharing assets such as tutorials and videos. These connect directly to DX factors involving recognition, commitment, relationships, knowledge exchange, and developer relations (Zacarias et al., 4 Sep 2025).

At the organizational and governance layer, the model recommends governance charters, contribution guidelines, decision logs, issue and pull-request review policies, transparent requirements-flow mechanisms, roadmaps, status pages, prioritization rationales, and published data-handling policies. The significance is that fair and auditable governance is treated as part of DX rather than as an external administrative concern (Zacarias et al., 4 Sep 2025).

SECO-TransDX also suggests concrete transparency indicators aligned to its eight conditioning factors. These include availability and responsiveness of communication channels; accessibility and uptime of documentation; developer comprehension of information; accuracy and update frequency of platform information; portal usability scores and task success rates; trace logs and changelog quality for auditability; dashboards for project evolution; and trust signals or provenance mechanisms for information reliability (Zacarias et al., 4 Sep 2025).

Parallel DX indicators can be aligned to the four DX categories: tooling satisfaction, API stability, onboarding friction, time-to-market, approval-time variability, community-support engagement, recognition usage, retention rates, contribution frequency, perceived financial opportunity, and learning progress. A plausible implication is that SECO-TransDX can serve as a bridge between portal-quality measurement and ecosystem-sustainability measurement, because it explicitly connects transparency conditions to procedure quality, DX, and success factors such as attraction and retention (Zacarias et al., 4 Sep 2025).

6. Scope, limitations, and nomenclature

SECO-TransDX is explicitly scoped as a conceptual model. Its semantics are structural and explanatory rather than algorithmic. The work notes the need for further empirical validation across diverse ecosystem contexts, including platforms such as Android, iOS, HarmonyOS Next, GitHub-centered ecosystems, and SAP Cloud Platform–type settings. The authors also acknowledge that the model’s current validation rests on expert judgment rather than behavioral telemetry or causal estimation (Zacarias et al., 4 Sep 2025).

The model should also be understood against the broader ambiguity of the acronym SeCo/SECO on arXiv. Multiple unrelated papers use the same string for different technical constructs: “Seasonal Contrast” in remote sensing representation learning (Mañas et al., 2021), “Semantic Connectivity-driven pseudo-labeling” in cross-domain segmentation (Zhao et al., 2023), a self-supervised method with external memories for context reasoning (Liu et al., 2022), Sequential Conic Optimization for rocket landing (Kamath et al., 14 Aug 2025), and Sequential Chunk-wise Optimization for long-context LLM training (Li et al., 22 May 2025). Several of those works explicitly state that the term “TransDX” does not appear in the paper (Zhao et al., 2023, Kamath et al., 14 Aug 2025, Li et al., 22 May 2025). In the arXiv material considered here, the exact term SECO-TransDX denotes the transparency model in software ecosystems introduced in 2025 (Zacarias et al., 4 Sep 2025).

A common misconception is therefore to treat SECO-TransDX as a generic label for any SeCo-based transfer or optimization pipeline. The documentary record instead indicates a narrower, software-ecosystem-specific meaning: a developer-centered conceptual model in which transparency is treated as a non-functional requirement that mediates developer experience through the quality of ecosystem procedures (Zacarias et al., 4 Sep 2025).

In that sense, SECO-TransDX occupies a distinct position in SECO research. It does not replace prior models of ecosystem structure or governance; rather, it extends them by linking transparency to developer-facing outcomes. Its central contribution is the claim that transparency is not merely an attribute of disclosure or openness, but an operational condition of developer experience, ecosystem trust, and long-term participation (Zacarias et al., 4 Sep 2025).