What is OSLC?

Open Services for Lifecycle Collaboration (OSLC) is a community of software developers and organizations that is working to standardize the way that software lifecycle tools can share data (for example, requirements, defects, test cases, plans, or code) with one another.

We want to make integrating lifecycle tools a practical reality.

What we do

Gather industry experts

We bring together industry experts to form workgroups around common issues in software development

Openly discuss common problems and solutions

Workgroup members agree on what scenarios and data are needed to support the most common tasks and interactions.

Publish open specifications

We publish specifications that allow any tool to easily use the data from any other tool. Our specifications are free to use.

What OSLC means for you

Make software integrations easier and more robust

We want to help others build software that easily integrates with other software, which will let you build your ideal development environment, minimize frustration, and save time and money.

Expose more lifecycle data – and effectively use it

If your tools can freely understand each others' data, you can better analyze and explore that data to make better decisions.

Support from a vibrant, active community

We will be an active and transparent advocate for anyone that supports our goals and shares our values.

The problem with software development today

Too often, application and product lifecycle tools disappoint because they don’t cooperate well with one another. They fall short of their potential, and let down the teams and individuals that use them.

Your developers suffer with fragile environments, unstable integrations between tools, wasted time, and lower productivity.

Because a typical organization uses a variety of tools – either open-source, purchased, and proprietary – we want to take an industry-wide approach to solving these problems.

How does it all work?

Inspired by the web

Our specifications are based on Internet and linked-data standards. For example, any resource such as a defect or a test plan must be accessible to multiple tools via a URL.

Free to use and share

We want OSLC to spread, so our specifications are freely available for anyone to adopt. All contributions on this site are submitted under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, and all contributors agree to not to assert patent claims on implementations of the specifications. See the terms of use for more information.

Changing the industry

Software and service providers that have adopted OSLC specifications can easily interoperate. The more participation and adoption from members of the industry, the greater the benefit.