Archive of UserLand's first discussion group, started October 5, 1998.

My notion of what is open source

Author:Rahul
Posted:8/23/2000; 1:38:42 PM
Topic:Next survey: Are you an open source developer?
Msg #:19993 (In response to 19977)
Prev/Next:19992 / 19994

I've been a developer and sysadmin for about 5 years now. I've been a linux user for 7 years. Back from the days when I was a newly arrived student from India, it was all I could afford, and I was grateful that kind developers would share. The availability of a free kernel and free programming tools, especially perl and gcc, were instrumental to my quickly learning to program, so I can say that my present job and expertise owes its existence to open source. I have released open source cosmology and scientific project software in the past, and my group here will soon be releasing a complete cluster management and installation toolkit for linux under the X11 license.This software is enabled by metakit, an open source embedded database. I like re-using open source in this fashion, it enables fast development on the very low budget that I have.

I have nothing against proprietary software, but I hate algorithm, software and business process patents. I do believe that all software must use open standards as much as possible, for us to inter-operate. However I do not consider an open source software designing a new standard as bad, since the code is open the standard is there for all to see and pick, even if it hasnt gone through a consensus process. Innovation requires such leaps. So, for me KDE making its own word processor format is OK: its open, and I can write to it. MSWord format isnt totally open, that I dont like. I hate WAP-WML even more, as even though the standard is readable and has open source implementations, it is patent encumbered.

In other words, patent encumbrance of a standard or idea is the worst evil. The difference between open source and commercial software is unimportant in front of the patent crap. Closed code stops the spread of code, which in my book is ok, but patent encumbrance stops the flow of ideas, which is evil. (See http://grove.cis.upenn.edu/thesite/nareau/index.pl?node_id=379 for Jeffersons thoughts on this)

For me the basic idea of open source is sharing. Different licenses arise because a person who shares usually wants to do it on their own terms. I like the GPL the best, as it naturally encourages sharing and community building: my thesis is that the reason the Linuxen are more popular than the bsden is not technical, its community: when you know your code will not be stolen and that your contribution will be acked for posterity, is a better feeling. And for non-developers too, there is this feeling of group ownership of the code which leads to installfests, evengelism, etc

Even though I have money now, I am likely to look for open source alternatives for a few reasons: (a)I can hack the code to my purposes, and give back (b)I like sharing in a community, and entering into conversations with developers (c)(political)I come from a poor country, and I can see clear benefits to sharing code in developing systems that empower people to not be subservient to global corporate interests and control. I see sharing software and using the web for conversations as empowering ordinary folk, as an opportunity to change the otherwise lopsided power equation.



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