“Is it possible that, despite all the hype, open source is not necessarily the best way to develop software? That it’s not about to take over the software industry, and that it’s no more a threat to Microsoft than were Netscape, the Macintosh or Word Perfect?” Read the analysis by Tony Healy.
The biggest issue right now facing linux is that there is no cohesive development environmemt. You have different desktops with different apis and different ides for each language.
While thats nice for “hackers” and it allows for flexibility its far too confusing and complicated to actually use for software development.
And of course because most open source projects dont have 100s of developers or millions of dollars to hire developers a project as daunting as creating a “visual studio.net” for linux will never happen.
What hype? Of course open source is not the end-all-be-all! Everybody knows that! But that doesn’t change the fact that open source is still very good for many situations. Even big open source advocates are honest about this.
Looks like somebody’s trying to make open source people look like a bunch of liars who hype up things.
As opposed to the two hundred APIs for Windows? MFC vs VCL vs .NET vs QT vs pure Win32 API vs whatever custom toolkits many commercial apps use. C vs C++ vs C# vs VB vs Delphi vs … you name it.
“While thats nice for “hackers” and it allows for flexibility its far too confusing and complicated to actually use for software development.”
KDevelop, Anjuta, MonoDevelop…
In my opion we need something more like Delphi, not Visual Studio.
Open source is the first viable cultural contribution of generation X.
Its only begun spreading its wings, challenging copyright, patent law, and of course so gutting the premise of closed source software and security that even Microsoft is grudgingly accepting that it must open its kimono, if even slightly.
There will be lots of naysayers who give a knee-jerk approval to this post just to sound insightful, and to them I ask for one key social and business development that is demonstrating why closed source, closed ideas, and limits to access are the future. I see none.
“The most important is the distinction between simply writing a program, which any computer science student can do, and creating a software product for the mass market, which requires much more expertise, time and work.”
False dichotomy. What is mozilla? What is linux? Are these student projects? False premise leads to false conclusions. Author is fitting data to a conclusion he wants to reach.
“The mass market now numbers around 600 million computer users, and it demands that programs be easy to install, reliable to operate and useful.”
His premise is that closed source software is all of these things and open source is none. False premise.
“Linux has only around 1 percent of the mass market [1]. This poses some serious questions for open source advocates, particularly their demands for preference in government purchasing. If people don’t want open source, why should they be forced to use it?”
?????
So we should only adopt the majority solution, regardless of actual merits. Does this guy have a high school diploma??
And who is being “forced” to use open source???
I can’t be bothered to read the rest, this is drivel masquerading as insight.
“The Institute for Policy Innovation (IPI) is a non-profit, non-partisan public policy “think tank” based in Lewisville, Texas and founded in 1987 by Congressman Dick Armey to research, develop and promote innovative and non-partisan solutions to today’s public policy problems.”
No need to read any more. This is a Repugnicant drivel machine passing itself off as a think tank.
While I like some aspects of the idea of open source to say that its the perfect solution to all of lifes problems is simply not true.
“For law firms and lawyers, open source represents a rich opportunity to benefit from the increased complexity of licensing and copyright agreements. Only lawyers benefit from this.”
Insane! This man is insane. Has he never compared the Microsoft EULA’s complexity to that of the GPL, which I may remind you is THE SAME everywhere it is used. Has he never compared it to the BSD, which is like two sentences?
This article is complete BS.
Open source has its theoretical and still not achieved limits, I agree about that.
Yet this article compares things such as theoretical lockin by an open source company to lockin by a proprietary company. He completly misses the poing! If I am locked in by microsoft, I have no way of transfering the data or an easy migration path. In an open source enviorment, if some distro is trying to lock you in by allowing you to run only specific software under contract (i.e. if you dont you lose support etc…), then you can always go to a different distribution, and migrate your programs and data to there.
The article is filled with these incorrect comparisions which make it look more like a flame then anything else. Fact is that open source is a threat to everything from the server market, to the embedded market, and slowly to the desktop market.
There are obviously projects such as linux and other that are very good. But maybe that has more to do with who developed it and their passion for the technology than perhaps the open source issue itself.
Personally I have seen good closed source software and good open source software. Sometimes one is better than the other and vice versa.
Who exactly said that?
Doesnt sound like a very “balanced” article. But im interested to see the responses to it. I will say that the open source communittee definitely is a passionate bunch which is needed to make it be trully successful.
Must have misunderstood what was being said.
Another interesting insight:
“It is also illustrated by the fact that most of the successful open source products tend to be for technical users or for running on servers. This type of software is easier to write because the user can be relied on to carry out any necessary installation or operating procedures as instructed, or to understand the need for particular technical restorative actions.”
That’s right. Writing a server OS for Big Iron or a 4-, 8-, or 16-way Intel server is distustingly simple. Perhaps Windows and Linux acquired the ability to run effectively on these kinds of hardware platforms relatively late because the developers preferred to work on harder and more challenging tasks.
And other server software, e.g. a reliable, efficient, and secure web-server or DBMS is something that anybody can whip up over the weekend with a couple of buddies and a large coffee pot. (Yukon is late because Microsoft is out of coffee, btw).
Another gem:
“This point is nicely illustrated in the games market, where innovation is at a premium, and technology changes rapidly. In that environment, the open source model, of copying existing code bases from someone else, fails dismally.”
Ah, so that’s why some companies buy their game engine from other companies (e.g. Unreal or Quake). And I suppose that the complaints from a large number of endusers and several media analysts about lack of innovation in today’s games are just static?
Tony Healy should stick to subjects within his realm of understanding. This article is just rubbish.
He really dosent know what hes talking about.
Well duh, nobody said open source is perfect. Unlike closed source zealots, who claim that closed source is the end-all-be-all for everything, we’re being honest about the facts.
Buying a game engine <> open source.
Open sourcing a multiplayer online game is like telling hackers ‘COME AND GET IT!!!’
OSS has not seen great things in the games industry.
I was on the school of my niece tonight she is 10 and
there are learning powerpoint and word on Windows XP/98
computers. Why not run Linux and OpenOffice? get them to know the basics of computing and word processing instead of one
sided views on computing. Mostly some kind of teacher know a bit of windows and he/she is the one that decides what OS and apps will be used. Wasted money in a dep. where OSS should be king!
Isn’t this getting tiresome? Who cares if open
source is “not necessarily the best way” to develop
software? It’s nobodies business. If people want
to get together and develop software then they
can. It doesn’t have to be the best way, a good way,
or even a not so bad way to develop software. If
people like the product they will use it. If not
they won’t. If you care either way it’s only because of
your own agenda.
What’s tiresome are the popular sites that do not have the editorial integrity to stop FUD.
I was going to cut and paste some obviusly stupid and wrong quote from that “article” and make fun of it… But I just don’t know where to start! There is so much of it!
How about this one:
Good developers create their own designs; they don’t need to copy other peoples’ source code.
Come on everybody, lets chant:
Reinvent the weel!
Reinvent the weel!
Reinvent the weel!
Reinvent the weel!
REINVENT THE WEEL!!!
I’ve only read half the article yet. I’ll definitly read the rest though. Who knows what gems of developer’s wisdom may hide in the final paragraphs…
Buying a game engine <> open source.
You’re right, but the point made in the article (“shared code has no value for game developers”) is still obviously wrong.
Open sourcing a multiplayer online game is like telling hackers ‘COME AND GET IT!!!’
You know, it is possible to open the code without giving away all the data (graphics/music/maps) and access codes (which obviusly should be unique for each paying customer).
I was referring to this bit:
“…copying existing code bases from someone else, fails dismally.”
You can open source the engine of a Multiplayer online game as long as you have control of the data on the server. Assuming, of course, that you don’t rely on security through obscurity. 🙂
The article suggests “that so-called free programming is often funded by taxpayers in one form or another.”
Proprietary programs are also funded by taxpayers in one form or another. Software licensing fees for governmental use are paid by taxpayers. The licensing cost for software used to develop and/or produce physical products is absorbed in the cost of the products and has a similar effect to that of a sales tax in inflating prices above the total economic production cost. The public funds proprietary software when the people people purchase authorized copies of the software. The inefficiency of non-freely distributable software (besides the large administrative and enforcement overhead) is that those who would substantially benefit by the software, but benefit by an amount less than the license price, would not receive the software. This is economically inefficient since software has an almost zero distribution cost.
“Good developers create their own designs; they don’t need to copy other peoples’ source code.”
Code is reuse is one of the most important ways to save development time.
“In that environment [the games market], the open source model, of copying existing code bases from someone else, fails dismally.”
Open source code is actually predominantly original. Some open source games are very good to play; though, perhaps, they are not marketed very well. There is, however, a deficiency in open source games.
A great game, especially a role-playing one, is probably a great, specially tailored, intricate, and a very complex work of art. The fine artistic skills (such as storytelling, using suspense, and consistency in theme across a large work), which tend to be deficient in open source game projects, are quite unnecessary for most computer software.
The article makes other false and misleading claims as well.
Well it looks like everyone else has done an excellent job flaming this article. I disagree with the author too. Open source will not die, you cannot kill an idea.
Really, it is quite shameful that ANYTHING that bashes your precious oss/linux/gnu is immediately drivel or wrong.
The article is 100% right on. If you weren’t so blinded by utter idiocy you’d see that.
I’d be surprised if any of you actually have real lives outside your parent’s basement.
The article has some valid points, but they don’t have anything to do with the fact that OSS has it source open.
What the author wrote about the flaws of the OSS modell can be one to one applyed to the Closed Source modell as well.
Software needs to be build professionaly and that’s it! If the software is open in it’s source or not is another thing.
This is really well written article. However, I think the writer falls into the trap that I’ll normally levy against open source people.
Open Source != Linux
Closed Source != Windows
He makes some excellent points as to the market viability of open source. Its good for service and hardware industries (IBM, SUN…) as they can essentially USE free software and increase their profits. Its bad for the software industry itself themselves who do not benefit from IP protection and cannot profit from their product.
It is kind of ironic as the money making scheme. Open Source products which acheive the same ease of use (install/configure) as commercial products don’t require the kind of service that probably could have sustained them as a market.
Could you really see an open source single player game being profitable? I say single player just to avoid someone pointing out some service charge for network play
Or how about open source tax software…No mass market would pay for these products as they’re free (as in beer).
The author’s rant about open source products not being as easy to use for the end user may be a generality that may be true right now, but its certainly not something required by open source. If anything, the more open source enters the consumer marker, the more it WILL have to become easy to use. Firefox…easy to use and install. I just installed Apache and MySql…very easy to install and run for anyone would would actually be interested in installing such things
In the end though, I think that the commercial success of open source will not end up solving any of the ‘problems’ that people see right now. It doesn’t make any difference to me if MSWORD rules the market or OpenOffice does. Open Source is not inherently more secure. The current security of linux is more due to it being based on Unix (made for networking). There are other closed source and secure OS, but MS ain’t exactly slacking on security now that is turned its attention to it. I’d also think that the number of developers thoroughly reviewing code is about the same for any large commercial operation as it would be for the supposed open source model. And any software company can display its code to institutions to review them.
Is it possible that, despite all the hype, open source is not necessarily the best way to develop software?
There are a few reason why companies have an advantage when developing software. Funny the author didn’t mention any of them.
However, Open Source is the only way to develop an alternative to the Microsoft OS and Office monopoly.
This should be also a sufficient reason for goverments to consider a switch: To protect competition between application vendors and to prevent Microsofts ongoing vertical integration of the market.
I like this one:
“This is a point made by Bertrand Meyer and Nikolai Bezroukov, who contend that so-called free programming is often funded by taxpayers in one form or another, and that open source essentially represents a distortion of the market.”
Open source a distorsion of the market. 🙂 ROTFL
Well then, Microsoft’s monopoly is also quite a distorsion of the market, probably a many times greater distorsion.
http://www.heatland.org/LinksCategory.cfm?lctId=2
“The Institute for Policy Innovation (IPI) is a non-profit, non-partisan public policy “think tank”, […]”
oops! Would be quite interesting who the sponsors are.
Just a side note. Anyone know when these ‘think tanks’ started to become mainstream? It seems every group or interest out there has their own think tank. Or maybe they always have and I just haven’t noticed.
I too would like to be paid to think.
@Whomever wrote this:
“Open sourcing a multiplayer online game is like telling hackers ‘COME AND GET IT!!!'”
You’ve obviously never played Ragnarok Online. That game is as proprietary as you can get, and the usage of any third party clients is strictly forbidden. Yet there are tons of third party clients and hacks available for this game.
@DUDE:
“Really, it is quite shameful that ANYTHING that bashes your precious oss/linux/gnu is immediately drivel or wrong.”
I’d say it’s quite shameful that anything that bashes OSS/Linux/GNU is immediately praised to the heavens!
What makes criticism against OSS/Linux so great that we’re not allowed to criticise the criticism?
“The article was submitted to Slashdot…and within one minute was rejected.”
Bzzzt, wrong. Slashdot regularly links to anti-Linux articles.
Let’s see, two cool new games I’ve been playing lately are Uru: Ages Beyond Myst and Second Life.
Uru uses:
OpenSSL
Python
FreeType
Boost
Ogg Vorbis
Speex
LibJpeg, Libpng
zLib
How’s that for an open source library checklist?
Second Life also uses FreeType — I’m afraid I don’t recall any other open source libraries by name, but I do remember the developers talking about how much of the low-level game engine uses open source code.
There are also an increasing number of fully open source game engines out there, with more and more games using them all the time. As other posters here have said, reinventing the wheel constantly is NOT a good way to develop software!
Regards,
Jared
Why does opinion have to be totalitarian. Every time some one steps up and says anything bad about OSS or GPL people can’t take it. What’s wrong with criticism? Did any of you ever read any management? Criticism is your best friend if you use it right.
OSS Zealots please stand up! Yah that’s it slim shadys…
And what makes criticism against Linux so great that nobody’s allowed to criticise the criticism? Just because he criticises Linux doesn’t mean he’s right!
Every time someone criticises the criticism, you anti-zealots can’t take it.
“Really, it is quite shameful that ANYTHING that bashes your precious oss/linux/gnu is immediately drivel or wrong”
No, but you have to attack us on facts that are viable. How about, for example any of the following VIABLE attacks on open source:
– Open source communities generally waste efforts on knock-offs or minor deviations which serve no long term use
– Open source communities tend to not reward commercial uses of their code
– Open source communities often tend to product viable unfiying architectures
those are just a few examples i can think of. We are open to attacks, but they have to be penned by someone who is semi-literate and at least has a vague idea what they are talking about
“Every time some one steps up and says anything bad about OSS or GPL people can’t take it. What’s wrong with criticism? Did any of you ever read any management? Criticism is your best friend if you use it right.”
Once again, we welcome semi-literate criticisms that have some grounding in fact and reality. This one didn’t.
“Could you really see an open source single player game being profitable?”
RedHat, Novell blah blah blah
You have heard of these firms I presume
In my opion we need something more like Delphi, not Visual Studio.
Look at FreePascal/Lazarus:
http://www.lazarus.freepascal.org/
Here’s another “OSS Sucks” article from this same offer. He seems to shadow exactly MS’ position on the subject at any given time.
http://www.onlineopinion.com.au/view.asp?article=616
-1 Strawman
<yawn>
“How about, for example any of the following VIABLE attacks on open source:”
Viable, you say??
“- Open source communities generally waste efforts on knock-offs or minor deviations which serve no long term use”
Um, this is a matter of opinion. 1) Quite a few Open Source projects of an ambitious nature are constantly in the works. 2) What you’re calling off ‘knock offs’ is actually non proprietary ALTERNATIVES to proprietary apps, which is the whole point of OSS.
“- Open source communities tend to not reward commercial uses of their code”
It’s not the Open Source community’s job to make money for the corporates, and on the other hand, commercial users are getting free source. They are getting their reward in advance. Afterall, the OSS is not exactly flush with cash.”
For the life of me, I can’t understand why would someone honestly want to attack Open Source when they’re offering something for free? How many free things in life do you get?
Now, is this a paid advertisement for Microsoft, or not? I thought it was supposed to say advertisement in tiny print somewhere.
Why is the GNU logo on an article about open source? GNU software is a subset of open source software.
Buying a game engine <> open source.
I disagree. If you get the source code for the engine, then it is open source, just not free software (in either sense.)
Open sourcing a multiplayer online game is like telling hackers ‘COME AND GET IT!!!’
Sure, and then they come up with things like
http://www.q3f.com
The nerve of those hackers.
It is possible to implement a secure network environment with the infrastructure source code totally in the wild. Besides, I have not heard of ANY cheats being written based on source code knowledge. There may have been, I just haven’t heard of them.
my point was to show that there are at least some args against open source that could be offered intelligently…unlike those in the article
They all look like a bunch of Realtors.
The IPI is a right-wing “think thank” that unquestioningly supports conservative ideologies of all kinds. They are pro-deregulation, anti-government and not at all an objective observer. No doubt that they received a generous donation from Microsoft for the publication of this so-called article.
Seriously, would you publish articles from the Weekly Socialist Worker? This is source is no more credible (and, in fact, one could argue that it is even less credible, receiving a lot more funding from big business).
I got so fed up with this cr@p that I even sent a letter to IPI – it was so bad it overcome the enormous potential barrier of apathy and motivated me to write a slap-down (first time ever!).
—————-
Dear IPI,
Your article “Has Open Source Reached Its Limits?” promised to provide a much needed evaluation of the hype surrounding open source software. To my mind, many of the proponents of open source fail to understand its true nature and so promote it as a “silver bullet” to the complexities of software development. However, I found that Tony Healy’s article seemed to suggest that he lacked either direct experience with open source projects, or had failed to do more than cursory research on the subject. His credentials list him as a “software engineer”, although this seems implausible to me. If he is not an experienced software developer it seems inappropriate to list him as one as your customers will be able to tell the difference. To me, as CIO of a hi-tech export company in New Zealand, this lack of in-depth research reflects poorly on IPI, and would mislead your customers. Please do not write me off as a zealot, in general I agree with much of the article’s arguments. However, I believe I can provide your company with feedback as the article contains some inaccurate statements. I provide errata and corrigenda below.
Best regards,
Dr. Mike Reid
————-
1) “other IT industry fads that were once trumpeted as the way of the future, like Macintosh computers, … and Y2K”
Mentioning Y2K as a fad and the “way of the future” shows a complete lack understanding of the Y2K problem, and is poor journalship to include it.
2) “However, industry development requires strong intellectual rights
protection, according to a United Nations report on developing nations. This is especially so for producing valuable packaged software.”
Here the author shows that he lacks even a bacic understanding of open source principles. Open source is not the same as “public domain”, and relies on the strength copyright law and licensing agreements.
3) “In any case, for developing nations, it seems odd to concentrate on the costs of software when many other factors are more important. For example, whereas a computer costs a month’s wages for an average American worker, it costs eight years’ wages for a Bangladeshi [8]. Similarly, the University of Namibia had only 15 computers for 2,000 students in 1998.”
In this case, how would paying for extra proprietary licenses help in this situation? This does not provide a logical reason to support the article’s principal claim.
4) “Australian politician and open source advocate Ian Gilfillan claims that open source projects help train local developers, presumably by making the source code available. [10] But that claim makes no sense. Good developers create their own designs; they don’t need to copy other peoples’ source code. Further, developers already have access to extensive source code in samples and software development kits if they wish to see how particular techniques are implemented.”
This ignores the statement of your politician, he was talking about training local developers rather than programmers already skilled in the craft. Also, innovative good designs is not always the same as good implementation (as any commercial software developer knows). So even great architects can still learn imnplementation details from others (just as scientists do).
5) “Pushing the open source concept too far into areas where it’s not applicable will lead to universities and taxpayers shouldering the cost of software development for business, and doing it less capably than specialist software development firms.”
Open source isn’t about who writes and owns the software, businesses will still do that (as universities can’t hope to). It is about who can see the code to suggest fixes. This paragraph suggests that business developers will be supplanted by university coders (what a disaster that would be!) which has nothing to do with open source, but is some strange fantasy about outsourcing.
6) “The reality is that open source can trap a customer into an outsourcer relationship more readily than commercial software. This is because commercial platforms expose standard API’s for third party applications and any consultant can develop for them.”
Open source not only exposes the API, but also the implementation. How could that possibly trap a customer?
Otherwise, I thought the article has some interesting and relevant points, but please check your facts next time.
When did this thread become a policial one, Let’s try to stay on topic and stop attacking “right wing liberal left realtors” who have a opinion on “OSS is great, M$ sucks / Microsoft rules, OSS will never go anywhere” crowd.
I can’t wait until the next op-ed article comes out so everyone can attack the auther and each other again, and again and again.
I need a beer and shot and a couple of asprain. You all are giving me a headache.
Utter, ignorant, biased rubbish.
The man doesnt even demonstrate an understanding of basic software engineering principles.
Every software developer builds their work on the libraries and code snippets of other people. Noone has time to reinvent the wheel every time they add a new functionality. Open source has huge benifits for security, stability and portability. Open file formats allow all applications to share data easily. Open source itself permits transparent code auditing to prevent and remove code vulnerabilities and exploits. The distributed yet regulated development environment of open source increases the stability of end programs, with quick revisions and fixes.
Open source softwares are headed bigtime into the mainstream market. Open office provides productivity software that is as good as the second most recent versions of office. I dont know anyone who uses all those advanced office features, I think in general they must only be there to be able to call it a new version
– but all joking aside, open office will do anything and everything most people need. Not happy with that? Try star office, with its own built in scripting language.
These days, it is possible, and has been possible for a long time, to install a linux or freebsd or whatever workstation, and run it, with no degree of skill or expertise in linux. The only people who need that skill are those who like to tinker, extend, administer networks etc. This is the same for any operating system and applications software.
I could go on, but its clear the author is either completely ignorant of the subject matter, or extremely biased, or both.
What really annoys me, is microsoft and other closed source models feeling the pinch, will hold up this article as proof that open source is bad. No matter how clearly and accurately it is refuted. And that just plain bites.
Peace
Phonetic
>In my opion we need something more like Delphi, not Visual Studio.
Well, actually there’s is something called ‘Kylix’ that was very good, but for some reason didn’t fire up as expected. If Borland with there almost-best IDE weren’t able to pull it, nobody will.
This article was intended to highlight flaws in open source, and it did. Many of the flaws are badly presented and in some cases purely imaginary.
Of course it missed the absolutely huge advantage of Open Source development which is that the economic burden is significantly reduced when producing complicated large scale software projects. The production of high quality open source products like, linux, gnome, kde is possible without the financial resources of IBM, Oracle, Sun, HP or MS.
This is especially important for poorer economies with unsupported language requirements which can’t attract the investment from commercial software providers.
The reason there is probably less commercial software for open source operating systems is that commercial companies will generally target the largest market which is Windows users. If the market share of Linux were 20% it would certainly be big enough to attract commercial software developers and possibly even game developers.
Of course the guy is a corporate schill as well.
>In my opion we need something more like Delphi, not Visual Studio.
I respectfully disagree. OSS needs a visual studio clone.
My gripe is that Linux gets far too much attention when OSS is mentioned. Linux is only one piece of OSS. Too many people make it out to be the god of all OSS software that all others revolve around. I use many OSS applications on a daily basis and i dont use Linux (eg Mozilla,Filezilla,Media Player Classic, Miranda IM). It would be nice if the Linux zealots would butt out of the thing and let the many great OSS projects shine on thier own.
“I disagree. If you get the source code for the engine, then it is open source,”
No it isn’t. Just because you can look at the source doesn’t automatically make it open source unless it complies to the Open Source Definition: http://www.opensource.org
@Harky:
“Well, actually there’s is something called ‘Kylix’ that was very good, but for some reason didn’t fire up as expected. If Borland with there almost-best IDE weren’t able to pull it, nobody will.”
I tried Kylix. The reason why nobody uses it is because it sucks. It crashes all the time, is slow and consumes *a lot* of memory. Plus, it uses some weird version of Qt, and unless the very same version of that Qt is installed, your app will not run (it will go into an inifite loop at startup and freezes).
I’d be using Kylix now if it really is great. But it isn’t.
@—.cable.mindspring.com
“I respectfully disagree. OSS needs a visual studio clone.”
Have you ever worked with Delphi? It’s RAD capabilities exceed everything else I’ve ever tried. Creating a GUI is so easy! It’s also very extensible and flexible. I’ve never been as productive in any other IDE than Delphi.
No it isn’t. Just because you can look at the source doesn’t automatically make it open source unless it complies to the Open Source Definition: http://www.opensource.org
THIS IS EXACTLY THE PROBLEM!!!! If you rely only on Opensource.org because of their domain then it’s not hard to understand how ignorant you are. I bet you even think GPL is Free and Stallman is a nice guy who seems rational.. maybe you even worship him like many other.
Open Source means whatever you want it to mean. That means “The source is open”… is it? Well if yes then yes no matter the rules surrounding it. Even MS is partially open source since some get to view their code…
What’s wrong with protecting your IP?
Totalitarian opinion ==> GPL Zealotry ==> Communism
I can’t understand why the author brings up games. I think there is a good reason why there are few (successful) OSS games. The gaming scene is a very rapidly changing environment. What’s “cool” today is “outdated” tomorrow. So, to make a successful game, you will need a cohesive team of talented developers working full office hours, together, finish the software, ship, reap in the profits while it lasts, and move on to the next.
Why spend all this effort on something this volatile? OSS seems to focus on stuff which is deemed important, which doesn’t just scratch a temporary itch.
Too much in the commercial software scene is going in the direction of “toys”. Step 1 is: convince people they need your new toy, step 2 is: sell it to them. Once it’s not longer profitable, it’s dropped like a hot potato. I really really can’t understand why people would trust anything important to a commercial company.
Off-topic but in the same light, I am highly worried about the global privatization of infrastructure. There will come a day when it’s no longer commercially viable to deliver power to a far-off little town, have hospitals in rural regions, deliver mail to obscure corners of the world. Some software should perhaps be considered infrastructure.
He states, and I quote:
In any case, for developing nations, it seems odd to concentrate on the costs of software when many other factors are more important. For example, whereas a computer costs a month’s wages for an average American worker, it costs eight years’ wages for a Bangladeshi [8]. Similarly, the University of Namibia had only 15 computers for 2,000 students in 1998. [9] Closequote
http://www.ipi.org/ipiIPIPublications.nsf/PublicationLookupFullTex…
That point didn’t escape three of the Arab World’s electrical engineers, Handasa Arabia http://www.handasarabia.org/ :
Quote
“Those countries can’t afford the R&D expenses that are usual in the advanced world,” [Mohamed Eldesoky] said. “The R&D budgets in some companies might exceed the income of some very poor developing countries.” Closequote
http://www.eedesign.com/story/OEG20030822S0011
Their solution?
Quote
“Open source provides an easy and cheap platform to start our own projects and discover our abilities,” said Khatib. “It enables us to communicate with engineers and students from all over the world and keeps us up to date with the latest technologies.” Openness, said Salem, is “the most effective methodology to bridge the technological, educational and cultural gaps between developing and developed countries.”
Closequote
In other words, more openness, not less.
It sounds like Healy’s an apologist for an established risk-averse company, not a genuine researcher.
“What hype? Of course open source is not the end-all-be-all! Everybody knows that! But that doesn’t change the fact that open source is still very good for many situations. Even big open source advocates are honest about this.”
ROTFLMAO!!!!
Really, you should give this oneliner to Woody Allen.
“The most important is the distinction between simply writing a program, which any computer science student can do, and creating a software product for the mass market, which requires much more expertise, time and work.”
False dichotomy. What is mozilla? What is linux? Are these student projects? False premise leads to false conclusions. Author is fitting data to a conclusion he wants to reach.
Pleeease.
Mozilla took 5 bloody years to get right. From certain perspectives it is still not a great product for the mass market. UI-wize it kinda sucks. Documentation is not so good. Etc.
Keep in mind also that the core of mozilla’s developers were (until recently) from Netscape (then AOL). So yes, OS projects FROM CORPORATIONS can be polished for
the mass market! Wow!
Linux is also not ready for the mass market (as the author means it, i.e polished, etc). I ask you the same question: what is Linux? A million distros, some far from having any mass market qualities.
If anyone wants to keep locked in by software vendors, then fine. As long as we get the option not to….
“So yes, OS projects FROM CORPORATIONS can be polished for
the mass market! Wow!”
So? Whether they’re from corporations or not is irrelevant. Open source is open source.
“THIS IS EXACTLY THE PROBLEM!!!! If you rely only on Opensource.org because of their domain then it’s not hard to understand how ignorant you are. I bet you even think GPL is Free and Stallman is a nice guy who seems rational.. maybe you even worship him like many other.”
NO, YOU ARE THE PROBLEM!!!!! The term “open source” was invented Eric S. Raymond. Opensource.org is not “just a domain name”.
“Open Source means whatever you want it to mean.”
No it isn’t. The one who invented the term defines the term.
Saying Open Source means whatever you want it to mean is like saying Microsoft’s shared source means whatever you want it to mean, or that the word car means whatever you want it to mean.
“What’s wrong with protecting your IP?”
Nothing. But what’s wrong with allowing other people to use, study and copy my code?
“Totalitarian opinion ==> GPL Zealotry ==> Communism”
Totalitarian opinion ==> Anti-open source zealotry ==> Facism.
All these open source bashing articles get the most of their audience in the open source public, where they always get the deserved answer “get out of here”.
Browsing the rest of the press never yields these pieces. So, thanks for trying so hard, but stop trying. We just like open source and its fruits, leave us alone.
NO, YOU ARE THE PROBLEM!!!!! The term “open source” was invented Eric S. Raymond. Opensource.org is not “just a domain name”.
OMG… that’s like saying Office Suite is *ONLY* MS Office since they were the first guys who started using it widely.
Or howabout “Internet Connection” is only Modem since that was the first thing that connected.
Things change over time, realize that. Open Source is simply open sourcecode available to externals on certain conditions or no conditions.
You zealots have this problem with words, let me exemplify
1. You misuse the word free completely (as in you don’t have a clue)
2. You make a definition of what open source is and can’t redefine it properly.
3. FUD + Troll + M$ + l33t are what? Intelligent?
4. You say “Linux” will overcome Windows and all others but when critisized you go “Linux only a kernel”…
Frankly, you have your own language, no one understands it, perhaps that’s why females strongly dislike Linux and their users? GEeee, I wonder how you will win them when you can’t express yourselves… and therefor you can hardly win the market, like MS have with MSN for instance.
“Why spend all this effort on something this volatile? OSS seems to focus on stuff which is deemed important, which doesn’t just scratch a temporary itch.”
Oh yeah, all those projects listed on freshmeat are *important*. Uh-huh.
Tell us another one.
“OMG… that’s like saying Office Suite is *ONLY* MS Office since they were the first guys who started using it widely.”
No, it’s like saying Microsoft Office is the only software allowed to be called Microsoft Office. It’s like saying that a car is the only object that’s called “car”.
Or do you go make up your own names for objects like cars? Do you call JoeOffice also “Microsoft Office”? Saying you can define open source as whatever you want is like saying you can call your bike a car.
The only zealot here is you. You’re bashing OSS just because bashing it is cool and “MS is soooo l33t everything else sux0rz”.
>Mozilla took 5 bloody years to get right.
How many years did it take to get windows right?
Is it right yet? The effort of longhorn
indicates it isn’t.
>From certain perspectives it is still not a great
>product for the mass market.
It’s not hard to know where your perspective is
comming from.
> UI-wize it kinda sucks.
IE kind of sucks.
>Documentation is not so good. Etc.
I’ve never read the documentation for either IE
or mozilla. I doubt most anyone has. Is there
documentation?
Some people’s mentality (be they open-source people or close-source people or if they take a side on some other issue) is best summed up like this:
His idea worked, someone else’s didn’t: “More evidence that my idea is better than yours.”
His idea worked, someone else’s did: “More evidence that my idea is better than yours.”
His idea didn’t work, someone else’s did: “My idea will work soon and it will be better than yours.” Or “My idea is better than yours because of some attribute that can’t be measured.” Hence, “More evidence that my idea is better than yours.”
His idea didn’t work, someone else’s didn’t: “My idea will work, yours never will.” Or “Neither idea worked, so this test doesn’t matter.” Hence, “More evidence that my idea is better than yours.”
Other person says: “Well… Aren’t we Mr. Perfect with the Perfect ideas?”
Perfect person replies: “I never said I was perfect!!!” <Of course, he says this because if he did say he was perfect then we would be imperfect.>
What I’m saying is, that some people assign victory to whichever idea they support (or themselves) irregardless of what actually happens. No matter what someone else does or says, this person wins… In their own mind anyway.
Also… Some people assign attributes to the ideas they support (or themselves) or the competition which have little to nothing to do with anything. Also, alot of attributes have more to do with how an idea interacts with other ideas or the people involved with the idea. These interactions can potentially change as time progresses as other ideas change or different people rise up to handle an old idea or the old people change their ways. As if this weren’t enough the same ideas or people which cause problems for one idea may actually in the end cause problems for one (or more or even all) competing ideas.
Anyway… When people are either acting like they (or the idea they support) is perfect or that it has attributes which are not actually a part of the idea they support… This is quite noticeable to the other side, but rarely noticeable to people on the same side.
>You have different desktops with different apis and different ides for each language.
While thats nice for “hackers” and it allows for flexibility its far too confusing and complicated to actually use for software development.<
Occam’s razor: Too many choices isn’t a problem, picking one appears to be. Don’t confuse yourself with multiple options that create conflicts within the framework you want. Single out the one(s) that you want to use and stick with that. There is normally a preferred way for each developer to use to develop a solution. The developer is the one who picks the method. End of confusion, end of conflicts.
The only zealot here is you. You’re bashing OSS just because bashing it is cool and “MS is soooo l33t everything else sux0rz”.
NO comments needed LoL… thank you for proving my point
Talk about a top heavy corp. No wonder they have crap products.