Julia Thompson wrote:
Article at http://firstmonday.org/issues/issue9_4/levesque/index.html
I'm interested in anything folks here can add about open source software, either from a user's point of view or a developer's point of view. Or if someone has a refutation for any of the points raised in the article, I'd be interested in reading that.
The author seems to have unreasonable expectations -- that "Project X" is typical and that *every* free/open source (FOSS) application will be good. It seems obvious that focusing on one -- "Project X" -- is an unreasonable basis for generalization. Perhaps our expectation should be more like they are for Hollywood -- the vast majority of FOSS applications will not be so great, but there will be a few great ones.
Gary Lawrence Murphy has written a response to the LeVesque piece, entitled "Fundamental Misconceptions with Open Source Software Development" at <http://www.teledyn.com/node/view/484>. Bottom line: FOSS isn't shrink-wrap: it isn't (always) one-click-easy to install, isn't (primarily) intended for Jo User or her mom.
For me, it's the fact that I can peel back a couple of layers, get at some of the inner workings and hidden mechanisms, and wire it together with something else totally unrelated and have a completely new thing that neither developer may have had in mind. Although I mostly spend my time on Linux and WinXP these days, I've been a Mac fan since 1986, brought my own Mac to HP when I worked there, and eventually worked for seven years at Apple -- the accessibility of the innards of FOSS reminds me of the ability I had with HyperCard and AppleScript to glue things together to do what I want 'em to do.
BTW, It looks like "Project X" may be gforge-49x, an attempt to extend GForge for managing undergraduate programming projects <http://pyre.third-bit.com/projects/gforge-49x/>.
Dave
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