Ryan Tomayko

Book Review: Coders at Work —

A quote from Brad Fitzpatrick:

I find that is the best way to start a conversation. If you get on a mailing list and you are like ‘hey I want to add feature X’ the maintainer is probably going to be like: ‘ Oh fuck, I am so busy, go away, I hate feature X’. But if you come to them and you are like ‘I want to add feature X. I was thinking something like the attached patch’ which is totally wrong but you say, ‘But I think its totally wrong. I am thinking the right way might be to do X’ which is some more complex way, generally they will be like ‘Holly crap, they tried and look, they totally did it the wrong way. Maybe that pains the maintainer. They are like ‘ Oh man, I can’t believe they went through all that effort to do it. Its so easy to do the right thing,’ and then they reply.

This is the secret to being productive when contributing to open source. It’s very rare that you should approach a mailing list without a patch of some kind.

The Maximal Usage Doctrine for Open Source —

I like the way Yehuda first lays out his motivations and goals as an open source developer and then evaluates the MIT/BSD vs. GPL licenses based on those goals. That’s how you pick a license. No one can tell you why you write a given piece of free / open source software, so no one can really tell you how it should be licensed.

Like Yehuda, I tend to lean heavily toward MIT/BSD style licenses these days but I can imagine situations where the copyleft stipulations included in the GPL would be extremely important to me.

Writing good documentation —

Jacob Kaplan-Moss:

It’s really tempting to use an auto-documentation tool like Javadoc or RDoc for reference material.

Don’t.

Auto-generated documentation is almost worthless. At best it’s a slightly improved version of simply browsing through the source, but most of the time it’s easier just to read the source than to navigate the bullshit that these autodoc tools produce. About the only thing auto-generated documentation is good for is filling printed pages when contracts dictate delivery of a certain number of pages of documentation. I feel a particularly deep form of rage every time I click on a “documentation” link and see auto-generated documentation.

Hate that shit.

You know what I want? Man pages. For everything. Wouldn’t it be cool if you didn’t have to write roff?

Toward a new self-definition for open source —

Ian Bicking’s talk from DjangoCon 2009. Stimulating. I’m sure a nice comment thread will develop here over the next few days as well.

Code for Christmas —

Xavier Shay:

Ticking off an amazon wishlist never really resonated with me, so this year here is what we are all doing instead:

1. Find someone’s pet open source project – I’d start at github
2. Contribute! It doesn’t have to be much – a spec or two, some documentation, or even just a “hey it works on my box”. Fork, commit, pull request.
3. Wish them a Merry Christmas!

Great idea. I feel like I finally have something worthwhile to give this year.

A Big Change for Open Source —

Bruce Perens on the recent JMRI/GPL ruling:

“For a decade there’d been questions: Are Open Source licenses enforceable at all? Are their terms, calling for a patent detente or disclosure of source code, legal? Are they contracts, which require agreement by all parties to be valid, or licenses, which are binding even if you don’t agree to then? What legal penalties can a Free Software developer employ: only token damages, or much more? The court’s ruling makes the answers to these clear. Did such weighty questions come up in cases involving IBM, Sun, HP, or Red Hat? No, this is the quirky world of Free Software: it was a court case about model trains.”

Opentape —

PHP-based Muxtape clone that you host yourself. From the project page: “Opentape’s creation and design are proudly inspired by Muxtape’s success and sleek interface. We were sad with it’s untimely shutdown and wanted to let the web mixtape movement continue.”

muxtape.com was RIAA’d a couple of weeks ago. And while the EFF believes they could have decent legal footing if they wanted to challenge the take-down, it seems unlikely that the site will reopen anytime soon, if at all.

Video of Chris Wanstrath's Ruby Hoedown '08 Keynote —

I just totally love this kid. Chris explains the future and past of, uh, everything that matters, and gives good, solid, practical reasons for why contributing to free and open source software projects is something worth dedicating a large chunk of your time to.

Freedom 0 —

Ahh, those were the days… What’s left to fight for?

Postgres for the win! —

Yep. I can’t think of a single piece of technology that’s been less of a PITA than postgres. In fact, when I think about “solid software,” postgres is the first thing that comes to mind.

GNUpdf —

“The goal of the GNU PDF project is to develop and provide a free, high-quality, complete and portable set of libraries and programs to manage the PDF file format, and associated technologies. ”

ZFS Puts Net App Viability at Risk? —

Schwartz: “… we will be going after sizable monetary damages. And I am committing that Sun will donate half of those proceeds to the leading institutions promoting free software and patent reform, and to the legal defense of free software innovators.”

Microsoft 'evidence' turns against them [tectonic.co.za] —

“The market needs to understand that the study Microsoft is citing actually proves the opposite of what they claim it does.”

Open Letter to Jonathan Schwartz from NeoOffice.org —

Best Open Letter Ever. Add your signature!

Planet PostgreSQL —

How long has this been here?

Sun joins the Free Software Foundation —

Bravo.

Open Source Conversations: Stephen O'Grady —

Nice.

Gyre - The open source, web-based IDE and debugger for Rails —

Interesting concept. I’ll have to check this out once it comes out of “pre-pre-pre alpha” (which doesn’t really make sense, btw. There’s nothing more alpha than alpha).

Vienna —

Nice looking Newsreader for Mac OS X (F/OSS with an Apache 2.0 license and public subversion repository).

Fedora Legacy shutting down —

This seems like really bad news to me.

2006: The year the Free Software Foundation reached out to the community —

Interesting look at how the FSF is picking up a more activist role with tech. politics and policy. Mentions the GPL v3 process, BadVista.org, and the anti-DRM site, Defective By Design.

The Problem of Open Source in the Microsoft World —

I’m sorry but it is just baffling to me how developers and cough evangelists can put up with this kind of behavior as being the sort-of default mode of operation at MS. The company needs to consider massive sweeping changes in the way they treat develop

Microsoft versus FOSS Configuration Management —

“Dependency management is probably the most important contribution of open source to software engineering.” — I don’t know about that but it’s definitely up there. It’s mind boggling that MS hasn’t developed some form of package management.

GPL Java: An interview with lead Kaffe developer Dalibor Topic —

Good perspective on Java going GPL.

Free software is a weak mode of production | Free Software Magazine —

“The success of GNU/Linux and other free software projects is annoying.”

EU Parliament bins software patent bill —

“by a massive majority”

The Free Software Definition - GNU Project - Free Software Foundation (FSF) —

Just wanted to link to this because it pisses me off that download.com is the first hit in a google search for “Free Software”. Bha!

Patent absurdity —

Stallman on the EU software patent mess.

The 80-20 problem —

This is mostly true in my experience. It’s too bad we had to pick on some nice Python projects to make the point but true is true.

Writing code for others that use it —

Damn if I haven’t started writing this post 10 times and stopped because I couldn’t get the point out. Well said, Bill.

Open-source LAMP a beacon to developers —

Beautiful. Our pal Stephen O'Grady gets a nice quote in this one. To the moon!

Linus compares Linux and BSDs —

“Which mindset is right? Mine, of course. People who disagree with me are by definition crazy. (Until I change my mind, when they can suddenly become upstanding citizens)”

The History of the GNU General Public License —

“What led Stallman to the creation of this copyleft license was his experience with James Gosling, creator of NeWs and the Java programming language, and UniPress, over Emacs.”

Seth Vidal : Fedora Foundation —

Seth on the recent Fedora Foundation announcement: “It reminds me of the announcements about 2 years ago for something called the Red Hat Linux Project.”

The Most Powerful Labor Union in the World: Linux? —

I don’t even know what to think of this…

How The Kernel Development Process Works —

Debunking the common myth that anyone can commit changes to any F/OSS project whenever they.

Okay, James Gosling isn't really this ignorant... —

Yes he is! He seems to not understand even fundamental F/OSS licensing concepts and always throws up that same “Open Source = everyone can check in anything” strawman.

SCO to Groklaw's PJ: Who Are You? —

Haha! SCO is out of control.

MIT Backs Brazil's Free Software over Microsoft —

I’m seriously considering considering moving to Brazil. That country is really starting to get their shit together and the gov seems close to the people.

JBoss Killed Hunter S Thompson —

Another reason to hate JBoss. :)

Microsoft's first explicit anti-GNU/Linux ad —

From Oct 23, 2000 issue of the German language magazine c’t

Bill Gates and other communists —

Stallman cutting through the bullshit.

Open Sores Software Development —

“Save Money, Save Time, Save Your Ass”

The open source monopoly —

Nice look at how companies are releasing new products under F/OSS licenses but missing much of the spirit.

LA city councilman says open source = more cops —

Next time someone asks you “why?” tell them you’re all about putting more cops on the street.. That doesn’t have value?

Linux in Government: Another Look at Linux in the MS Infrastructure —

Samba eating Microsoft’s lunch. I smell a patent infingement case…

Gilberto Gil's extraordinary engagement with Brazilians —

Wow! You mean the political figures talk to the people in this backward country? That’s never going to work!

Eclipse Java-GNOME Demo —

Demo of 100% free Java/Eclipse natively compiled with gcj. This is slated for Fedora Core 4.

Open-Source Java Under Consideration —

Hmmm.. Maybe the confirmed “three letter part” referred to: “S” “U” “N”?

The Emerging Economics of Open Source Software —

Finally got a chance to read through this massive piece. It’s worth the time if you have it.

Open Source Radio —

“A space for you to help contribute to a forthcoming CBC radio column about the open-source movement.” This is a great example of blog-as-collaboration-tool.

MSFT refuses to give 15 XP licenses for tsunami relief related work —

I almost puked when I read this. I hope there’s just been a mix up or something.

A Sneak Peek at GNOME 2.10 —

Looks like a nice little upgrade..

MilkMint GTK2 Theme (for GNOME) —

A nice and simple theme for GTK2/GNOME desktop environments (click thumbnail image to see larger screenshot).

CNet: Red Hat tries again with Linux enthusiasts —

Decent coverage of recent Fedora activity. Things should start kicking up here now that Fedora Extras CVS is available and Seth Vital is taking a more active role.

Free Software Magazine —

This could be really cool.

Experimental Culture —

A look at the past, present, and possible future of GNOME culture.

IBM Gives FOSS Free Access to 500 Patents - Rethinks IP Management —

Was this a typo or something?

New Voices —

$12,000 grants for people who want to take on building community based micro-local news projects.

Commons-based Peer Production —

Ted Leung generalizes his involvement w/ free and open source software as being a simple contribution to the societal commons. Interesting viewpoint.

Bruno Souza to Sun: "Stop Saying That 'Our Implementation Is Open Source,' It Is Not" —

Right. The issue is the (lack of) redistribution rights, not whether the source is available. Free Linux distros cannot ship Sun’s Java (or IBM’s by extension). Lastly, Bruno needs a spell-checker.. bad.

Torvalds: A Solaris skeptic —

Linus on Solaris going OSS.

Optimize Me Harder —

“Nobody really modifies the source of open source software.” — somebody didn’t get that memo; possibly all of australia..

Open Source Licenses Are Not All the Same —

Pretty good look at the four mainstream F/OSS license models.