Needed: An Open Source Rock Star
Tuesday, May 22, 2007 -
I've been working a lot with Sam Ramji (Microsoft), Phil Haack, Jon Galloway, and Scott Hanselman over the last few months on various ways that, together with Microsoft, we can help expand the Open Source landscape for .NET. Lots of ideas are on the table and one of them in particular seemed to be a pretty good one: An Open Source Incubator and so we thought we would run with it, to see how receptive the .NET developer world is to Open Source in general.
The idea here is that ideas for Open Source projects are spun up (either through suggestions or circumstance) and a group of Alpha Geeks gets together to help scope and form the initial architecture of the project. Then that project is handed off to a willing soul who would like to own it and run with it.
As a show of support, Sam has agreed to offer 1-2 MSDN licenses to support the ongoing development of the project, and we'll do the best we can to help get a community going for you.
Why Would I Want To Do This?
It's not easy running an Open Source project, for sure. However the upsides are pretty good:
- You get to work with some top-flight people who will want to contribute to your project
- You will be able to help the whole Open Source thing, which in turn helps out the whole community
- It's your chance to finally do things your way instead of wondering why things are done the *other* way
This is hopefully just the start of a bigger initiative between the OS community and Microsoft. Sam's position at Microsoft is all about fostering this kind of growth, and this is one way to get them to to do more the OS way! But we want to sort of "beta" the idea... and this is that chance :).
The First Project
So I volunteered to toss the first project into the ring (and with it, 2 MSDN licenses): The SubSonic Forums App. I've been working up this application for the Green Screen challenge, the idea here is to create a light-weight, pluggable forums "sub application" that people can drop into their web sites. I have some interesting ideas for it that I'll share with you - and if you're into it we can go over it and then it's all yours once the video series is finished!
Ideally we'd like to see a person who:
- Likes to blog
- Is a community-type who knows their way around a forum
- Has some good experience with .NET
- Has the time to commit to running an Open Source project (a couple hours a week-ish)
If you're up for this, send me your email (robconery at gmail) along with whatever information you'd like to share with us and we'll look it over.
I'm really hoping we can make something of this, and if you have any ideas - we'd love to hear em!
Let's take care of the folks doin' it first.
Thanks for supporting OSS on MS!
Sam Ramji
sramji@microsoft.com
I only wish my skill had reached a level I could be of some value to the project. I'm always here to help with testing in the mean time though.
I only wish my skill had reached a level I could be of some value to the project. I'm always here to help with testing in the mean time though.
Sam Rocks! Long Live Sam!
Sam Rocks! Long Live Sam!
The question is how do you measure who is "worthy"? Lines of code contributed? We all know that's a bad metric and ignores those who steer/architect. How is a project worthy? Number of downloads? Code churn?
I think poor Sam is in for a world of hurt if people start sulking they didn't get an MSDN license. (PS Sam; I'm sulking, obviously. Send me an MSDN license. And a dual core laptop. And some free t-shirts. And a test server. And ....)
There are far too few initiatives out there already! If you have an OS Project and you think you deserve and MSDN license - well go get one! I don't need to ask for you do I?
There are a lot of reasons OS projects fail, and by trying to go the route of offering as much setup help as we possibly can (architecture, project roadmap, kick-off, screening the project lead, etc) we are trying to do what we can to help make sure the project will succeed.
How do we decide? Well, how do YOU decide who to hire at your job? A lot of it is applicable experience (active in the .NET community, a blog, good development experience) and a lot of it is plain old "gut".
I do think we need to try this, however.
(And I decide to hire based on mad technical skills. Then the HR and consultancy people do the hard stuff around personality)
I think the hard part is in your phrase
If *you* have. It doesn't work like that a lot of the time. It's the grunts, not the project owners that may need more help. The project owners already have VS Professional, SQL 2005 and so on, otherwise how would they start the project...
No, it's the people coding up pet features in active projects (subtext being my example) that need "rewarded" as well.
(And I decide to hire based on mad technical skills. Then the HR and consultancy people do the hard stuff around personality)
I think the hard part is in your phrase
If *you* have. It doesn't work like that a lot of the time. It's the grunts, not the project owners that may need more help. The project owners already have VS Professional, SQL 2005 and so on, otherwise how would they start the project...
No, it's the people coding up pet features in active projects (subtext being my example) that need "rewarded" as well.
Grunts? What grunts? Subtext started as just Phil, CSK/SubSonic started as just me. Most OS projects start with one person, passionate enough to pursue their vision. I think you're missing my point here - I was saying if you already have an Open Source project - go ask for an MDSN license. I'm sure Sam would take a look and give it some thought.
"No, it's the people coding up pet features in active projects (subtext being my example) that need "rewarded" as well."
Rewarding everyone who contributes? How does that scale?
RE the Channel9 thing - I'm not sure why you think it's amusing?
My point is, I guess, that those starting a project tend to already have everything they need; through work or something else, otherwise they can't start it.
I'm not saying it's a bad idea at all (which was why it had occurred to me on C9); but I'm not sure it'll work as a kickstart; as those people who start something already have the tools.
Now if you handed them to the team leads in the same way MVPs got them last year, then an more interesting approach would be to give them out as prizes by the leaders for best contribution that month. The problem is never starting, it's getting everyone else on board and building a community of developers as well as users; that to me is more useful. An open source project lives or dies by its activity.
Fortunately, James Avery stepped in and hooked me up with an MSDN license.
However, I do see your point. We do want to try and make the most benefit possible.
@Everyone - Keep in mind that we're just trying this out as a beta as I pointed out in my post Beta: Incubator for .NET OSS Projects.
Rather than trying a BDUF (Big Design Up Front) approach, we're trying to do this in a more agile way. Consider this a "spike" if you will. A way for us to test the waters.
We don't want to "own" this thing. We want the community to own it. But we do want to caretake it until it reaches that point.
Another company just emailed me about offering hosting too. That's what we were hoping for.
More companies who say, "Hey! We benefit from OSS. Let's give back! Not to mention the benefits we get for being involved in this community."
Again, keep the feedback coming. It's become obvious that we need to setup some sort of wiki or something to track all this input. Rob? A Subsonic CMS Starter Site?
Another company just emailed me about offering hosting too. That's what we were hoping for.
More companies who say, "Hey! We benefit from OSS. Let's give back! Not to mention the benefits we get for being involved in this community."
Again, keep the feedback coming. It's become obvious that we need to setup some sort of wiki or something to track all this input. Rob? A Subsonic CMS Starter Site?
Hopfully there will be some level of "love" that the OS community can give out :).
Oh, and btw - do you need an MSDN license?
And Pedro it's a whole different area; if MS defend their patents and they are legit patents then fair enough, but that action doesn't stop some of us still wanting to develop and share that development.
Unless you're one of those who believe it can't be true open source if it runs on a closed platform, in which case "pah" to you *grin*
On a lark I hex edited the IL bytecode of the app I was gonna submit. Located in the file was every comment from my source along w/ complete variable names. VB3 "bytecode" far from being a optimized intermediate representation of my program was instead an obfuscated version of it.
At the touch of a button, MS had a way to simply reverse this bytecode into the actual VB source, comments and all. MS programmers had planning on reading everyone's code and copying the good bits to make their own VB apps. Get others to write the hard algorithms - brilliant.
That was the year MS discontinued QBASIC. They stopped people from downloading the QBASIC Interpreter and announced that they would not include it in future versions of Windows. The QBASIC community pleaded, nay begged, MS to release the sources. MS refused, they wanted people to _buy_ the (then new) VB4. Look how easy it is to port QB to VB they said. Pay up and you can still code.
So now MS wants to do OSS. That's "Open Source". The dev tools are very expensive. Couple months salary for the whole set. Paying someone $1000 so you can work is not "Open". Do you expect a non-coder to pay MS $1000 so they can view your Project/Code?
A couple years from now, the .NET framework will be replaced by the next big thing. Remember that. Will MS release the .NET sources?
If you want to work on Windows OSS, join the FreeBASIC community. It's what's left of MS "OSS". Or do the smart thing and develop Visual C++ (or some no cost MS compiler) apps for SourceForge. C++ is portable. When MS leaves you behind, you can port your code to a platform that really is Open.
On a lark I hex edited the IL bytecode of the app I was gonna submit. Located in the file was every comment from my source along w/ complete variable names. VB3 "bytecode" far from being a optimized intermediate representation of my program was instead an obfuscated version of it.
At the touch of a button, MS had a way to simply reverse this bytecode into the actual VB source, comments and all. MS programmers had planning on reading everyone's code and copying the good bits to make their own VB apps. Get others to write the hard algorithms - brilliant.
That was the year MS discontinued QBASIC. They stopped people from downloading the QBASIC Interpreter and announced that they would not include it in future versions of Windows. The QBASIC community pleaded, nay begged, MS to release the sources. MS refused, they wanted people to _buy_ the (then new) VB4. Look how easy it is to port QB to VB they said. Pay up and you can still code.
So now MS wants to do OSS. That's "Open Source". The dev tools are very expensive. Couple months salary for the whole set. Paying someone $1000 so you can work is not "Open". Do you expect a non-coder to pay MS $1000 so they can view your Project/Code?
A couple years from now, the .NET framework will be replaced by the next big thing. Remember that. Will MS release the .NET sources?
If you want to work on Windows OSS, join the FreeBASIC community. It's what's left of MS "OSS". Or do the smart thing and develop Visual C++ (or some no cost MS compiler) apps for SourceForge. C++ is portable. When MS leaves you behind, you can port your code to a platform that really is Open.
The dev tools are free, btw. All of the one's you'll need. And if you don't want the free ones (in case you missed this), MS is giving out MSDN licenses which means you can back the truck up to the MS softwarehouse.
Yes, I'm sure software will evolve and with it, the way we write code. I'll be right there, learning as I go (which is the definition of my job), while others crankily complain about "those darn kids and their new platform".
Finally, I'd rather rip my eyeballs out with a fork than ever touch anything related to VBx, ever again. If I wanted to do something completely MS-free, I'd go the Mono route.
Hey wait - I did already.
As you can tell, I'm not into the "WTF-ers" out there who like to pile on. Trying to do something positive here people...
The dev tools are free, btw. All of the one's you'll need. And if you don't want the free ones (in case you missed this), MS is giving out MSDN licenses which means you can back the truck up to the MS softwarehouse.
Yes, I'm sure software will evolve and with it, the way we write code. I'll be right there, learning as I go (which is the definition of my job), while others crankily complain about "those darn kids and their new platform".
Finally, I'd rather rip my eyeballs out with a fork than ever touch anything related to VBx, ever again. If I wanted to do something completely MS-free, I'd go the Mono route.
Hey wait - I did already.
As you can tell, I'm not into the "WTF-ers" out there who like to pile on. Trying to do something positive here people...
Sam Ramji , Phil Haack, Jon Galloway, Scott Hanselman & Rob Conery.
It seems you havent checked the hottest product in the top 10 category on Sourceforge or Codeplex.
Developed on .Net3.0 I swear it rocks.
Do check it out guys.
I bet you would find it interesting