Re: [dev] Open Source DIY ethics

From: Jan Bessai <jan.bessai_AT_tu-dortmund.de>
Date: Sat, 22 Dec 2018 11:26:19 +0100

On 12/22/18 8:57 AM, Hiltjo Posthuma wrote:
> On Sat, Dec 22, 2018 at 01:55:51PM +1300, Martin Tournoij wrote:
>> [...]
>> I wrote a brief article about "Open source DIY ethics", which I think
>> describes the mentality of open source development for many (in the
>> suckless community it's more explicit, but I think it's hardly contained
>> to suckless):
>> [...]
>
> [...] I liked the article and the Dutch bicycle example :) [...]

Thanks for the article. I also enjoyed it.

You might add that keeping things small is crucial for the described way
of operating. Otherwise things are impossible to understand for casual
contributors. Suckless embodies this as a core value. In your analogy
you can DIY fix bicycles, but DIY fixing airbags in cars is probably a
bad idea (unless you are resourceful enough to do crash tests). With
software, browser engines are a good example: surf currently uses
Webkit, because writing browser engines is inherently complicated. Just
as with cars, many things are complicated instead of complex, because of
complicated standards.
Received on Sat Dec 22 2018 - 11:26:19 CET