Hugh MacLeod wrote a post entitled “how well does open source currently meet the needs of shareholders and ceo’s” wondering why there are no open source billionaires around, considering how good is open source.
Many others joined the conversation, I would reccomend reading Seth Godin, JP Rangaswami and Rick Segal.
Electronic Frontier Foundation, Free Software Foundation Europe and Open Rights Group launched a call for action because next week the European Parliament will vote IPRED2, the EU’s second intellectual property enforcement directive.
Against software patent by kianee
If it passes in its current form, as reported by the Open Rights Group:
“aiding, abetting, or inciting†copyright infringement on a “commercial scale†in the EU will become a crime. What’s more, it will be the first time the EU will force countries to impose minimal criminal sanctions – this is normally left up to the discretion of member states.
The FSFE has prepared an open letter to the MEPs, the proposed text, in all formats and languages, can be found on the proposal’s eur-lex page. FSFE endorses amending that text with the compromise amendments hosted on FFII’s site.
Electronic Frontier Foundation has also set up a web site to help stop the directive in its current form.
Act now!
With the new year Linden went (partially) Open Source releasing its Second Life client with a GPLv2 license with a FLOSS exception. In the meanwhile later was created the first “open source” Second Life server. Few days ago Peter Seebach wrote an insightful post on hacking Second Life client that I warmly recommend to anyone interested in the subject.
10, 9, .. ignition! by bryan campen
NASA within the CoLab initiative is taking second life seriously, with a classroom-course facilitated virtual build of the International Space Station in Second Life. The project is aimed at catalyzing the volunteer community, and teach them about the ISS, space sciences, and technical skills.
If you are interested just in knowing more about on line virtual worlds read this mini-guide.
Reading Wayne Porter I happened to know about Open Source Cinema, likely not the very first push for Open Source Film, but for sure now on a stage level.
B-movie heroin by ale2000
As Porter suggests the question how makers make money is still open , since they are still searching for someone to fund their film. I googled around and I found another interesting post on viability, not a definitive answer though.
Yesterday StillSecure, a firm founded in 2000 specialized in creating secure network infrastructure software, announced Cobia, an (almost) open source modular framework for networking and security.
Christian Koch, Network Engineer at a technology infrastructure services company, said:
The convergence of networking and security is increasingly requiring administrators to deploy solutions once and then redistribute them across the network as needs evolve. Cobia is the first real option for those who understand the benefits of using an open, modular, software-based approach to networking and security, and how it enables users to take advantage of advances in general computing hardware to dramatically decrease cost of ownership.
Currently the Cobia platform is in the beta phase, and apparently its community, currently reaches over 1,000 users involved.
There are two Cobia licenses, the community one, named after the company StillSecure Community License 1.0, is not approved by OSI and I believe it doesn’t qualify, since it requires you to sign a Contribution Agreement if you distribute modified version of the software.
Mitchell Ashley, StillSecure CTO, summarized Cobia characteristics as follows:
1. Cobia is a software platform for networking and security.
Cobia can operate on a variety of hardware platforms (Intel/AMD) including off-the-shelf servers and computers, hardware appliances, blades such as blade servers and blades within network infrastructure gear.
2. Cobia is plug-n-play network and security modules.[..] Cobia is all about modularity, right down to its software architecture. Cobia Modules for networking and security are available today on the Cobia site. Additional modules are under development and as the Cobia community grows, I anticipate there will be a variety of people creating modules for Cobia.[..]
7. Virtualizing the network.
[..] Cobia ushers in virtualization for networking and security right now. Today, you can run Cobia as a VMware instance on Windows or Linux. Download Cobia from the site ready to run in VMware.
Sahana , an Open Source Disaster Management system that addresses the common coordination problems during a disaster from finding missing people, has won the 2006 Free Software Award for Projects of Social Benefit awarded by the Free Software Foundation.
The Free Software Award for Projects of Social Benefit is presented to a free software project that intentionally and significantly benefits society through collaboration to accomplish an important social task.
Sahana was created, in the wake of the tsunami that devastated Southeast Asia in 2004, to compensate for the devastating consequences of a government attempt to manually manage the process of locating victims, distributing aid and coordinating volunteers.
Four members from the Sahana team (Chamindra, Pradeeper, Mifan and Ravindra) were present at the meeting to receive the Free Software award for Project of Social Benefit!! This is a truly great achievement, kudos to you all!
As reported by Anuradha Weeraman besides the four members from the Sahana team (Chamindra, Pradeeper, Mifan and Ravindra) other notable attendees were present, like Bruce Perens and Ted Ts’o.
The presentation by Mako Hill on “Defining Free Culture†was quite informative on some of the good work he’s been upto lately. Eben Moglen’s oratory was impressive as always and Gerald Sussman confounded the audience with some deep mathematics. RMS spoke on software patents.
The Sahana project leader Chamindra de Silva said:
We are deeply honored to receive this award and were so excited we traveled half way around the world from Sri Lanka to attend the ceremony today. The Sahana project is all about a cohesive disaster response between multiple agencies and bringing them together to help victims. None of this would have been possible without the work of the wider free software community, and we would not have been able to bring benefit to the victims and the people who help the victims without that. It is a credit to the whole community.
is completing his doctoral thesis at the University of Cambridge with a thesis entitled “Quality Improvement in Volunteer Free, and Open Source Projects: Exploring the Impact of Release Management“.
Time by gastronauten
I happened to know about his thesis reading an article on linux.com, and I saw also Matt Asay posted on the subject, so over the weekend I took my chance to read it.
First I wish to public thank Martin to mention our paper “Capability Coordination in Modular Organization: Voluntary FS/OSS Production and the Case of Debian GNU/Linux“. He cited our findings talking about release management in volunteer teams and also about problem of organization when a coordination effort is required to accomplish complex goals.
I totally agree with him when he states that the ‘release when it’s ready’ policy might heavily affects large (complex) projects, because:
It can lead to delays, out-of-date software, and frustration, and it also means that users and vendors cannot plan, because nobody knows when the software will actually be released.
I remember Mark Brewer, Covalent CEO, saying that, even if Covalent has about 40 software engineers involved with Apache, they can’t assure that a feature will be available at a certain date. He also did similar considerations talking about road-map’s decisions. No wonder though, that is the way it is when it comes to community-driven Open Source projects.
Getting back to Martin research his abstract reports:
This dissertation explores why, and under which circumstances, the time based release strategy is a viable alternative to feature-driven development and discusses factors that influence a successful implementation of this release strategy. It is argued that this release strategy acts as a coordination mechanism in large volunteer projects that are geographically dispersed. The time based release strategy allows a more controlled development and release process in projects which have little control of their contributors and therefore contributes to the quality of the output.
I read some chapters of the paper, and I was impressed by the quality and the depth of his studies. I believe that the introduction of time based releases leads to a more controlled development, positively affecting the resulting overall quality. In his words:
[..] the time based release strategy can be considered as an important means of quality improvement in FOSS projects.
Kudos to Martin to honestly have highlighted that there are problems in Open Source projects, he also stressed the importance of Regularity and the Use of schedule. As a matter of fact the use of schedule claims a project management function (release manager), reducing somehow the degree of independence among contributors. Our research in this respect stated that:
[..] a pure modular structure – that is one lacking of hierarchy, such as a market – embeds flexibility, but it lacks coherence, the ability to coevolve after adapting to change.(cfr. Langlois Richard “Do firm plan?” 1995)
A hierarchy is a must, then, when you need to manage a complex activity coordinating many contributors, either volunteers or employees. Martin makes clear that policies and infrastructures are needed to support his release strategy.
Reading the paragraph “Limitations and Future Research” I would suggest another question:
Introducing time-based release management could move developers’ focus from software’s effectiveness to meeting release targets? How to balance the trade-off between time and quality?
How to balance the trade-off between time and quality?
I think this is the key question.
GNOME has happily released versions with key features missing because they weren’t ready in time. This just isn’t viable for a commercial provider of desktops, who would then have to cover for the “failure” of the open source model, probably by not shipping that version of GNOME in their desktops.
Ubuntu similarly has shipped releases with major holes in them, again something that the proprietary world would not do, because it would slow adoption, and defeat the commercial point of a release.
Sure clearer time tables, and clearer planning may be good for organizing the work, but ultimately deadlines will go whoosh, if the work isn’t done, and that is how it needs to be if people depend on the product finally delivered.
Simon,
I totally agree with you, at the end of the day time-based release management can address few issues indeed, but it is not a panacea.
In another post I mentioned that within an hybrid production model paid employees are often responsible for less attractive tasks, as results from “GNOME, a case of open source global software development”, also by Martin.
Corporate production has to be on Time on Budget. The firm solves the problem of finding the efficient management of human resources through time not allowing the free entry and exit, and delegating production control to a manager.
Community-based production on the contrary allows volunteers to enter and choose their tasks. Volunteers choosing what to do apply for tasks they like, and that they are likely to accomplish effectively. They can also freely exit from a project though, or not to end their tasks on time.
Do you agree?
I don’t see why dropping features to hit a target is necessarily a hallmark of F/OSS process failure. Consider Microsoft pulling WinFS from Vista.
The company I work for will not consider using Debian for any server because of the lack of any kind of predictable release cycle. Indeed, having a commitment to (say) 12 month release periods, and missing that commitment, would be better than none at all.
Ofcom, the independent regulator and competition authority for the UK communications industries,released a discussion document to encourage debate around public service intervention in digital media and the concept of the Public Service Publisher. The Open Knowledge Foundation made a joint response in association with the Open Rights Group to OfCom’s Public Service Publisher consultation.
Public Content by jlori
Firstly, we commend the suggested investment in open content and open data. In particular we urge that, where the PSP funds the generation of new content, such content should always be made available under a license such that others are free to enjoy, redistribute and, most importantly, reuse and refashion that content.
Secondly, we ask that OfCom pay special attention to the ability of the PSP to invest in architectures of participation, both by supporting the development of Free, Libre and Open Source Software (FLOSS) and Open Content technologies and projects and by investing in the creation of content to encourage the growth of networks around these technologies.[..]
The success of an endeavour like the PSP will rely upon these details of its founding principles, and we urge OfCom to pay significant attention to those details now. For example, the PSP may commission a website for people to post and discuss short films, investing in the “architectures of participation†suggested above. But unless the use of Free/Open Source software is specified, and the resulting website platform is ‘open’, allowing re-use and modification by other interested parties, the PSP will not be fully meeting its public service remit. Similarly, The PSP might commission a set of short films to be placed on the website, to seed its growth as a network. But unless the PSP commission explicitly requires that the resulting work be ‘open’ so that others are free to use, reuse and redistribute the work, the PSP’s audience will remain ‘consumers’ of content, and the PSP will have failed to maximise the opportunities of the digital age.
Finally, the PSP should engage in advocacy and educational initiatives to enable people, organisations and companies to publish their material using open licenses, formats and technologies. It is our sincere hope that the PSP can become a strong, public voice in favour of open knowledge structures.
Priority Sign by Pete Reed
Representatives of the US government have demanded that the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) come up with a solution for prioritizing certain data within government networks and at the interfaces to other networks. [..]
At the IETF meeting in Prague Antonio Desimone of the US Department of Defense said that the switch to a “global grid” raised a number of issues, such as how delivery of a specific e-mail could be ensured within a defined period of time. What was needed was a prioritizing of data, one that also took in emergency and catastrophe scenarios. [..]
The solution would have to encompass the networks of partners, such as NATO, as well as public and commercial networks. As it was, the prioritizing of important data traffic was a topic of interest to all sides, he declared. [..]
At the IETF meeting in Prague it was impossible to miss that some parties had their doubts about a default “priority bit” for data traffic. Commenting on the idea Fred Baker, Cisco developer and former head of the IETF, told heise online: “Realizing the prioritization in all servers is undoubtedly a controversial matter with the IETF.” He said he was especially worried that prioritization might in reality not be confined to authorized persons. Should confinement fail script kids and hackers might find ways to use “priority bits” for their purposes, he observed.
Tom Hoffman, project manager of SchoolTool, an initiative funded by the Shuttleworth Foundation to create an open source framework for schools using Python and Zope, recently gave a presentation titled “Managing an International, Philanthropically Funded Open-Source Project from a Victorian in Elmwood.â€
Schoolroom by cake_land
But while schools may pay large sums for information systems, they often cannot add a feature or change an option to accommodate a particular scholastic arrangement. This causes problems for school administrators constantly. With proprietary software, it may even be illegal to analyze the technology in an attempt to make such changes.
He said.
Schools face difficult challenges because their scheduling, resources and classes regularly change and, importantly, differ from one school to the next. Open-source projects such as SchoolTool are based on collaboration between the author and users, who can improve and alter the source code to meet a specific need.
It is difficult to bootstrap this kind of open-source project in schools that have stable technical infrastructure like here in the United States or in Europe. SchoolTool is more explicitly philanthropic and aimed at the developing world in the long term.
So SchoolTool is not specificly addressed to schools already having a stable infrastructure.
Tom has also wrote a letter to to Kenneth Whang, the NSF program officer in charge for the Scratch programming environment asking to publicly release the source code of the project, supposed to be already available as stated by the website.
Apparently Mitch Resnick from the project replied, but his answer wasn’t fully satisfactory indeed.
About Tom Hoffman.
As a teacher, free software project manager and developer, and blogger, Tom Hoffman advocates for progressive educational reform and practical open source technology in schools. Since 2004 Tom has managed SchoolTool.
About SchoolTool.
It is a project to develop a global school administration infrastructure that is freely available under an open-source license and designed to be used on an unlimited number of machines by an unlimited number of clients. Via a Web browser interface accessible through any operating system, SchoolTool allows schools to manage enrollment information, scheduling, attendance and grades, generate reports, and import and export data.
About Scratch.
Scratch is a new programming language that makes it easy to create your own interactive stories, animations, games, music, and art — and share your creations on the web. Scratch is designed to enhance the technological fluency of young people, helping them learn to express themselves creatively with new technologies. As they create Scratch projects, young people learn important mathematical and computational ideas, and they gain a deeper understanding of the process of design.
We are a school based in Mozambique. Looking for a tool that would help us in School Administration. How do I download it to see what it can do for me?
Hi Jac, schoolTool is still under development. Have a look at SchoolForge news journal to find school-related open source resources, and take your time to read also the BECTA report.
I hope it helps.
Roberto Galoppini, 
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