 | Level: Introductory Gary Pollice, Professor of Practice, Worcester Polytechnic Institute
15 Jun 2006 from The Rational Edge: A favorable review of a guide to open source software, including the nuts and bolts of using open source software and building open source communities.  by Ron Goldman and Richard P. Gabriel
Morgan Kaufmann, 2005
ISBN: 1558608893
424 pages
Open source software has changed the face of the software industry. It no longer makes sense to try creating a product from scratch. Trying to understand open source and how to apply it to sound business strategy can be difficult and confusing. Ron Goldman and Richard Gabriel have given us a lucid treatment of how to leverage open source software in Innovation Happens Elsewhere.
The book focuses on the business issues and benefits of adopting open source software. The authors were two leading advocates of open source adoption at Sun Microsystems and have been members of the open source community for years. They share their experience and knowledge with the reader in an easy-to-read, interesting book that covers open source from A to Z.
The first four chapters introduce open source. The authors tell us: "Effective innovation is not merely being able to invent and improve, but also being able to determine what to invent and how to improve. High productivity requires doing less to produce as much or more -- a company that requires its own employees to labor hard and long to make its products or perform its services will be less profitable, in general, than one that can take advantage of the efforts of others." They point out that there are a lot of smart people creating software, and most of them don't work for your organization. This leads to the conclusion that adopting open source make obvious sense.
A culture has arisen around open source software, and you need to understand its rules if you are going to become a part of it. Beginning with the fifth chapter, the authors take you into the nuts and bolts of using open source software and building your own open source communities. Chapter 5 tackles licensing, a very important issue if you plan on using open source software in commercial applications. Chapters 6 through 9 discuss how to organize and run open source projects and how to succeed in doing it. Goldman and Gabriel spend a lot of time on the human issues, such as how to guide visitors to your project and honor the elders who are the long-time, respected members of the community. The lessons of these chapters will help you develop a successful open source product, rather than become a forgotten experiment.
The last chapter, which offers the authors' closing thoughts, is followed by four useful appendices. The first is a list of open source resources, including useful Websites, tools to help open source developers, and references to other articles and books. The second appendix contains the text of several open source licenses. This appendix is followed by a companion one that contains the text of contributor licenses -- a necessary but often overlooked part of open source development. The final appendix is a reprint of an article, "Codename Spinnaker," by Leigh Dodds that appeared on the XML.com Website. It chronicles the beginning of the Apache Spinnaker project, which was a refactoring initiative for the Xerces software. It provides an interesting insight to how open source projects work and some of the problems they encounter.
If you, as an individual, want to get involved in an open source project or start one of your own, this is a book you need to read. If you're a manager who is considering entering the open source arena, you need this book too. It will help you navigate the sometimes rough waters of open source projects.
About the author | 
| | Gary Pollice is a professor of practice at Worcester Polytechnic Institute, in Worcester, MA. He teaches software engineering, design, testing, and other computer science courses, and also directs student projects. Before entering the academic world, he spent more than thirty-five years developing various kinds of software, from business applications to compilers and tools. His last industry job was with IBM Rational software, where he was known as "the RUP Curmudgeon" and was also a member of the original Rational Suite team. He is the primary author of Software Development for Small Teams: A RUP-Centric Approach, published by Addison-Wesley in 2004. He holds a BA in mathematics and an MS in computer science. |
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