4 ms·

I don't think it's any coincidence at all that the most successful open source effort ever is the same one where there is the greatest force of personality in c

I don't think it's any coincidence at all that the most successful open source effort ever is the same one where there is the greatest force of personality in charge, who insists on maintaining top-down control. I'm not convinced that lateral organization between developers can ever work very well.

sgift 16y ago
Besides your hyperbole "most successful" I point to FreeBSD for a quite successful open source project which is not controlled top-down by one person. Apache httpd (or other apache projects) also come to mind.
- jshen 16y ago
  I have no idea how FreeBSD is managed. Is it explained anywhere? I'd love to see how it compares to linux.
  - sgift 16y ago
    They gave a presentation with an accompanying paper a few years ago to explain how the project works: http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-4400856579609253323 http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-4400856579609253323 http://www.watson.org/~robert/freebsd/2006eurobsdcon/eurobsdcon2006-howfreebsdworks.pdf http://www.watson.org/~robert/freebsd/2006eurobsdcon/eurobsd...
  - kunley 16y ago
    There's a Core Team reelected each 2 years. Btw it just changed: http://docs.freebsd.org/cgi/getmsg.cgi?fetch=11461+0+/usr/local/www/db/text/2010/freebsd-announce/20100718.freebsd-announce http://docs.freebsd.org/cgi/getmsg.cgi?fetch=11461+0+/usr/lo... Btw, they have an excellent practice of quarter reports, here's the latest: http://www.freebsd.org/news/status/report-2010-04-2010-06.html http://www.freebsd.org/news/status/report-2010-04-2010-06.ht... I wish every opensource community had such clean summary of what they do.
- jpablo 16y ago
  While I think FreeBSD has created a great piece of software I don't think you can say that they are as successful as Linux.
  - jvdh 16y ago
    You can't really compare the two. If you want to compare you'd have to look at GNU/Linux. Attributing that success to just the genius of Linus goes a bit too far.
  - kunley 16y ago
    While the FreeBSD people didn't have their momentum to market themselves in a way Linux community had, they still manage to produce better system. The other thing is that most people, even who consider themselves OS hackers, don't need such sophisticated and cohesive system. Or they don't have an opportunity to really dive in to see the difference.
- WilliamLP 16y ago
  Wouldn't "hyperbole" imply that the statement isn't literally true?
  - sgift 16y ago
    Singling out Linux as the most successful open source project is not literally true in my opinion. It is successful, other projects are successful too - how do you want to determine "most successful"?
    - moe 16y ago
      It is successful, other projects are successful too - how do you want to determine "most successful"? Most mindshare? Most impact? Most users? I wonder what metric you'd come up with that doesn't have Linux come out on top.
      - pixelbath 16y ago
        I'd believe more users have heard of Firefox than have heard of Linux.
        moe 16y ago
        Agreed. That's one (valid) metric. But I think once you take at least two into account...
        lamnk 16y ago
        IMO if you count servers installed with Linux as "users" then Linux may have more users than Firefox (no hard data to back this up though)
        bad_user 16y ago
        And yet more users are using services running on top of Linux than are using Firefox. The best infrastructure software is the one you don't even know it exists ;)
      - riffraff 16y ago
- pquerna 16y ago
  re: Apache, I don't believe that most people understand the scope of the current Apache Foundation. From a recent members meeting: Projects: 84 Incubating: 36 Labs: 30 Committers: 2359 Members: 298 iCLAs on file: 3583 SVN Revisions: r962795 While some of those 84 Top Level Projects aren't well known, many of them are the standard implementation used in their respective places -- and many of them have strong communities years after their project started. I think Apache is important in this sense, because its building up new projects with similar community expectations, rather than just being held up as a 'good way' to do things.
- SkyMarshal 16y ago
  If you include the personality-driven schism between FreeBSD, OpenBSD, and NetBSD, it's not so clear the 'core-team' maintainer model works so well. That's what Ted Tso was warning the Linux community about back in '98.
  - JoachimSchipper 16y ago
    What personality-driven schism? (I'm serious: you could reasonably argue that the OpenBSD/NetBSD split was personality-driven, but to the best of my knowledge, FreeBSD has no personality conflicts with either.)
jshen 16y ago
and the arguably most successful company (apple) has the same force of personality.
onedognight 16y ago
> who insists on maintaining top-down control This is quite the opposite of what he insists on. He insists on good code, not control. He maintains control because of the former. He went so far as to design git to avoid top-down control and make sure that anyone can fork the code at any time. The funny thing about the ARM "blow up" is that all the ARM devs for the most part agree with him. Things needed to change, he knew it and they knew it. He just provided the push.

sgift 16y ago

Besides your hyperbole "most successful" I point to FreeBSD for a quite successful open source project which is not controlled top-down by one person. Apache httpd (or other apache projects) also come to mind.

jshen 16y ago
I have no idea how FreeBSD is managed. Is it explained anywhere? I'd love to see how it compares to linux.
- sgift 16y ago
  They gave a presentation with an accompanying paper a few years ago to explain how the project works: http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-4400856579609253323 http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-4400856579609253323 http://www.watson.org/~robert/freebsd/2006eurobsdcon/eurobsdcon2006-howfreebsdworks.pdf http://www.watson.org/~robert/freebsd/2006eurobsdcon/eurobsd...
- kunley 16y ago
  There's a Core Team reelected each 2 years. Btw it just changed: http://docs.freebsd.org/cgi/getmsg.cgi?fetch=11461+0+/usr/local/www/db/text/2010/freebsd-announce/20100718.freebsd-announce http://docs.freebsd.org/cgi/getmsg.cgi?fetch=11461+0+/usr/lo... Btw, they have an excellent practice of quarter reports, here's the latest: http://www.freebsd.org/news/status/report-2010-04-2010-06.html http://www.freebsd.org/news/status/report-2010-04-2010-06.ht... I wish every opensource community had such clean summary of what they do.
jpablo 16y ago
While I think FreeBSD has created a great piece of software I don't think you can say that they are as successful as Linux.
- jvdh 16y ago
  You can't really compare the two. If you want to compare you'd have to look at GNU/Linux. Attributing that success to just the genius of Linus goes a bit too far.
- kunley 16y ago
  While the FreeBSD people didn't have their momentum to market themselves in a way Linux community had, they still manage to produce better system. The other thing is that most people, even who consider themselves OS hackers, don't need such sophisticated and cohesive system. Or they don't have an opportunity to really dive in to see the difference.
WilliamLP 16y ago
Wouldn't "hyperbole" imply that the statement isn't literally true?
- sgift 16y ago
  Singling out Linux as the most successful open source project is not literally true in my opinion. It is successful, other projects are successful too - how do you want to determine "most successful"?
  - moe 16y ago
    It is successful, other projects are successful too - how do you want to determine "most successful"? Most mindshare? Most impact? Most users? I wonder what metric you'd come up with that doesn't have Linux come out on top.
    - pixelbath 16y ago
      I'd believe more users have heard of Firefox than have heard of Linux.
      - moe 16y ago
        Agreed. That's one (valid) metric. But I think once you take at least two into account...
      - lamnk 16y ago
        IMO if you count servers installed with Linux as "users" then Linux may have more users than Firefox (no hard data to back this up though)
      - bad_user 16y ago
        And yet more users are using services running on top of Linux than are using Firefox. The best infrastructure software is the one you don't even know it exists ;)
    - riffraff 16y ago
pquerna 16y ago
re: Apache, I don't believe that most people understand the scope of the current Apache Foundation. From a recent members meeting: Projects: 84 Incubating: 36 Labs: 30 Committers: 2359 Members: 298 iCLAs on file: 3583 SVN Revisions: r962795 While some of those 84 Top Level Projects aren't well known, many of them are the standard implementation used in their respective places -- and many of them have strong communities years after their project started. I think Apache is important in this sense, because its building up new projects with similar community expectations, rather than just being held up as a 'good way' to do things.
SkyMarshal 16y ago
If you include the personality-driven schism between FreeBSD, OpenBSD, and NetBSD, it's not so clear the 'core-team' maintainer model works so well. That's what Ted Tso was warning the Linux community about back in '98.
- JoachimSchipper 16y ago
  What personality-driven schism? (I'm serious: you could reasonably argue that the OpenBSD/NetBSD split was personality-driven, but to the best of my knowledge, FreeBSD has no personality conflicts with either.)

jshen 16y ago

and the arguably most successful company (apple) has the same force of personality.

onedognight 16y ago

> who insists on maintaining top-down control This is quite the opposite of what he insists on. He insists on good code, not control. He maintains control because of the former. He went so far as to design git to avoid top-down control and make sure that anyone can fork the code at any time. The funny thing about the ARM "blow up" is that all the ARM devs for the most part agree with him. Things needed to change, he knew it and they knew it. He just provided the push.