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> What has always suprised me about open source software is that the source is always 'out of band' From "Open Source is not enough" by Adam Spitz[1]: The Ope

by cxr 6y ago

> What has always suprised me about open source software is that the source is always 'out of band' From "Open Source is not enough" by Adam Spitz[1]: The Open Source movement is great, but it doesn’t go far enough. […] When I feel the Urge To Tinker, only rarely does it feel like a loud voice shouting in my brain with enough energy to propel me to find the website and download the source code and figure out how to find the part of the code that corresponds to the thing I’m looking at on the screen and make the change and restart the program and retrace my steps. Much more often it’s just a quiet voice mumbling, “Hey, it’d be kinda neat if…” and then I think, “Well, it’s Open Source, I guess I could go download the source code… but… meh, it’s so far out of my way, not worth it,” and the urge fizzles out. I think that a lot of potential human creativity is being wasted this way. > Of course I realise that this workflow is not technically possible in the way software is currently built, but it does seem worthwhile in the future I've been thinking a lot about this and working on it. On a technical level it's more possible than it seems—even with "conventional" toolchains—but the primary obstacle is going to be social rather than technical. Funnily enough, GitHub's popularity and its measurably less-than-optimal workflows actually serve as a preview of how difficult it will be overcoming stalwartism from people who are technophiles first and only think of productivity as an nth-level concern—somewhere at a lower priority than social media presence and ginning up demand for the skills and practices they've alrealy invested in. 1. https://web.archive.org/web/20151016184630/http://adamspitz.com/avocado/2011/05/05/open-source-is-not-enough/ https://web.archive.org/web/20151016184630/http://adamspitz....

eterps 6y ago
Thank you! My thoughts exactly. I just reposted this article: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24295133 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24295133
eterps 6y ago
Can you share some of your thoughts how this might be technically possible even with conventional toolchains?
- cxr 6y ago
  I've written about it before, but nothing I've worked on is in a good state that I can point to as an example. A big part of turning the tide is going to be about getting the messaging right, because even with the ability to grandfather in conventional toolchains, it requires a perspective shift/attitude adjustment on the part of developers, and oh boy are developers going to revel in shitting on the idea and downplaying the costs of continuing to do things the same way we always have. It involves non-destructive compilation and the ability to (re)publish tooling for a common platform. I've seen multiple comments here on HN in threads about compiler development where chrisseaton points out that compilers are pure functions. All you really need to do is combine that observation with the observation that we already have a near-universal substrate for doing computation. (And it might help further to recognize that releasing an open source project is fundamentally an act of publication, almost-but-not-quite in the vein of Knuth's literate programming.)

by cxr 6y ago

eterps 6y ago

Thank you! My thoughts exactly. I just reposted this article: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24295133 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24295133

eterps 6y ago

Can you share some of your thoughts how this might be technically possible even with conventional toolchains?

cxr 6y ago
I've written about it before, but nothing I've worked on is in a good state that I can point to as an example. A big part of turning the tide is going to be about getting the messaging right, because even with the ability to grandfather in conventional toolchains, it requires a perspective shift/attitude adjustment on the part of developers, and oh boy are developers going to revel in shitting on the idea and downplaying the costs of continuing to do things the same way we always have. It involves non-destructive compilation and the ability to (re)publish tooling for a common platform. I've seen multiple comments here on HN in threads about compiler development where chrisseaton points out that compilers are pure functions. All you really need to do is combine that observation with the observation that we already have a near-universal substrate for doing computation. (And it might help further to recognize that releasing an open source project is fundamentally an act of publication, almost-but-not-quite in the vein of Knuth's literate programming.)