4 ms·

You're selecting against employees working at Fortune 500 who are limited from participating in open source, unless filling some horrifying paperwork.

isbvhodnvemrwvn 6y ago
At my former company there was a three step process for contributing to open source: - get approval from VP to spend time on that - get approval from legal (they checked the license and if the company has any liability from that code not working, this alone took a couple months) - get approval for release of code from a so called open-source committee (basically checked if your contribution doesn't damage company's reputation) It was easier to set up a fake account and get things fixed this way. But no way I could do that on company hardware or time.
- pbhjpbhj 6y ago
  We're talking about contributions in one's own time, outside of work and not using their resources??
  - isbvhodnvemrwvn 6y ago
    Are we? > I will still think odd that’s someone who is a professional hasn’t found one bug in an open source lib that is worth a PR or even an issue in a decade of work. It seems like the person is surprised how nobody has any contributions from just their professional work. Naturally unless I had no life outside of programming I would spend the vast majority of my time doing my 9-5 stuff.
  - tapland 6y ago
    Not allowed everywhere. Any code I write ay any point of time is owned by my employer legally and in an EU country. This is because I work at a large consulting company that touches on any and all business fields. Free Github private repos has been a blessing for just storing modifications to existing projects.
  - anonymousab 6y ago
    In NA, it's common for software dev. employment contracts to prevent you from working on software in your own time, and/or to claim moral rights to anything you do work on, regardless of field or business interest overlap. I have no idea about enforcement, and most coworkers I've had have ignored those clauses.
pbhjpbhj 6y ago
I've not heard of that before - is that a legal employment restriction. Not that it necessarily has to be to stop people, of course. I'm going to guess you're in USA, is it legal to stop phone workers using the phone outside work. Seems like not allowing people to work on things directly related to their actual work (due to IPR claims by the employer) would be a thing, but no OSS at all?
- astura 6y ago
  https://www.joelonsoftware.com/2016/12/09/developers-side-projects/ https://www.joelonsoftware.com/2016/12/09/developers-side-pr...
- user5994461 6y ago
  I thought we were talking about contributions at work? I find bugs in OSS libraries from working 8 hours a day on software (including in glibc and python). My last company did have a policy that you are prohibited from participating in OSS, unless getting a bunch of approvals per project or per patch. I'm risking my job sending a PR. It's work related, it should be fixed at work. (I certainly don't want to patch things in my spare time because the company forbids me to work at work). P.S. I am in London. USA would be worse.
- sethammons 6y ago
  I’m a decent developer. I’ve shipped code, led projects, and worked at scale. My employer owns everything I code. I’m not supposed to, legally, even write code during an interview if I’m looking for another job as they own it. I can contribute or create open source but everything must be approved by my org first. For many, that hurdle alone is too big to justify working on open source. I got a talking to for contribution to documentation on a Go project out of Facebook without proper paperwork being done and “exposing risk to my employer.”

isbvhodnvemrwvn 6y ago

At my former company there was a three step process for contributing to open source: - get approval from VP to spend time on that - get approval from legal (they checked the license and if the company has any liability from that code not working, this alone took a couple months) - get approval for release of code from a so called open-source committee (basically checked if your contribution doesn't damage company's reputation) It was easier to set up a fake account and get things fixed this way. But no way I could do that on company hardware or time.

pbhjpbhj 6y ago
We're talking about contributions in one's own time, outside of work and not using their resources??
- isbvhodnvemrwvn 6y ago
  Are we? > I will still think odd that’s someone who is a professional hasn’t found one bug in an open source lib that is worth a PR or even an issue in a decade of work. It seems like the person is surprised how nobody has any contributions from just their professional work. Naturally unless I had no life outside of programming I would spend the vast majority of my time doing my 9-5 stuff.
- tapland 6y ago
  Not allowed everywhere. Any code I write ay any point of time is owned by my employer legally and in an EU country. This is because I work at a large consulting company that touches on any and all business fields. Free Github private repos has been a blessing for just storing modifications to existing projects.
- anonymousab 6y ago
  In NA, it's common for software dev. employment contracts to prevent you from working on software in your own time, and/or to claim moral rights to anything you do work on, regardless of field or business interest overlap. I have no idea about enforcement, and most coworkers I've had have ignored those clauses.

pbhjpbhj 6y ago

I've not heard of that before - is that a legal employment restriction. Not that it necessarily has to be to stop people, of course. I'm going to guess you're in USA, is it legal to stop phone workers using the phone outside work. Seems like not allowing people to work on things directly related to their actual work (due to IPR claims by the employer) would be a thing, but no OSS at all?

astura 6y ago
https://www.joelonsoftware.com/2016/12/09/developers-side-projects/ https://www.joelonsoftware.com/2016/12/09/developers-side-pr...
user5994461 6y ago
I thought we were talking about contributions at work? I find bugs in OSS libraries from working 8 hours a day on software (including in glibc and python). My last company did have a policy that you are prohibited from participating in OSS, unless getting a bunch of approvals per project or per patch. I'm risking my job sending a PR. It's work related, it should be fixed at work. (I certainly don't want to patch things in my spare time because the company forbids me to work at work). P.S. I am in London. USA would be worse.
sethammons 6y ago
I’m a decent developer. I’ve shipped code, led projects, and worked at scale. My employer owns everything I code. I’m not supposed to, legally, even write code during an interview if I’m looking for another job as they own it. I can contribute or create open source but everything must be approved by my org first. For many, that hurdle alone is too big to justify working on open source. I got a talking to for contribution to documentation on a Go project out of Facebook without proper paperwork being done and “exposing risk to my employer.”