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Evangelizing OSS in the Caribbean
An anonymous reader writes "Here is an article on NewsForge regarding evangelizing OSS in the Caribbean. I'm wondering what others think of the impact efforts like this may have on software development jobs in the US. Is IT still a viable field to get into and if so will it last?"
If they can't afford office they sure as heck can't afford joint developent of free code with U.S. programmers.
Information Technology will be a neccessary feild for as long as humans need to store information -- viable, you ask? Well, as software users increase, brains to upkeep their databases, troubleshoot, and otherwise code their software, will become more and more valuable. In other words, if you know how to REALLY use a computer, your job is important, thus viable.
The hard part is in putting the hardware, software, and people together to make it all work. On time. Within budget. To expectations. That will be a rare skill for a long, long time to come, and it has nothing to do with coding.
The fact that Free Software is gaining in popularity is a Good Thing (tm). Yes, it will lead to lower wages and perhaps fewer jobs, but society as a whole will benefit.
There will always be a business need for programmers to glue software together and create things that nobody else sells or builds.
For example, the IRS changes their reporting requirements every now and then. I don't know of any company that would risk an OSS bug in that kind of software.
There will always be a need for people who can do software upgrades and systems work. A lot of that can't be sent out of the states because of the cost of shipping the computers around.
Karma: Food Fight (Mostly affected by Date Plate).
Not only that, OpenOffice and other Open Source programs can be customized and modified at will -- by local programmers instead of by companies overseas
But one of the reasons MS is achieved so much success is because they made their stuff very easy to extend a long time ago, witness the gazillions of VB coders out there who use MS components in their apps, for example its a doddle to stick another button on to IE and code whatever you want behind it in C++ or VB taking advantage of almost all MS office functionality/disfunctionality depending on your point of view. Jesus the number of people I have seen working in major corps who depend on their self built spreadsheets to get anything done alone defies belief.
I always find this a very disingenuous argument for OSS as it implies MS software cannot be customized when it obviously can. Yes you dont have the source code but the occasions where the OS source is required are few and far between for application developers.
Do not try to read the dupe, thats impossible. Instead, only try to realize the truth
What truth?
There is no dupe
Is IT still a viable field to get into and if so will it last?
No. Absolutely not.
Alice spends 40 hours a week at work developing databases, and 40 hours a week working on OpenOffice.
Bob spends 40 hours a week at work writing an office suite, and 40 hours a week working on PostgreSQL.
I will use Alice's office suite, and Bob's database.
Think hard: Did you all expect your open source project to put everyone else out of a job but not you?
- Adam L. Beberg - The Cosm Project - http://www.mithral.com/
Commoditise all the building blocks you want. Operating systems? Fine. Office applications? Yep - alright. Development tools? Yes please, we like that. When you're finished, you still left with a ton of tools that need plugging together to do useful work for a business.
Now, if your business just needs Office to write letters and send invoices, plus a database to track stock, then you were never in the kind of software market I'm talking about anyway. If, however, you happen to be a multi-national bank needing realtime market data information feeding to custom databases, with their own trading front ends etc. - this kind of stuff is only helped by Open Source. Give us the middleware (in this set-up, the OS and database is almost immaterial) and we'll carry on building the final product thank you. Always plenty of work for developers here.
Cheers,
Ian
Most programmers don't work writing software that is sold. They do software development that helps a company's business procedures. OSS will only kill off-the-shelf software (Office, Oracle, Windows, ... etc). It won't kill development of proprietary internal software that is never seen by anybody outside the company. Sit back programmers, you'll be fine.
for people who are passionate about it. For the "this looks like a good way to make a quick buck" brigade, I think the game is up...
Seriously, I've been through a couple of IT recessions, and it's never pretty. If you're good, care about your work and want to work hard, there are still plenty of opportunities. If you're into IT because it's well paid and involves no heavy lifting, you'll find it hard to get by untill the next boom (I've been through a couple of booms, as well). And in the confusion, lots of good people get laid off, and lots of clowns stay around - it's not fair, not clean and good people get screwed.
So, right now, IT is like most other jobs - if you're good, enjoy the work, and have people-skills, you'll probably be okay. If all you want is a fat paycheck in return for an MCSE, bad attitude and the ability to use TLAs without blushing, no, IT is pretty terrible right now...
It's all very well in practice, but it will never work in theory.
My wifes family moved to from Jamacia to the US when she was 3. a few years ago we went to Jamacia and she was upset to see how poor the country was compaired to the US. The fact is as with most Caribbean nations more Jamaicans live outside Jamaica than live there. This is due to a lack of oppurtunity at home. If the people in these nations have more access to OSS or any technology it's a very good thing. They have more oppurtunity for education and we get more skilled immigrants.
The US is an immigrant nation and for the past few years population growth in the US is being fueled by immigration because fewer US citizens are having kids. It only makes sense to outsource our our needs to countries with high migration rates to the US. South America and Asia. That way we increase our skilled population base.
People like to attribute this to evil globalism or money grubbing multinationals but it's simple. If we don't have generations of skilled workers in this country it will cease to exist.This is not a bad thing for the US.
People who bite the hand that feeds them usually lick the boot that kicks them
Yes. But in the future it won't be enough to merely understand how computers work in order to make it in the IT field. You will need to understand how an IT department fits within the overall structure of an organization and how to meet the requirements of your internal customers. You will also need to understand how to scale your IT services within the organization. There are entirely too many bad system administrators out there who really need to get either educated or purged, and even the current IT downswing hasn't been able to do it. There are still too many people who are in the IT job market who should simply stop sending their resumes around. 1999 is over, and you weren't that good.
If you can't think beyond "this machine is broken, here's how to fix it" to "this process is broken, here's how to fix it" then don't bother going into IT. There are already way too many people who are perfectly technically capable in IT but who have no idea of how to solve, or in some cases even identify, a larger problem.
(And yes, I had a bad week at work)
If Microsoft opened the source to Windows (perhaps 98) tomorrow, Linux would die a quick death or revert back to being a tool of hobbyists.
No, IMO, we'd just have a near perfect wine in about a year... and Linux use would skyrocket. Be honest, have you ever used anything but windows for more than a day? Really? That kind of comment makes me think not.
Re your software point... wtf? You want to ban people making open source applications? How much sense does that make? Law should not there to sustain any particular business models...
You shouldn't ban something just because you don't want to do it.
And the research point... IMO, a lot of the interesting research is done in universities. Integration is done within companies. If the majority of the world was on an OSS platform, universities might make more effort to push their research ideas into production. This should certainly be encouraged. Things like HCI are just starting to get enough academic respect to garner reasonable funding.
Universities are funded by government and industry, along with tuition fees. I think thats where the money will come from to fund new research in software too. Industry forums, which produce specs ( ISO, ECMA, etc etc) will probably evolve to also produce and maintain standard open source reference implementations.
But I still think there will be a few niches for proprietary software. Its funny industrys with maybe a couple of hundred players world wide, with very specific needs, that can drive 2 or 3 entire companies. That kind of stuff will stay proprietary for a long while yet...
I agree. I am not OSFSF fanatatic But I believe the the real benefit of OSS is not that it's free but it allows you to freely integrate which is a definate bonus for governments and their tax payers.
I think that the Open Source movement is suited for goverment because the gov usually deals with undirected problems and since OSS is basically undirected in that you can make almost anything from the available parts its a good fit. Closed source apps are designed to solve specific directed problems usually within rigid criteria...a function of corporate development.
It makes sense to me.
People who bite the hand that feeds them usually lick the boot that kicks them
Strange. You seem to have reversed half your viewpoints since the parent post -- in which you stated (in essense) that OSS was an evil communist plot to rob everyone of the ability to make a living. OK, I'll bite. I'm bored so what the hey. Maybe you aren't a troll afterall.
But there needs to be an economic reward for the developers. What we need is something different from this world of mega monopolies and free software revolution against the machine. We need to figure out how to create a structure where there is both a flow of ideas and money.
There's this nasty lie floating about that OSS is just a wild-eyed revolution "against the machine" and without economic reward for those involved. I would propose that this myth is largely propagated by those with stake in the "old way" of doing software business. While OSS is indeed a revolution, it is not against the principles of business, the free market economy, and being paid for hard work. It's just a different (and incredibly more efficient) approach at arriving at the same goal. I personally do (paid) consulting using OSS solutions. The free software I use, develop and/or enhance gives me a large advantage over my competitors -- I can charge them less for the total package because all they're paying for is my labor. I could keep my own custom software closed, but then I'd be freeloading off the hard work of others and hindering the revolution from continuing. (and if it stopped, there goes my business model) And of course by staying open, I get free bug-fixes, feedback suggestions, and enhancements from other people in a similar line of work. So it's something of a 'symbiotic' relationship with other OSS developers. Not all who use my software pay me for consulting, but enough do, and that's all that matters to me. I'm doing something I love and getting paid to do it. Sure, it's a brand new business and I'm not making the big bucks, but all things start out small.
"Free Software" alone won't kick the third world's IT industry into high gear. There has to be an economic reward for the hard work it takes to become a great software developing center. Reworked revolutionary sloganeering (even with the Who playing in the background) won't create software heaven.
It depends on what you mean by "high gear." If many independent developers and small businesses can collectively accomplish more than traditional large software development firms, then that should be considered the new "high gear" even if those people aren't under the same roof in a big flashy headquarters. As for developing countries, they're just working at inching forward in first gear anyhow. So OSS is currently a great way to give them a boost because there are no barriers to entering the labor market of OSS development. "What about exports?" you may ask. Well, it's just labor. So there's no reason why US consultants can't pay overseas developers to help in meeting their clients' needs. And heck, the inverse is true as well!
I would love to be able to make a living developing OSS, however, there needs to be a way to pay rent.
Start brainstorming. Start out by finding out what the needs of local businesses are. Ask around. Right now, a career with OSS is usually about being your own boss. That'll change in the future as larger consulting firms develop, but for now it's the easiest option.
For that matter, I think software developers should make enough that on a whim they could vacate for the islands on a cruise ship, and maybe buy some trinkets.
If they think that's a worthwhile expenditure of disposable income, software developers can do what the vast majority of the world's population would have to do: save up. "On a whim" implies gratuitous wealth. Maybe possible, maybe not. Depends on how good of an entrepreneur you are. (: