Small but Mighty:The Bricolage Story

SilentBob4 writes "Bricolage is an example of the power of an open source project to survive its proprietary origins. As you will read below, Bricolage was originally started in-house by Salon magazine, and then open sourced by About.com. I imagined how very frustrated David Wheeler, a Salon employee, would have been had he been forced to watch the code he helped develop just die on the shelf. Never underestimate the strength of the human passion to create, and to see one's creations bloom in the light of day." The full story is at Mad Penguin."

Comments

Success is customer driven

[winkydink]

This is the biggest stumbling block to most OSS software. Developers dont get it that if they want to make a living off it they have to be customer-focused. Wheeler clearly understands this.

Re:Success is customer driven

[rovingeyes]

Developers dont get it that if they want to make a living off it they have to be customer-focused

Very true. But there are products that are completely customer driven. In fact, we have developed a Content Management System which is completely drvien by customer demands. This product is in development for over 5 years now. It started out as a simple web based content editor for our clients' hosting. Slowly, one after the other requests started pouring in. The good thing was that the requests were incremental in nature. Now we are at a stage where we are analyzing whether this product has grown beyond its needs (it has become a hybrid between cpanel and xoops) and does it warrant to be made a product and sold?

There lies the big problem. Our company still wants to have control over it coz 80% of our company's revenue is directly or iderectly generated by this product. So some company execs are questioning whether Open source is the right way. Couple others are saying that open source might be the only way out as there would less risk involved as bulk of the revenue off of a product is generated by support unless you have a product like SAP.

Definitely interesting times ahead...

Re:Success is customer driven

[cptgrudge]

I dunno, my approach so far has been to shout at customers, poke them with sticks and let them know that they aren't smart enough to know what they want.
It hasn't paid off yet, but any day now I'm sure it will. people respect honesty.

No, see, your problem is basically that you just have to do it with a smile and a laugh. Gain the customer's trust. Make them think that you are on their side. The thing is, people know that they aren't smart enough to know what they want. They just want someone to be able to tell them in a way that isn't condescending and makes them feel OK about it, that's all.

But seriously, the sad part is that this is very true for quite a few people.

Re:Whats Bricolage?

[Anonymous Coward]

Random buzzwords are a sure sign that the product sucks. And I can't even begin to describe how much Bricolage sucks! My company has been using it for too long now, and one look at the database structure and bloated templating strategy would send any developer worth his salt to the emergency room. It's truly one of the worst CMS products I've ever seen. Avoid it like the plague.

Re:Whats Bricolage?

[JamesonTV]

Damn straight! Just look at the screenshots. That's not a UI, that's a straight dump of the database. The job of the interface designer is to create a CMS which helps the user manage and publish content without having to be fluent in all the underpinnings of the system. Bricolage basically drafts every user into the role of novice database administrator.

Praise from eWeek does more to call eWeek's judgment into question than it does to make Bricolage look good.