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Without Jobs, Will Open Source Suffer?
darthcamaro writes in with an interview with Markus Rex, Novell's top Linux exec and the former CTO of the Linux Foundation. While some open source vendors see the current economy as a boon to open source, the interview concludes with Rex's speculation on the contrary possibility. "The other thing is in both Europe and the US the rise of the unemployment rate is something that is rather unprecedented... The open source community to a certain degree is dependent on the willingness of people to contribute. We see no indication that anything might change there, but who knows? People need something to live off." Have you thought about scaling back open source work as the economy continues to contract?
I know I got my current job because I had some code in the Linux kernel. Being able to show your code to prospective employers is good advertising.
PHEM - party like it's 1997-2003!
Speaking as a developer who uses lots of FOSS, I think as long as there are jobs there will be a demand for open-source software. I would be worried if I worked for IBM or BEA or any of the other vendors who sell expensive stuff. My company believes in open source and when we propose to use that sort of technology, our business customers don't bat an eye.
After giving it some thought, I have decided that "Sentence case" is superior to "Title Case" from the viewpoint of precision. By capitalizing words in headings and titles of publications (of which there are many different ways to do it!), information is lost as to whether a particular word was a proper noun or not.
Furthermore, there are words (capitonyms) that completely change meaning and possibly pronunciation depending on the capitalization. For instance, "polish your shoes" vs. "eat a Polish sausage", or "measure the mass" vs. "go to Mass".
Using title case is a lossy operation.
Dr Superlove 300ml. I use my powers for awesome
Then it could be Calvin and Jobbes!