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The Cathedral and the Bazaar
Raymond is intelligent and literate, and makes his arguments about the benefits of open source in ways that are calculated to convince corporations that there's more money to be made with open code than closed in many situations. He's one of the relatively few people who can write first-hand accounts of long-running, successful open source projects, and can write authoritatively about the hacker community in the early days of the internet.
The essays make good reading, if you're into computers and software at all. Sometimes there are people who are good at something who nevertheless can't write about it. Bill Gates is probably a good example - he's good at what he does, but he sure as hell can't convey his knowledge. I've read Andy Grove's book about his management experiences, and I wasn't impressed by it either - again, it seemed like there was someone who knew how to do something but couldn't explain it (and haven't we all had teachers like that?).
Raymond is not only a gifted hacker, but an excellent writer as well. He manages to convey information about the culture one has to manage, which turns out to be very good way to teach someone how to manage it; or at least it was for me, anyway.
These essays are pretty much required reading, I would say, for anyone running a software company today. If you want to set up an open source project, there's no better information available. The early history of hacking is interesting and of course he's got a good handle on how and why Linux has been so successful.
The only difficulty I have in recommending the book, in fact, is that it's available at no cost on ESR's website. Yes, the essays are all material that's previously been available - indeed, I'd read several of them before. Supposedly they've been revised and expanded for the book - I'm not going to scan them line-by-line to check - but certainly the ideas expressed in the essays haven't changed from the web versions. Frugal readers might easily decide that free documents off a website make better reading than a purchased book.
On the other hand, a book is easier to read than a web page in most cases. And you can't give webpages as holiday presents to your pointy-haired boss who wants to keep your company's code totally closed. So perhaps there's a market for it after all...
The book contains the essays "A Brief History of Hackerdom", "The Cathedral and the Bazaar", "Homesteading the Noosphere", "The Magic Cauldron", "The Revenge of the Hackers", and "How to Become a Hacker".
Pick this book up at fatbrain.
Despite having floppy copies of most of the stuff in here, I'll be getting it anyway. For several reasons.
1. ESR will be in Dublin on Thursday, and I don't feel like having him sign my Palm III.
2. I don't want to use my palm in the bath (so to speak).
3. It looks cool on the bookshelf.
I don't want to start that whole 'books vs virtuality' again, just thought I should mention that I enjoy both.
This is really a great book, but I found it to be more useful as a geek coffee table piece.
1. Until I get a wireless link for my notebook, it is kind of hard to read the online version during potty breaks. (Insert log/dead tree puns here)
2. Money for ESR. Remember, this is a _gift_ culture. If he can't feed his family from books, he's going to find some other (possibly not programming) way to do it. Buy the book and kick a few bucks his way.
--
then it comes to be that the soothing light at the end of your tunnel is just a freight train coming your way
To me, it's pretty nice to see this happen! For some reason, PHB's don't like to buy into a web page as a source of information, unless it's something like WSJ online!
But, when it comes to dead trees versions, they have a tendancy to take it more as 'truth' than finding a copy of ESR's essays online at a Linux site. Everyone should buy a copy of this book for Christmas - and give it to the local PHB. Of course, the problem is still to get them to read it, rather than having it on thier shelf as part of the most current wave of 'in vouge' management books. While ESR and his essays are not perfect, TC&TB is excellent.
And personally - I'm going to get myself one for my bookshelf. Not particularly for reference or anything, but instead, so those who enter my office can tell what I support.
Davis Ray Sickmon, Jr - looking for something to read? Check out my three free novels at MidnightRyder.org
I purchased the "dead tree" version because I sit behind a computer all day long and would prefer to read things like this on the train, or in my living room, rather than at my desk... My employer is probably also glad I bought the book :)
Needless to say.. it's an excellent read.. esp. if you haven't read them before.. Plus the book is cheap ($28.50 CDN taxes and shipping incl from chapters.ca).
If you haven't read it yet (dead tree or online) do it now!
I think this is the absolute must-read-open-source-book...
2. Money for ESR. Remember, this is a _gift_ culture. If he can't feed his family from books, he's going to find some other (possibly not programming) way to do it. Buy the book and kick a few bucks his way.
:)
I'm not sure I agree with 2. We should buy the book on its merits. If it was well written and interesting, then fine. But I think it is a little dangerous to buy something just because ESR wrote it.
What I get out of ESR's writing is that it is possible to live, make money and feed your family as part of the open source community. Guys like Alan Cox find coding jobs. ESR is living as a consultant and writer. If he succeeds, it shows the OSS model is a success. If we all run out and buy it just because ESR wrote it, it only shows that we really like Eric
(This isn't a flame, I just find hero worship kind of scary)
Dana
>ESR will be in Dublin on Thursday... ...but what're the details about his visit. ;)
Off topic I know
I'm assuming you mean Dublin, Ireland, not Dublin Wyoming or whatever
I heard ESR speak one month ago. He told everyone that the reason to buy the book was so you can give it to your boss as a gift. That works for me.
I have a printed version of Eric's writings, as I prefer reading lots of text on paper. Now I can get those writings neatly packaged in a book. Great!
And my favorite sound bite would be "Oh Edmund! You killed him! How simply horrid!"
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
This is the first time i've seen ORA try and do a first run hardcover. Picked it up to flip through (having read most of it already online).
This is a really nitpicky comment, but who the hell typeset this thing? It's awful: huge type + leading (the space between lines) is so wide you could drive a truck through it. I'm figuring they did this to pump up the # of pages so it would feel more substantial in the hand. As it is, reading this thing would give me a headache.
Oh, well, it would have made a really nice, _slim_ volume.
Maybe I'll pick it up in paperback --- if they reset that godawful type..
=moJ
- - - - - -
swagmag.com
said it before, I'll say it again, O'Reilly is just plain cool. :D
first it's great to see esr's long contributions to open source as a programmer, writer, project manager and linux archive keeper crystalized between covers. esr's personal observations are deeply rooted and in that there is great value.
second it's great to get a chance to have esr in archival format -- this book is not disposable like so many bidnez and techie books. after many of our pages have succombed to bit-rot, the book will be in many ways fresh and at the same time historical.
go eric go
Certified Black Helicopter Pilot *** Unwitting Dupe of One World Gov'ment
It would be interesting to see this scenario played out in a court of law:
Judge: The defendant stands accused of soliciting money for sex. How do you plead?
ESR: Your honor, I plead not guilty! My family was starving! My septuplets were crying out from pain of hunger! It was either this or *shudders* accept that position at Microsoft.
Judge: I see your point. Case dismissed. You are free to go.
-A.P. (note for the humor-impaired: this was meant to be taken lightly)
--
"One World, one Web, one Program" - Microsoft promotional ad
"Remember when the U.S. had a drug problem, and then we declared a War On Drugs, and now you can't buy drugs anymore?"
I think it really depends on what your intentions for it are...*I* rather read it on the web, not cause of the money, but cause I spend most of my waking time infront of it, and I can read it while I monitor my servers, chat on IRC, read email, etc.
:)
But I do plan on buying it, as has been mentioned, so I can give it out for Xmas to PHBs and non-initiated...makes for a nice gift, supports the people that give their time to OSS, and makes people know what I support.
Besides...I like ESR
Vox
Pain is the gift of the gods, and I'm the one they chose as their messanger...
> Obviously I spend too much time on the net when
> I can no longer distinguish between webpages and books.
Books are horrid media. You _must_ be on crack if
you can not distinguish the two.
Moderators: Don't forget to mark this one down
for truthfulness.
I, like most geeks are more partial to ping pong than coffee tables.
For the critical review of the key ideas of the book see:
e _catb.shtml
http://www.softpanorama.org/OSS/second_look_on_th
Here is the abstarct of the paper:
Although this review is to a certain extent a reaction to publishing of The Cathedral and the Bazaar: Musings on Linux and Open Source by an Accidental Revolutionary (O'Reilly) this paper is to large extent can be considered as a continuation of my paper Open Source Software Development as a Special Type of Academic Research. One of the important aspects of the first part of my paper was critique of the description of the Open Source software (OSS) as a revolutionary phenomenon and argumentation that it is better should be considered as another form of a scientific community. In this paper I would like to concentrate on the Cathedral and the Bazaar (CatB) itself and try to provide an overview of the weaknesses of the paper (the idea of inapplicability of Brooks' Law, the idea that "given enough eyeballs, all bugs are shallow", the view of the source code as the best thing after sliced bread, etc.) as well the more coherent demonstration of the fact that that the bazaar metaphor is internally contradictive and that in some parts Linux can be considered belonging to the Cathedral model, while Microsoft can be considered belonging to the Bazaar model. Complex nature and pitfalls of status competition is discussed. Along with critique of CatB views, more objective picture of the status competition in the OSS environment is provided.
Contents
Introduction
Some vulnerabilities of the key ideas of the Cathedral and the Bazaar
Brooks' Law is no longer applicable in the Internet environment
"Given enough eyeballs, all bugs are shallow"
Does Linux belongs to the Cathedral model or to the Bazaar model ?
Does OSS development model automatically provide the best results?
What is really new in the Linux development model ?
Idealized description of the status competition in the Internet-based developer communities
Hierarchical structure and corresponding distribution of political power in the OSS environment
The possibility of unfair status hierarchies (favoritism)
Poisoning of the peer review process
The danger of overload and burnout
The fear of exclusion as a motivational factor
The possibility of wrong status achievement lines
The role of the press
- Nikolai Bezroukov
The good thing about putting the essays into printed form, is that they will reach an audience which wouldn't normally have access to them, or be interested in searching for them. I mean those people who aren't hackers / techies / web heads, or whatever we want to call ourselves. With the recent publicity and interest in Open Source, people are starting to wonder what it's all about, so if they see a book about the origins of Open Source and the Internet written by one of the original hackers in the creation of the internet, they are quite likely to be interested in buying and reading it. It will be good to set the record straight that the Web and Internet were created with Open Source software, and were not invented by Microsoft (as Bill Gates keeps trying to assert). Most non-hackers will be amazed that something as cool as the Internet is based on Open Source software, that cost nothing but the programmers' time and is free to all who want to use it. Okay, we could argue that internet access is not entirely free as there is the ISP subscription and some also have to pay metered connection charges, but that's another debate. J.
The good thing about putting the essays into printed form, is that they will reach an audience which wouldn't normally have access to them, or be interested in searching for them. I mean those people who aren't hackers / techies / web heads, or whatever we want to call ourselves.
With the recent publicity and interest in Open Source, people are starting to wonder what it's all about, so if they see a book about the origins of Open Source and the Internet written by one of the original hackers in the creation of the internet, they are quite likely to be interested in buying and reading it.
It will be good to set the record straight that the Web and Internet were created with Open Source software, and were not invented by Microsoft (as Bill Gates keeps trying to assert).
Most non-hackers will be amazed that something as cool as the Internet is based on Open Source software, that cost nothing but the programmers' time and is free to all who want to use it. Okay, we could argue that internet access is not entirely free as there is the ISP subscription and some also have to pay metered connection charges, but that's another debate.
J.
I haven't seen that chapter online at all...
Why don't ever see reviews for books where the reviewer says that the book was horrid? It seems we only get reviews where the reviewer is heaping the books with praise. :)
The reality is that any story praising the Open Source God will get printed. Anything remotely hinting at the slightest sign of critism will get moderated down to -1000.
So, we have the geek world nerding away on /. looking at banner ads for stuff they cant afford whilst the real world simply ignores it.
/. does a great job of giving a site exposure. And the folk at ZD and others milk it for all its worth.
Psst; watch this get moderated down.
"http://www.softpanorama.org/OSS/second_look_on_th e_catb.shtml"
A great resource. It is sad that the OSS community doesn't really believe in critical thinking - instead it exists almost purely on hate. Hate of MS most of all.
The paper above explains many things about what we see around us, and why Linux is so successfult, and why it is not really what ESR dreams about.
ESR has good ideas sometimes, but he is no god, and not a good philosopher. He has few good ideas on how the world works - or why.
...when ESR writes the fourth essay? IIRC, it's titled "Weaving the Web of Indra?" (or something like that), but I cannot find on his website a reference to his intent to write it, anymore.
Christopher A. Bohn
cb
Oooh! What does this button do!?
Brooks's Law is no longer applicable in the Internet environment.
That is not Raymond's allegation: He claims that debugging is parallelisable in open source. Brooks's famous observation was, of course, that development cannot be parallelised. Raymond nowhere challenged this latter assertion.
-- Rick M.Huh, funny. Soooooo you can make a lot more money off of Open Source, but if you dont buy the book of the Open Source "Fuhrer" he will starve?
Amazing how that works. According to his Open Source theory, he will make a ton of money off of open source. Yet this hasnt happened.
ESR has as much intelligence as the average garbage digging rat. First and foremost, he is an illiterate who had nothing better to do, and found a whole bunch of misguided retards (in a "movement" called Linux) so he appointed himself it's leader. Second, he professes "crashing Microsoft's stock". Okay, unless he has some magical control of the market economy (of which he has about $10.00 to his name, explaining the free-loading mentality) Microsoft or any other corporation is not going to crash. Third, when does a RETARD become glorified. Only when surrounded by bigger retards. Fourth, Linux sux shit. It will never beat Microsoft or Solaris or AIX or any other real operating system, because of it's open source nature. Here's a hint: Open Source economic models don't work. Case in point Netscape, whose decline started after they opened their source (at the request of the great ESR). BTW, does ESR ever mention that he was fired by Apple Corporation. Wonder why ?
Wow, you're a troll and an AC! Talk about breeding from the best stock. When you're done stuffing Microsoft Shaft 2000(TM) up your (_|_), you can go bury your cynical little mentally-handicapped-fixated head in the sand and tell yourself that the we're all a bunch of rabble-raising freeloading bleeding-heart commies. 'Kay sqoodgums?
Rebuttal: 1. Prove 'illiterate,' 'nothing better to do,' 'misguided retards,' and the implication that Linux isn't a movement. (Since when is a collection of bits a movement anyhow? I though Free Software was the movement, silly me. :)
2. It may just be me, but I never heard anything about 'crashing MS stock.'
3. Aha! Use of all caps on a derogatory term that has no basis except the poster's imagination. You're only, oh say, 11 years old, right? I mean maturity-wise, of course.
4. Nuts. I was giving you points for spelling up until now, but that 'sux' bit lost you that. Oh, and qualify the sucking feces bit, aside from any scat-fixation you might have, yourself. Oh, by the way; 'Microsoft' isn't an OS like Solaris or AIX. I assume you mean 'never beat MS OSs...or any other real OS.' FYI, Windows 95/98 isn't a real OS.
Your bit about econimic models? Bunk. Here's a hint: open source isn't an econimic model. It's a software development model. Know what is the more likely reason that Netscape bombed? Few open source developpers want to sift through years of closed kludge. That, and AOL's corporate culture is incompatible with what's left of Netscape's. My case in point here would be RedHat. Are they going under? Hardly.
BTW, I never heard about ESR being fired by Apple Corp. Hey, didja hear that Einstein failed math? Yeah, all the big scientist-like dudes are talking about all the dork-wads that still believe in Einsteinian physics.
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Hey, that was fun. Keep it coming you twisted soul of black oozing hate. I bet you have a bad rash too, and fuzzy teeth.
-- "Perhaps the truth is less interesting than the facts?" -Amy Weiss, RIAA
Why are you so loudly? Your boss dick is so small that even a punk like you should manage to swallow it all anyway. And what has Apple to do with software development?
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__
Men with no respect for life must never be allowed to control the ultimate instruments of death.
GW Bu