Archive for the 'Discussion' Category

Life is wonderful

Published by Ross Gardler on March 10, 2010 in Discussion. 9 Comments

Whilst this blog allows OSS Watch members and guest posters to express personal opinion we don’t usually use this blog for personal items. However, I’m making an exception today to remind myself, and hopefully some others, that whilst life can sometimes be horrible it is more often than not wonderful

.Loving brotherDad and newborn Saskia Proud MumSaskia Frances Gardler

On Sunday at 17:17 (GMT) March 7th my wife gave birth to a beautiful and healthy baby girl, Saskia Frances Gardler at 7lb 10.5 oz. Mum and baby are doing very well and are now home with a proud Dad.

I’d like to publicly acknowledge the superb  care that my wife and I received during this pregnancy. We only truly appreciate the National Health Service when we really need it, and Heidi and I have  needed it on far too many occasions over the last few years. The care we have received has been exceptional when compared to what I have seen in other countries.

I should also mention Oxford University Computing Services. I could not have hoped for a more understanding employer, it was clear from the first day that as long as I worked hard when I was able OUCS would respond by giving me as much space and time as I needed to support my family during this difficult period. I’m truly grateful to my boss Lou Burnard and to my exceptional team here at OSS Watch.

As for extended family and our friends - we hope they already understand how appreciative we are of their combined efforts in recent years.

Like I said in the intro, sometimes life is horrible, but more often than not life and the people around us are wonderful. We should never forget that in the difficult times.

Software Developers for Haiti

Published by Ross Gardler on January 22, 2010 in Development, Discussion, Software and Community. 1 Comment

Some time ago I posted “Does it take a disaster to understand the power of open development?” Unfortunately it is now time to revisit that post with a call for software developers to help Haiti.

The Sahana Software Foundation are looking for additional developers to help with Sahana, a disaster management tool. They need to continue to build an information portal that is seeing increased interest and usage to assist organisations responding to events in Haiti. Information on the work underway can be found on the Sahana Haiti response Overview page.

The skills they are primarily looking for are (you don’t need them all, any will do):

  •  Python - the main development for SahanaPy is Python (we’re not using PHP for this instance)
  •  web2py - Sahana uses the web2py enterprise framework for SahanaPy (I’m told it is fairly easy to learn if you’re used to Django)
  •  OpenLayers
  •  jQuery

To find out more and offer your help please jump onto #sahana on freenode. Please give as much or as little as you want.Some of the core devs have been working really long hours the past 5-6 days, and any additional resource would assist us greatly, particularly as the effort is really starting to get some interest, traction and coverage, which leads to more and more feature requests.

Thanks for reading this far - please consider giving a few hours of your time to help out, if you can.

Treading the thin line between Free, Proprietary and Open Source Software

Published by Ross Gardler on January 4, 2010 in Business and Discussion. 4 Comments

For quite some time OSS Watch have been trying to put together an article examining Microsofts approach to open source. Today we welcomed the new year with the publication of “Microsoft: an end to open hostilities?“

This has been a very hard piece to write. We felt we needed to talk to as many people as possible, we needed to sift through  significant amounts of Fear Uncertainty and Doubt along with unnecessarily emotional responses.

Things weren’t made any easier by the fact that every time we felt ready to publish something else heppened that seemed to change the story somewhat and we had to return to our sources for more observations.

During our research for this article OSS Watch have been accused, by an OSI board observer and ASF Member, of being “surrogates” for Microsoft, whilst Tony Hey (Corporate Vice President of External Research, Microsoft) privately expressed concern that OSS Watch was “encouraging academics to use the GPL.” Simultaneously, various free software representatives have pointed out how “naive” they believed us to be by even considering the idea that Microsoft may have genuine intentions with respect to engaging with the free and open source community.

As a non-advocacy advisory service we tend to think that if all sides in a debate believe we are in the wrong, yet all are still talking to us, we are probably doing something right. Certainly none of them can claim us as their own.

Given all this input what did we conclude?

Well, as you would expect, the conclusion is far from clear. On the one side we have the Stallman’s (Free Software Foundation) view that “these free programs are meant specifically to prevent the world from freeing itself from non-free software”. On the other side we have Erenkrantz’s (The Apache Software Foundation) view that “every positive and constructive engagement Microsoft has with the open source community (and vice versa) … will continue to chip away at the old perceptions”.

Furthermore, whilst Microsoft may be making concessions to open source and are happy to play with open source when it suits their needs they are also willing to use other methods where it best suits their business. For example, on patents Darren Strange (Head of Open Source Engagement, Microsoft UK) says “Patents drive innovation and they drive openness actually.”

Our own conclusion is that “Microsoft is not simply an unchanging monolith.” The article demonstrates that things within Microsoft are changing. Naturally they are changing in ways that benefit Microsoft as a business, but the good news is that some of these changes also benefit the world of free and open source software.

Over the years I have often quoted Ghandi when looking at Microsoft and their relationship with Free and Open Source Software: “First they ignore you, then they ridicule you, then they fight you, then you win”. FOSS has not “won” yet, but the frontline is moving and it is open source software that is winning.

Mailing lists vs. forums

Published by Sander van der Waal on December 15, 2009 in Development, Discussion and Strategy and Policy. 5 Comments

On Monday the 9th of December we organised two simultaneous workshops on open development. One track was about open innovation whereas the other focused on the theme of building an engaged community around open source software projects. I gave a presentation on the latter track about my first experiences with an open source project and explained about the community tools that are essential for open development: a good homepage, a version control system, an issue tracker and mailing lists.

One question at the end of my session was about the mailing lists. I had explained that it is very important to have a publicly accessible mailing list that anybody can subscribe to and that you should ensure that all communication about the project is on the mailing list. The question was about why you should use mailing lists for this and not forums.
Continue reading ‘Mailing lists vs. forums’

Writing for the Web: a few tips

Published by Elizabeth Tatham on December 5, 2009 in Event and Discussion. 0 Comments

My worst nightmare at school was having to think of something for show and tell. I had the same feeling today, when I was asked to write a blog post as part of my new job as content editor for OSS Watch.

I have never written a blog before, and seldom read them, so I had a few questions for my colleagues. What shall I write about? Oh, anything really. Who am I writing for? Oh, anyone and everyone. Scary. All the more so because blogging is  personal and immediate - quite the opposite of the book publishing process I am used to, where the product is carefully crafted over several weeks or months and there’s a team to share the responsibility.

Luckily I went on a course yesterday, so at least I have something to write about. The course was called Writing for the Web, and I was keen to go on it because I wanted to know how the writing and editing processes for the Web differ from those in book publishing.

The course outline looked very promising: devising a strategy for your website; understanding how people read online; structuring your information; writing skills; managing your website; editing and proofreading; and creating reusable material. For me, it didn’t quite deliver on all fronts, but I did pick up some useful tips:

  • a website should not be seen as whole, and is non-linear, unlike most books
  • reading on screen is uncomfortable, so presentation is important (see http://webpagesthatsuck.com for examples of how not to do it)
  • consider the reader’s environment and accessibility issues
  • use storyboarding to plan the site, and to demonstrate layout of screens and navigation links
  • navigation reflects the relationship between information and also readers’ need to access it
  • people don’t read the text, they scan it, so make it scannable: use highlighted keywords, meaningful sub-headings and bulleted lists
  • keep headings short; the first two words are the most important
  • paragraphs should contain a maximum of two sentences
  • keep it short and simple (see http://www.plainenglish.co.uk/) and focus on the action
  • avoid ’speed bumps’: inconsistent use of terms, jargon, slang, non-descriptive headings, marketing hype

All in all, it was a useful day away from the office. I will now be able to look at our website in a new light, and think about how we could apply some of these principles to improve it, and the documents we write for it, for our readers. Pity we didn’t cover blogging.