Open source software, agile development techniques and social media tools are three of my favorite things. They have one thing in common that binds them together — they help people collaborate. All three provide mechanisms people can use to interact and cooperate. In fact, the more we do so, the better the results. That’s how […]
Many companies use open-source software in some part of their businesses. Reports suggest that up 98% of all enterprise companies use open source to some degree — 98%. Server-based software such as Linux, MySQL and Apache is the most common. Unfortunately, only a small percentage of those companies will ever give anything back to the […]
There are significant objections to overcome before open-source software can be broadly adopted across an enterprise. These issues aren’t insurmountable, but they need to be adequately addressed before open-source can go head to head with proprietary software. Let’s explore the major objections: Support Availability Functional Limitations Software License Terms Rapid Software Release Cycles Package Roadmaps […]
The open-source community can teach us a few things about being agile whether you follow Scrum, Kanban or any other agile approach. 1. Open-source teams tend to be decentralized with a minimal hierarchy. This enables fast decision-making. Multiple levels of approval aren’t needed to get things done. This level of autonomy can be difficult to […]
Canonical deserves a lot of credit for releasing Ubuntu 11.04 with the Unity desktop interface. For Linux to be more successful on the desktop, it needs a new look. The Gnome and KDE desktops have dominated Linux for years — many years. They are are old and dated. Even recent revamps to both desktops have […]
There’s a lot of talk about Android fragmentation. Google decided to restrict access to the Honeycomb (Android 3.0) source code thus adding fuel to the discussion. Is fragmentation really a problem or could it actually benefit Google? What is fragmentation? Software fragmentation occurs when multiple parties take software source code, customize it as they like, […]
The Mozilla Foundation is exploring moving from a long, browser development cycle to a much shorter one. If you’ve followed the life cycle of the original Mozilla browser which evolved into Firefox you know that the release cycles have been unbearably long at times. For example, Firefox 4.0 has been in development for over a […]
Apple takes all the credit for inventing the concept of an “app store”. They even want to copyright the name. Copyright aside, Apple did not invent the concept, the open source community did — over a decade ago. Linux distributions (aka distros) use the concept of ‘packages’. A package can contain any software that runs […]
When Oracle bought Sun Microsystems they acquired the rights to OpenOffice, an open source equivalent to Microsoft Office. Sadly, Oracle is not known for its openness or contributions to open source projects. It began to look like OpenOffice would become OracleOffice. Thankfully, some of the OpenOffice contributors decided to fork the code and create LibreOffice. […]