User:AaronMT/FSOSS 08

FSOSS 2008 Report (DPS909)

Free Software and Open Source Symposium

Introduction

Upon observing, analyzing and assessing the presentations to which I appreciatively attended at the Free Software and Open Source Symposium, I will focus, illustrate, and describe my findings on two speakers and their associated presentations. Seneca College's 7th annual Free Software and Open Source Symposium, captured the essence of the open source spirit by bringing in a vast assortment of speakers, long and diverse; representing the best of the web, the open source desktop, open source business/law, and the quintessential open source spirit. Professors, students, employees, administrations, and community leaders all brought together to discuss the essence of the open source world.

Komodo: Making Proprietary Products Open Source

Shane Caraveo, a senior developer at ActiveState and technical lead for the Komodo IDE, spoke about ActiveState Komodo, the name given to a family of integrated development environment (IDE) applications produced by the software firm, but specifically spoke about Komodo Edit known by its open source project name, Open Komodo.

In late 2007, ActiveState announced that Komodo Edit would be developed as a free software project. The new project is known as Open Komodo. In March 2008, ActiveState released the first version of Komodo Edit (4.3) built on top of the open source project.

A year past the initial release of Komodo Edit, Shane shared thoughtful insight and knowledge on the topic of making proprietary products open source; focusing on the struggles, roadblocks and great successes of ActiveState.

In essence, when Shane and other lead developers raised the idea to tinker with manifesting an open source product based upon a proprietary product, a set of guidelines were established, that fundamentally detail the purest sense of the open source idea.

They are as follows:

• Gain contribution
  • Through the essence of open source, one is permitted to use, change, and improve software, and to redistribute in modified or unmodified form. Users are treated like co-developers and so they should have access to the source code of the software. Furthermore users are encouraged to submit additions to the software, code fixes for the software, bug reports, documentation etc. Having more co-developers increases the rate at which the software evolves. One is fundamentally contributing towards the success of the project. Shane stressed that anyone can act as a contributor; common ways exist so that one can contribute. By using Komodo Edit in your everyday life and recommending it to others, by helping other users, by translating, documenting and testing one is contributing. Shane explained that many of these tasks do not require special technical skills. No matter how one wants to contribute, ActiveState welcomes new drive and ideas and any contributions to help improve Komodo and spread Open Source to the world.
• Explore new business models
  • As Shane explained, with the embracing of an open source business model, one becomes exposed to a number of great new ideas, such as:
    • Collaboration and project management: Collaborative work is resource efficient, duplication of effort is avoided.
    • End-user support - Open-source offers an alternative model, where easy access to the source code allows the proliferation of a multitude of alternative support organizations, each remaining small enough to remain responsive to the needs of its own set of customers.
    • Security - Flaws certainly occur in both closed-source and open-source software. However, as Shane explained, it has frequently been the case that a patch to fix one security problem in closed-source software has created another problem or failed to fix the actual problem, and other times a firm may leave a known flaw exposed for months or even years at a time. These sorts of issues seem to be less common in open-source software.
• Increased user base - As you establish a growing community your user base will increase. The most important factor of successful open source software is its community and user base. Active contribution and a thriving philosophy of sharing, establish a user base that will fundamentally support your product.
• Repositioning the product - Establishing a new, free product among a line of other retail products - drives interest, curiosity and exposure.
• Exposure to new markets - A leap away from a highly fragmented market with stern competition (integrated development environments).
• Increase commercial sales - Shane detailed on the fact that companies will support the product the open source product and purchase the retail edition for commercial backing (support) purposes.

With these great ideas comes challenges, and roadblocks. As Shane detailed and as I hinted above, software firms have two common problems: How does one expose a software product in a highly fragmented market stuffed with competition, when one has low financial backing? and Would open source, better our product?

ActiveState resolved the fist issue with an attempted fix by implementing strategic marketing, which fundamentally increased their user base but neglected to obtain a dominance in a niche area. This fixed the first problem but the second remained.

The solution was to open source the product alongside an extended feature retail release. As a result, their user base greatly increased; those unwilling to pay for a product now were able to use the product and contribute, and ActiveState could explore new business models.

A firm like ActiveState embraced many fears prior to open sourcing Komodo, such as:

• Would the free version collapse sales on other Komodo IDE products?
• Could they build a community from scratch and leverage that community, and if they built it would they actually come?

But, as a result of open sourcing, ActiveState witnessed first hand, the essence and spirit of open source by the manifestation of a community of users willing to contribute patches, such as: language localization. Thus a benefit that ActiveState did not anticipate not have any resources to support on their own.

Ultimately, through the success of Komodo Edit, downloads are growing, sales are slowly increasing and the community is expanding to new frontiers. An outlook to the future details continual growth of the Komodo user base and expansion of community.

Shane's view on open source detailed the idea of choice, interoperability, freedom and standards. As detailed, ActiveState is allowing the community to take Komodo Edit to where they want to take it.