in reply to Re^5: Are Perl programmers just easier to deal with?
in thread Are Perl programmers just easier to deal with?

Yes, software companies are being forced to listen. They will die if they don't, bluntly.
Yada, yada, yada. I've been hearing these stories how good open source software is and that closed software companies will die for many years. And then they point to the open source successes: Linux, Apache, MySQL, Perl.

But they are the same successes people mentioned in the (late) 1990s. Then people were predicting the "death of closed source companies" as well.

Guess what? It hasn't happened. Open source is (unfortunally) still a small market. There are no large software companies whose business model is creating open source software (MySQL is probably the largest, with just a few hundred employees).

Call me when there are signs that Microsoft, Oracle, SAP or General Electric show some symptoms of dying.

  • Comment on Re^6: Are Perl programmers just easier to deal with?

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Re^7: Are Perl programmers just easier to deal with?
by samizdat (Vicar) on Mar 11, 2005 at 18:28 UTC
    What you say is true, of course. However, that doesn't invalidate what I am saying. Many niches are being overrun by open source. Eclipse, as I mentioned, is one very new strong contender in the EDA framework arena, and it's giving Synopsis and Cadence fits as they reposition to try to hold on to their captives. gcc is another. How many closed-source C compilers compete with gcc? A lot fewer than used to!

    While it is true that Microsoft shows no signs of dying, we are irritating the dinosaur immensely. They are being forced to work for their money as opposed to stealing from corporate, government and consumer babes.

    I am seeing signs of growth in a very significant trend: programmers being paid to work specifically on open source development. For many years, companies like Yahoo and Walnut Creek CDROM paid developers to work specifically on FreeBSD. This trend is widening, to the point where I have now seen several examples of senior programmers with reputations (Poul Henning-Kemp, for example) collecting money from the community to work on projects. Another very healthy sign is that Ton Roosendaal succeeded in getting the community to help him financially to release Blender.

    I believe the thing to watch for is userland and user-corp contributions to projects, not old-style software companies. MySQL is a formalized company, but there are other projects which are starting to look for and get money to develop.
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Re^7: Are Perl programmers just easier to deal with?
by CloneArmyCommander (Friar) on Mar 11, 2005 at 21:19 UTC
    I completely agree with dwildesnl. But, I think that you are anylizing things with the wrong state of mind. I do not think it is about the death of open source or open source taking over. I will admit that the money that open source projects have made are not even a drop in the bucket compared to the money that large corporations are raking in.

    The biggest part that I see open source playing is bringing about a sense of balance and offering a good alternative to proprietary software.

    This is a topic that should be seen with an open mind, I do not think that either way can be labeled "best," but I happen to make my personal choice to support open source, as do (I am certain) many in the perl community.

    You have to recognize that open source is a somewhat powerful influence. NASA uses a flavor of Linux, many robotix companies have chosen to use Linux and open source software to drive their robots, many cellphones have even gone to using Linux and open source software. If we take a closer look at the internet, there FreeBSD and Apache have a strong presence.

    To be honest, I would never wish for Microsoft or any of the other companies you mensioned to die. The relationship works both ways. Open Source drives proprietary to re-examine their practices, and proprietary drives open source forward to contiue fighting. About a year ago Microsoft contributed to the open soure world by opening the source to an XML parser of theirs. If you are interested, there is a book called "Free for all : how Linux and the free software movement undercut the high-tech titans" by Peter Wayner, and it does an interesting job of showing how open source was born and how it works.
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Re^7: Are Perl programmers just easier to deal with?
by samizdat (Vicar) on Mar 11, 2005 at 18:41 UTC
    I'd also like to point out what you don't see: look at all the application and systems programming work that isn't being done with payware. Were it not for open source, somebody would be making money off of these things. The space of payware is MUCH smaller than the space of all software, and Perl is a big part of that. So's Apache.

    The question isn't just 'Are they dying?', but also 'Aren't they growing?'. Considering the size of Microsoft's bankroll, their results show that they are in a very hard fight, and they know it.
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      Here is an interesting CNET article ;). I think it accurately illustrates the role open source plays in the corporate world :).
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        Yes, indeed. On the opposite side, let's just say that Microsoft got a big boost from open source when they lifted the IP stack from 4.4 BSD to create WFW3.11 with Internet, and I'm sure they have lots of little code wonks in Redmond dissecting everything from BSD to Zope in order to improve Doze. It's about time they gave us some turnabout.
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