Freeloaders are Essential
and Other Open Source Product
Truths
Stephen R. Walli
@stephenrwalli
stephen.walli@gmail.com

Patterns and Practices for
Open Source Project Success
Stephen R. Walli
@stephenrwalli
stephen.walli@gmail.com

WTFOSS*
Stephen R. Walli
@stephenrwalli
stephen.walli@gmail.com
* Hat tip to @codepope

There is NO Open Source
Business Model
Stephen R. Walli
@stephenrwalli
stephen.walli@gmail.com

Community
We’ve known how communities
work since you had a campfire
and I wanted to sit beside it
We are social animals;
community is what we do
Courtesy is how we survive one
another and feel safe in strange
communities
There’s nothing new here

1950 1960 1970 200019901980 2010
Code sharing
At Princeton
IAS in late
1940s
IBM “SHARE”
Conf & Library
Begins 1953
DECUS
Conf & Library
Begins 1962
MIT Project
Athena Begins
1983
1BSD Released
1977
AT&T Shares
First UNIX tapes
early-70s
Free Software
Foundation
Launches 1985
DoJ vs IBM begins
“Software Bundling
is Anti-competitive”
1969
IBM response is to
unbundle HW, SW, &
services pricing
1st DoJ vs IBM
Consent Decree
“Hardware Bundling
is Anti-competitive”
1956
Open Source
Definition 1997
USENIX Begins
1975
Linus Releases
Linux 1991
Apache httpd
Released 1995
Apache Software
Foundation 1999
OSDL Forms
2000
OSDL Re-forms as
Linux Foundation
2007
U.S. Congress
Adds Computer
Software to
Copyright Law
1980
GCC
1987
emacs
1975
We’ve shared software since we’ve written software

1950 1960 1970 200019901980 2010
Code sharing
At Princeton
IAS in late
1940s
IBM “SHARE”
Conf & Library
Begins 1953
DECUS
Conf & Library
Begins 1962
MIT Project
Athena Begins
1983
1BSD Released
1977
AT&T Shares
First UNIX tapes
early-70s
Free Software
Foundation
Launches 1985
DoJ vs IBM begins
“Software Bundling
is Anti-competitive”
1969
IBM response is to
unbundle HW, SW, &
services pricing
1st DoJ vs IBM
Consent Decree
“Hardware Bundling
is Anti-competitive”
1956
Open Source
Definition 1997
USENIX Begins
1975
Linus Releases
Linux 1991
Apache httpd
Released 1995
Apache Software
Foundation 1999
OSDL Forms
2000
OSDL Re-forms as
Linux Foundation
2007
U.S. Congress
Adds Computer
Software to
Copyright Law
1980
GCC
1987
emacs
1975
We’ve shared software since we’ve written software
Writing good software is hard work

1950 1960 1970 200019901980 2010
Code sharing
At Princeton
IAS in late
1940s
IBM “SHARE”
Conf & Library
Begins 1953
DECUS
Conf & Library
Begins 1962
MIT Project
Athena Begins
1983
1BSD Released
1977
AT&T Shares
First UNIX tapes
early-70s
Free Software
Foundation
Launches 1985
DoJ vs IBM begins
“Software Bundling
is Anti-competitive”
1969
IBM response is to
unbundle HW, SW, &
services pricing
1st DoJ vs IBM
Consent Decree
“Hardware Bundling
is Anti-competitive”
1956
Open Source
Definition 1997
USENIX Begins
1975
Linus Releases
Linux 1991
Apache httpd
Released 1995
Apache Software
Foundation 1999
OSDL Forms
2000
OSDL Re-forms as
Linux Foundation
2007
U.S. Congress
Adds Computer
Software to
Copyright Law
1980
GCC
1987
emacs
1975
Companies shared software before we had the OSD
DEC Ultrix
1984
SunOS
1983
OSF/1
1992
Red Hat
1993

1950 1960 1970 200019901980 2010
Code sharing
At Princeton
IAS in late
1940s
IBM “SHARE”
Conf & Library
Begins 1953
DECUS
Conf & Library
Begins 1962
MIT Project
Athena Begins
1983
1BSD Released
1977
AT&T Shares
First UNIX tapes
early-70s
Free Software
Foundation
Launches 1985
DoJ vs IBM begins
“Software Bundling
is Anti-competitive”
1969
IBM response is to
unbundle HW, SW, &
services pricing
1st DoJ vs IBM
Consent Decree
“Hardware Bundling
is Anti-competitive”
1956
Open Source
Definition 1997
USENIX Begins
1975
Linus Releases
Linux 1991
Apache httpd
Released 1995
Apache Software
Foundation 1999
OSDL Forms
2000
OSDL Re-forms as
Linux Foundation
2007
U.S. Congress
Adds Computer
Software to
Copyright Law
1980
GCC
1987
emacs
1975
Companies shared software before we had the OSD
(Writing good software is hard work)
DEC Ultrix
1984
SunOS
1983
OSF/1
1992
Red Hat
1993

A Story

Engineering Economics of F/OSS (Benefits)
• In 1995, Interix was the kernel-integrated “UNIX” face of Windows NT
• ~300 packages covered by ~25 licenses + Microsoft POSIX subsystem
derivative + Softway developed software
• gcc provided critical support for Interix Toolchain & SDK (~750K LoC*)
• Ported/Integrated/Tested to Interix in ~6-8 months by a senior
compiler engineer instead of ~US$10M-20M* cost-to-develop
• But now we’re living on a fork …
* Estimates from Black Duck Open Hub

Forks
The Two Ronnies, “Four Candles”, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sO6EE1xTXmw

Engineering Economics of F/OSS (Costs)
• Cost of Interix gcc fork is ~6 months of a senior engineer’s time (~US$50K+)
• If Interix changes are upstream, we estimate 2-4 weeks of
integration/testing on new gcc releases (~US$7-10K)
• But there are really five gcc projects to negotiate …
• Cygnus Solutions are core committers on gcc: quoted ~US$120K and they
could start in 14 months
• Ada Core Technology ALSO had core committers: US$40K & immediate
start

You Always Get More Than You Give

2 Stories

Orders
of
magnitude

ROTOR
500K LoC
500K Lines-of-Test Harness
Ran on Windows, Mac OS X, FreeBSD
One script to set environment
One command to build everything
One command to test it all
Minimal documentation
24 hours later …
24 hours later again …

Committer(s)
+
Code

Developers
Committers
+
Code

Developers
Committers
+
Code

Developers
Users
Committers
+
Code

Developers
Users
Committers
+
Code

How do you increase your user base?
(How do you make it easy to install/configure/use the software?)
How do you encourage developers?
(How do you make it easy to build/test/experiment?)
How do you make it easy to contribute?
(What do you communicate to your community)

How do you increase your user base?
(How do you make it easy to install/configure/use the software?)

How do you increase your user base?
(How do you make it easy to install/configure/use the software?)
Project Exes
published
Project Install
Automated
Software Construction Activities
Project
BugTracking

How do you increase your user base?
(How do you make it easy to install/configure/use the software?)
Project Exes
published
Project Install
Automated Software Construction Activities
Project
License
FAQs, Howto
Community Development Activities
Project
BugTrackingForums, Email

How do you encourage developers?
(How do you make it easy to build/test/experiment?)

How do you encourage developers?
(How do you make it easy to build/test/experiment?)
Project Build
Automated I
Complete Src
published
Project Test
Automated I
Software Construction Activities

How do you encourage developers?
(How do you make it easy to build/test/experiment?)
Project Build
Automated I
Complete Src
published
Project Test
Automated I
Software Construction Activities
Mission
Statement
Comms
Platform
Community Development Activities
Code of
Conduct

A small diversion on software engineering …
• 2 ratios define software development
• All advances in programming languages and software
engineering is attempting to beat these two ratios
• [Community|Product] scale depends on reliably delivering
the known executable environment every time
• Linus’s Law is about REVIEWS not BUG FIXING

How do you make it easy to contribute?
(What do you communicate to your community)

How do you make it easy to contribute?
(What do you communicate to your community)
Project Build
Automated II
Project Test
Automated II
Basic Arch
Description
Software Construction Activities

How do you make it easy to contribute?
(What do you communicate to your community)
Project Build
Automated II
Project Test
Automated II
Basic Arch
Description
Software Construction Activities
Governance
Events
Community Development Activities
Contributoion
Guidelines

Committers
Contributors
Community
EcosystemProject
Products
Services
Books
Training
The Evolution of an Open Source Project

Committers
Contributors
Community
EcosystemProject
Products
Services
Books
Training
Corporate
Contributors
The Evolution of an Open Source Project

How do you make it easy to contribute?
(What do you communicate to your COMMERCIAL community)
Project
License
Provenance
Tracking
Repositories
Protected
Dependencies
Documented
Contributions
Auditted
Provenance
Management
Committers
Indemnified
Committer
Governance
Trademark
Management
IP Management Activities

Foundations
• Henrik Ingo’s numbers
• Foundations CAN provide neutral ownership and a level playing field
• Bright lines for projects versus products

Open Source Community Practices
Project Exes
published
Project Build
Automated I
Project Install
Automated
Complete Src
published
Project
BugTracking
Project Build
Automated II
Project Test
Automated I
Project Test
Automated II
Basic Arch
Description
Project
License
Project
License
Mission
Statement
Code of
Conduct
Forums, Email
Comms
Platform
FAQs, Howto
Governance
Contributoion
Guidelines
Events
Provenance
Tracking
Repositories
Protected
Dependencies
Documented
Contributions
Auditted
Provenance
Management
Committers
Indemnified
Committer
Governance
Trademark
Management
IP Management Activities
Community Development
Software Construction Maturity

Open Source Community Patterns
Project Exes
published
Project Build
Automated I
Project Install
Automated
Complete Src
published
Project
BugTracking
Project Build
Automated II
Project Test
Automated I
Project Test
Automated II
Basic Arch
Description
Project
License
Project
License
Mission
Statement
Code of
Conduct
Forums, Email
Comms
Platform
FAQs, Howto
Governance
Contributoion
Guidelines
Events
Provenance
Tracking
Repositories
Protected
Dependencies
Documented
Contributions
Auditted
Provenance
Management
Committers
Indemnified
Committer
Governance
Trademark
Management
IP Management Activities
Community Development
Software Construction Maturity
Encourage
Users
Encourage
ContributorsEncourage Developers
Encourage/
Manage Corp
Contributions

Developers
Users
Committers
+
Code

Developers
Users
Committers
+
Code
Orders
Of
Magnitude
Freeloaders
Are
Essential

Developers
Users
Committers
+
Code
Books
Contractors
Products
Distributions
Consulting
Training
Support
Building the Ecosystem

Committers
Contributors
Community
EcosystemProject
Products
Services
Books
Training
Corporate
Contributors
Customers
The Evolution of an Open Source Project

Committers
Contributors
Community
EcosystemProject
Products
Services
Books
Training
Corporate
Contributors
Customers

Engineering/
Partner?/
Customer?/
Committers
Engineering/
Partner?/
Customer?/
Contributors
Community
EcosystemProject
Products
Services
Books
Training
Partner/Customer
Contributors
The Evolution of a Corporate Open Source Project
Setting Customer and Partner Expectations in Community is Critical

Don’t Confuse Projects with Products

Customer Pipeline
R&D
Product
Marketing
Messages
$$$
Code,
etc.
The community is NOT a part of the pipeline!
Don’t Confuse Communities with Customers

Customer Pipeline
R&D
Product
Marketing
Messages
$$$
Code,
etc.
The community is NOT a part of the pipeline!
Don’t Confuse Communities with Customers
WRONG

Don’t Confuse Communities with Customers
R&D
Product
Marketing
Messages
$$$
Code,
etc.
Conversations
Identify
Customer
Awareness Download
& Try
Deploy?
Train?
???
Buy
Identify
community
What
Mission?
Platform &
Tools
Arch. of
Participation
Code of
Conduct
IP
Machine
Governance
Structure
… with different tools,
programs and metrics.
Community members build awareness and evangelize,
provide expertise and trial support, are a demonstration of
solution viability, and provide great inertia around your
solution – Contributors provide innovation

A Last Story

A Story of Red Hat in Three CEOs

1994 1999 2008
A Story of Red Hat in Three CEOs

1994 1999 2008
A Story of Red Hat in Three CEOs

1994 1999 2008
A Story of Red Hat in Three CEOs

Questions & Comments
stephen r walli
stephen.walli@gmail.com
@stephenrwalli
http://stephesblog.blogs.com
http://opensource.com

Creative Commons Photo Credits
• Stephen R. Walli (https://www.flickr.com/photos/stephenrwalli/)(campfire, car)
• Mitch Barrie (https://www.flickr.com/photos/simonov/)(engine)
• Stuart Rankin (https://www.flickr.com/photos/24354425@N03/)(steel)
• Selby Lynn (https://www.flickr.com/photos/stacylynn/)(house)
• Emilian Robert Vicol (https://www.flickr.com/photos/free-stock/)(lumber)
• Olga Caprotti (https://www.flickr.com/photos/__olga__/)(trees)
• James Willamor (https://www.flickr.com/photos/bz3rk/)(football field)