"Scratch your own itch" isn't just for starting a company. You can fix a bug in an open source app you use. Or build a small service that solves a problem you have.
Ask HN: Do you contribute to open source projects?
71–80 of 84 posts
Re: Ask HN: Do you contribute to open source projects?
#72> What is your motivation for doing such things
I program for the joy of it. My dad got me a Commodore 64 when I was little. Later I had an IBM XT PCjr. I read Abrash's black book and wrote Wu anti-alias line drawing routines in assembly using DOS debug. ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Debug_(command) ) It was brutal and I loved it.
I encountered "The Next Whole Earth Catalog" and learned about Christopher Alexander (Pattern Language), Bill Mollison (Permaculture), and Bucky Fuller (Design Science Revolution), among others, and I developed a vision of a different, better world, where drudgery was eliminated by science and technology.
To me software is really only important as a means to this end, and charging for copies of it adds unnecessary and even regressive friction.
> coding without pay is so foreign to me
Ha! I wrote software for about a decade before getting a job doing it. I had been homeless for several years and got tired of e.g. not having a refrigerator or indoor plumbing, so I whumped up a project, presented it at CodeCon 2004, and was hired for my first real computer job later that day. (I'm still messing around with that project BTW: https://xerblin.readthedocs.io/en/latest/index.html )
I should mention that computers can also serve as a kind of spiritual investigation tool, but that's really only for folks on what is called the "mind-only" path.
Anyway, to sum up: to me FOSS is only important as a way to transform economic paradigm to a better. more humane world. Otherwise you're just automating this current shitty system, and "Where's the fun in that?"
Re: Ask HN: Do you contribute to open source projects?
#73I do not, though I have done so in the past to a small extent. Long before I came of age the notion of "free" software (in any context) had been well down the path of corruption by corporate interests. My opinion is that these days just about anyone who works on open source code (especially popular, widely used code) without remuneration is effectively a tool to accelerate the race to the bottom in the labor vs capit…
I can't critique the risk you raise about reward for worker time; that's valid concern.
But isn't part of the thesis of capitalism that it should drive market efficiencies and thus reduce the cost of goods and services for consumers?
(that could have sounded tongue-in-cheek; it's not intended to be. as I genuinely understand it, cost reductions over time are supposed to be one of the benefits of the free market system. and if those savings are being achieved thanks to open source software in industry -- which I believe they are -- then I think it's worthwhile questioning the effects. do profit margins and tax burdens increase accordingly with the efficiency savings, for example?)
Re: Ask HN: Do you contribute to open source projects?
#74I'm planning to release a large part of my self-written tech-stack as Open Source: https://nexusdev.tools/
I write my web apps with Nim on the back-end and Flutter on the front-end. The release will also feature a Python SDK.
Re: Ask HN: Do you contribute to open source projects?
#75Usually opensource projects miss something I need at work. So I fork, add code, test it at work and create a pr to upstream so that I don't have to maintain a fork. That's it, really. No touchy-feely stuff.
Re: Ask HN: Do you contribute to open source projects?
#76I do get joy from coding but with regards to OS:
- I simply don't know where to begin... which one to contribute to? I don't have an area of computing that excites me to such a degree for longer than a week.
- I worry that anything meaningful that warrants open-source contribution is going to established - and will feel more like a dayjob in terms of creativity (or lack thereof; implementing a shopping list of FRs) and formality.
I could be entirely wrong but I've never tested this hypothesis as I have a huge backlog of (useless/unprofitable) side-projects to build. Perhaps I'm more of a lone wolf :)
EDIT: One thing that I do assume would be better in established OS is focusing on complexity and going deeper. With side projects you'll often spend far more time on boilerplate stuff than on the "big idea" that might have drawn you in.
Re: Ask HN: Do you contribute to open source projects?
#77I do not, though I have done so in the past to a small extent. Long before I came of age the notion of "free" software (in any context) had been well down the path of corruption by corporate interests. My opinion is that these days just about anyone who works on open source code (especially popular, widely used code) without remuneration is effectively a tool to accelerate the race to the bottom in the labor vs capit…
I can't critique the risk you raise about reward for worker time; that's valid concern. But isn't part of the thesis of capitalism that it should drive market efficiencies and thus reduce the cost of goods and services for consumers? (that could have sounded tongue-in-cheek; it's not intended to be. as I genuinely understand it, cost reductions over time are supposed to be one of the benefits of the free market syste…
I don’t think the premise of market efficiency gains in capitalism rests on having a pool of free exploitable labor, though. Even in very strictly capitalist systems labor is supposed to be compensated (with money or equivalent value, not stars on a GitHub repo): just less than the value their labor provides the owner of capital.
Re: Ask HN: Do you contribute to open source projects?
#78Yes by using them thereby giving the developers reason to get out of bed. More seriously; no. The license gives no warranty for the software, or potential issues I encounter. If the developer would take more professional responsibility there, I might feel like funding or contributing somehow. But if their approach is this is free stuff no strings, my approach is freely take and provide no guarantees in return.
Which is fine but why be so mean about it? Do you have the same attitude to benovalent people in real life?
You inferred a moral judgment where none was intended.
Was it the use of “more”?
Do such folks have some indelible claim to the premise and conclusion and a monopoly on refusing to go further for others?
I did nothing but establish my line in the sand is similar to theirs. If you’re hurt by it, find a therapist.
Re: Ask HN: Do you contribute to open source projects?
#79I exclusively work on open source projects without pay or for donations. Granted, I don't work that much, but when I do it is not for money.
I wrote code for money before. I loved the work, hated the environment, didn't believe in the product. I would do it again, only if I had to. I'd rather work at a gas station.
My motivation is to use what skills I have to enact changes on the world I'd like to see happen, no matter how small. It's not much, you won't catch me maintaining a logging library or something like that, usually it's little tools for people to use.
Re: Ask HN: Do you contribute to open source projects?
#80I do, under pseudonyms. Usually for software I use for personal enjoyment or hobbies.
As long as your work is clean, understandable, and approachable, not having some long-tail back story or 'real identity" is completely fine.