[Bluej-discuss] Open Source

[Lon Levy]

Aryeh and other open source advocates,

There is a difference between having plug-ins that you develop and
having these easily accessible to students, which I believe would be
more the case if BlueJ went open source.  The ease of access is one
concern.

The second question you raise is one that, I am guessing, of importance
in terms of academic grants and funding of programs.  While the results
of the BlueJ team are a direct asset for my students, the ongoing
development as part of doctoral studies provides an additional benefit
that may be in jeopardy with a change in development community status. 
(I don't know if any of the professors want to address this end of
things publicly).

I have had the opportunity to learn directly from Michael Kölling at a
few workshops.  The work that he and others have put into BlueJ and the
effort that they make to respond to user requests (including some times
when he has told me "no") is impressive.  There is nothing wrong with
making a request, but please don't be upset if your request is not
granted.

Sincerely,

Lon Levy.



Lon Levy, MS-CSEd
Computer Science Teacher
Volunteer Computer Club Advisor
Oregon High School
608-835-1316
 
Lon.Levy at oregonsd.org
LXL at oregon.k12.wi.us
cs at levytree.net

non somnos requiem


>>> "Aryeh M. Friedman" <aryeh.friedman at gmail.com> 11/15/2007 12:03 PM
>>>
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Like Lon and some others your confusing the technical issues of open
vs. closed source with the business/community issues.  This is not
your fault because the FOSS community in general has either
purposefully and/or inadvertently confused the two in the public's
mind.   For example under the current model there is nothing stopping
me from making a plug-in that does exactly what you and Lon (and
myself) don't want to see in a student oriented IDE (in my case KISS
for professional use).  At the same time the development team has
every right not to include such a plug-in the base configuration.
Making BJ modifiable source or not modifiable source does not change
this.

As to the business issues the references I posted before show clearly
there is no business disadvantage to having user modifiable source if
structured properly.   This only leaves the issue of how much
community involvement there should be in the development of BJ.   For
the most part this is completely up to the development team.   All I
am saying is if the primary reason for not going open source is
financial SIW and to a lesser extent dual licenses make it so the two
can live side by side peacefully.

- --
Aryeh M. Friedman
Developer, not business, friendly
http://www.flosoft-systems.com 
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