Comments on: Perhaps You Shouldn’t Get Involved in Free Software

By: overwatering : Designing Technology around People

overwatering : Designing Technology around People — Mon, 13 Apr 2009 12:41:15 +0000

[...] back at some of my essays I can see that I’ve been talking around this indirectly for some time. I [...]

By: Giles

Giles — Sat, 03 Jan 2009 01:33:00 +0000

Given Apple's connection with Virginia Tech's supercomputer program, I suspect that those two BLAST implementations are quite closely related.

Either way, that's exactly it. If you go looking for original software projects that are obviously free, you'll find thin pickings.

That's an interesting point about computer science enrollments. If we carry the analogy a little further, then we really need some sort of engineering equivalent. The practice of programming is applying a science to solve real-world problems: that's engineering. So perhaps there should be more recognition of software engineering degrees as distinct from computer science, and those degrees would be worth pursuing as double degrees.

My problem with the OLPC is the idea that directing limited first world aid budgets and attention into giving the third world computers was pretty disgusting. They don't need computers, they need food and clean drinking water.

By: Dave Cameron

Dave Cameron — Fri, 02 Jan 2009 21:49:00 +0000

I was going to post shining examples of open source projects that ARE solving new problems. But there's a stumbling block: even when they are open source in some way, these projects don't particularly care that they are. Open source is just a means to an end for them, so it isn't plastered all over their websites.

And this supports your point rather succinctly: the free software community is the group most interested in free software. If free software was successfully solving problems for people, better than other solutions can, there would be more interest. The exclusivity you reference with respect to OLPC is a major problem, I think.

What I did find when I went looking...

2 parallel implementations of BLAST, which is a basic tool in genetics. Note that these both solve the technical problem of parallelizing an existing algorithm. The algorithm is open I believe, but the original implementation is closed.
one by apple
one from Virginia Tech

Open source tools used for climate modeling:
coverage in Science Daily
from University of Toronto
on sourceforge.net
from Princeton

I hope that Computer Science enrollments shrink until they are more comparable to Pure Mathematics enrollments. Most "computer scientists" should be getting double-degrees with something applicable to real world problems. Programming probably needs to go mainstream somewhere before there though.

What was the repugnant moral goal of the OLPC project?