Open Sources: Voices from the Open Source Revolution

Open Sources: Voices from the Open Source Revolution is an extremely interesting book about Open Sourcing in the real world consisting of essays by the people on the inside of the Open Source revolution.

After reading some of the essays at OpenSource.org I wanted further background on how all these great pieces of software came about and where they are going. This book tells you how it all happened and gives some good perspective on how things are working. Some things I learned: 1) i'll use GNOME and -not- KDE, 2) Stallman and Wall are nuts, 3) openSource may not conquer end-user apps (read behlendorf's essay), and 4) cygnus took care of the crown jewels. Thank you to Perens and Raymond for changing the language of free software into the more digestible "opensource" and I look forward to helping contribute to opensource projects myself.

Disclaimer: I got the book for free and never would have paid for it. That said, it is the most important book I have read in several years. The criticisms below, valid as they occasionally are, do not detract from the relevance of this book to every programmer and business person. Some essays, like the one on the history of UNIX are very boring, but provide the necessary historical context to understand the approaches that have succeeded and failed in the past. I knew nothing substantial about Open Source a few weeks ago. This is an excellent primer for someone who wants to understand it without getting into a flame war on a mailing list (one such flame is included in the book as an Appendix).Even if you hate some of the essays, you'll find plenty to love, especially those chapters on OpenSource business plans from Cygnus, RedHat, and Brian Behlendorf of Apache.This books covers everything from history, to zealotry, to business, to licensing, to engineering, to hackers, to the future. You'll find parts you agree with and parts you vehemently disagree with. That said, it will stimulate you to think about the coming tidal wave. Ignore it at your own risk.