Several happenings over the weekend are case studies in how open source software communities work. The Dev Behind a Hugely Popular GNOME Extension Just Quit While the news is about a developer quitting because it’s not “fun”. I think the message – or messages – are deeper than that. Isn’t it awesome that are free […]
How Open Source Communities Work Read More »
Traditionally, open source software has relied primarily on asynchronous communication. While there are probably quite a few synchronous conversations on irc, most project discussions and decisions will happen on asynchronous channels like mailing lists, bug tracking tools and blogs. I think there’s another reason for this. Synchronous communication is difficult for an open source project. For
I recently listened to a talk by Michael Lopp about how to be a great manager. During his talk, he stressed the importance of hallway conversations. Hallway conversations are informal conversations about projects, goals and status. As Shez says, they are great for bouncing ideas off people you might not normally interact with and just
How to have hallway conversations when you can’t see the hallway Read More »
When I told the GNOME Foundation Board of Directors that I was leaving my job as executive director, I told them my number one priority was to hire my replacement. Before I was hired, the GNOME Foundation went through a long period without an executive director and I wanted to make sure that didn’t happen
How to hire an Executive Director Read More »
“How do I raise enough money to be able to spend all my time working on my favorite free software project?” is a question I hear often. I have a few ideas and I’m very interested in hearing others as I think the world would be a better place if we all could afford to
How do I raise enough money to work on my project full time? Read More »
Planning a hackfest is not an easy process. You need an: organizer – someone willing to put some time into making the whole thing happen topic – what are you going to be hacking on, what do you hope to accomplish attendees – this is usually a particular group of people that work on a
Putting all the Hackfest pieces together Read More »
Typically free software projects have lots of very smart developers. Large projects like GNOME might also be lucky enough to have lots of great translators, designers, artists and writers working on the project. However, marketing is not typically an area free software projects have worked much on. GNOME is changing that. Over the past couple
How does a free software project do marketing? Read More »
The GNOME community is extremely diverse when it comes to nationality. But we don’t have many women working on GNOME. We want to make sure that women interested in working on GNOME know they are welcome, so we have announced the GNOME Outreach Program for Women! The goal is to encourage women to participate in
More Women in GNOME Now! Read More »
Chris Blizzard introduced me to Clay Johnson. I had such an interesting time talking to him about social networking, free and open source software, governments and fundraising that I asked if he’d share some of his points in a blog interview. Meet Clay Johnson, Director of Sunlight Labs! Hi Clay, you have a lot of
Should you ask developers for money? And other interesting fundraising dilemnas. Read More »
The GNOME Foundation's mission is to provide a free desktop accessible to everyone. Accessible regardless of their ability to pay, their physical ability or the language they speak. But I bet if you polled all 400 members of the GNOME Foundation and a few 1000 GNOME fans, you'd get a lot of different visions of
What’s your vision of GNOME? Read More »