We all, I assume, know the advantages of using Open Source Software. But now I need to look at it from a slightly different angle. My department is interested in potentially making some of our software available as Open Source and we need to persuade the Powers That Be that this is a good idea.
Currently I have the following ideas:
* Other people will potentially submit patches to our software thereby improving it.
* Being seen as a good citizen of the Open Source community means that Open Source developers will be more inclined to work for us.
Anyone have others to add to the list?
some other reasons
TeeJay on 2004-05-27T09:29:45
open sourcing your code means you can collaborate with others, not just having a CVS server but actually forming relationships with those companies or development teams with a similar interest.
Another advantage is that using open source compenents means that anybody joining can at least recognise if not be familiar with the tools you use when you join, reducing if only a little, the time it takes to get up to speed.
Also if you release stuff, people may point out that you are duplicating effort on something that already exists and you could possibly merge the code-base or something. This is increasingly likely as many outfits build the same basic components over and over.
Here too
ajt on 2004-05-27T10:33:37
As I said recently it's something we thought about too.
A more subtle reason...
james on 2004-05-27T10:55:21
The threat of making software open source tends to make programmers more careful about the code that they write. Its something that we've experienced a lot at Fotango.
There is something psychological about everybody being able to see the code that makes programmers produce higher quality stuff.
Re:A more subtle reason...
jsmith on 2004-05-27T13:37:15
This was one of the primary reasons I gave when persuading my supervisor. Didn't take much persuasion though -- he knew we used a lot of OSS (Apache, MySQL, PHP, Perl, ...), so he was more than happy to chalk it up to us paying the community back.
Addition to your second point:
da on 2004-05-27T13:44:47
Not only does it help to hire better developers, it is a strong force toward *keeping* the motivated open-source developers a company has.
well, from the commercial angle
hfb on 2004-05-27T20:24:40
I know that a large nordic company up here, *cough*, employs a tall someone I know to evaluate open source software for the company and advise them on it. Hire a lawyer.
