
The 100:10:1 method: my approach to open source (2015) - dredmorbius
http://blog.fogus.me/2015/11/04/the-100101-method-my-approach-to-open-source/
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splitbrain
How does that deal with the problem of the "social contract" of having to
maintain a software project and engage with its users?

This seems more like a recipe for people who want to have an open source
project but don't know what to do.

I'd wager most open source developers do not have that problem. The more
common problem is that you want to scratch another itch, but your last itch
based projects are still keeping you busy because they started to scratch
other people's backs.

~~~
Etheryte
As someone who maintains a number of OSS projects, there is no social
contract, it's a false dichotomy.

There are many people who ask you to do free work for them (implement feature,
review PR, discuss tickets), and asking is fine, but there is no implicit
expectation that it would be The Right Thing for you to do it for them.

If you find the work rewarding and have the time, great, you can do it if you
so please. If not, the project is open source, they can pick it up and do it
themselves.

You haven't wronged anyone by saying "no" when asked to do work for nothing.

~~~
splitbrain
I totally agree with you. The "social contract" was the premise the author
started his article with. So not only did he not address his own premise, that
premise is also wrong or a least worth discussing. _shrug_

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yummypaint
One of my favorite pieces of wisdom is that “The best way to have a good idea
is to have lots of ideas” from Linus Pauling. The 100 part is pretty
important.

~~~
agumonkey
I think this article gives one more important advice: try a few things and see
what fuels happy results / motivation and go deep with it. It avoids burning
out on that one idea that you never make progress on.

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dang
Discussed at the time:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10513015](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10513015)

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shartshooter
Practicing with no repercussions(100) is the best way to level up. If you’ve
written down 100 ideas that add value to someone else you’ll start getting
better at finding ways to add value. I’m sure practicing chess moves
intentionally with no repercussions makes you a great chess player pretty
quickly.

~~~
jacobolus
> _Practicing with no repercussions(100) is the best way to level up._

Is this claim based on formal research? Analysis of famous biographies? Long-
term personal experience? (Care to share?) Or just a hunch?

What exactly do you mean by “no repercussions”? What does it mean to play
chess without repercussions (it’s a game where you either win or lose...)?

In my experience the best way to improve at things is to throw tons of semi-
structured data relating context and actions to tight feedback at your brain
(personal pattern-matching neural net), and then wait a while for it to
subconsciously integrate it.

To improve faster, figure out how to make the data more varied and relevant,
by e.g. continually pushing the limits of what you can currently manage.

~~~
MetalGuru
> throw tons of semi-structured data relating context and actions to tight
> feedback at your brain (personal pattern-matching neural net)

What does this even mean? Relating context and actions to tight feedback? Can
you break it down in a more simple, understandable way.

~~~
jacobolus
Well, it depends on what you are trying to learn.

But to take something I have recent experience with: to get a 5-month-old baby
to learn to balance his torso using his core muscles, spend time holding him
by the thighs and let him flop around (it doesn’t help to support the baby at
the top, since that is a passively stable configuration). After a couple weeks
he’ll be somewhat able to stabilize himself and compensate for small
perturbations, so start tilting him in various directions so that he’ll have
to learn to compensate for being more aggressively off-balance.

After a month of occasional practice (a few minutes at a time every once in a
while) the now-6-month-old baby will be stable enough to sit up on Dad’s
shoulders without falling off, if held by the legs. Then just walking around
with the baby on your shoulders will be great balance practice, and requires
no special effort at all (but occasionally rocking a bit will help him to keep
improving his strength and balance). By 8 months old the baby will be very
good at balancing sitting on shoulders.

[I mostly care about this because carrying a baby on my shoulders is much less
tiring than carrying the baby in my arms; whatever benefit the baby gets out
of it is somewhat incidental.]

This kind of process works pretty well for learning to cook a recipe, solder
electronics, play an instrument, touch type, or the like.

If you want to learn to solve math problems or write poetry (i.e. something
that is largely non-physical) then the context, actions, and feedback are
rather different. But still, you want to get your brain as much data coming in
as possible, strengthening connections between ideas and concepts,
experimenting and doing more of what works, ...

One of the big problems with formal schooling for many students is that
feedback comes much too slow to be usefully integrated. The expert advice from
teachers (results of graded papers) is not interactive, but is low-bandwidth
and very delayed. Regularly sitting down 1:1 with an expert is a much faster
way to improve.

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einpoklum
The author writes:

> Unfortunately there seems to be a tendency to view open sourcing as a moral
> statement as well.

This is not unfortunate. The idea of hiding the source code of software from
people, or restricting the copying and adaptation ( _) of literary or
scientific works, had been, and should again be, an anathema. An artifact of
an effectively-misanthropic social order. Indeed, publishing open source, or
free, software, inherently helps de-legitimize such practices.

(_) with attribution of course.

