

Open sourcing all my private projects - maccman
http://blog.alexmaccaw.com/open-source-all-the-things

======
mceachen
After seeing so many "dump and run" code drops on sourceforge, and now on
github, I really don't think we (in the global sense) are in want of code.

What would make the world a better place? More well documented AND maintained
examples of code that satisfies some need.

~~~
Argorak
As a meta-reply:

Do people find value in unmaintained codedumps? I registered a dedicated
github account last year for all the small stuff I wrote during train rides (I
do a lot of them, 5 hours apiece) and never really finished. The idea was that
I put a README on each of those and just leave it there for anyone to look at.
But most of them are just tiny experiments in Ruby, so I decided not to
release them for precisely the reasons mentioned in the parent post.

~~~
albertzeyer
I really like reading other peoples code (even more when the
topic/language/whatever is interesting to me) even if it is only some small
proof-of-concept or idea / unfinished code, i.e. not really useable as-is.

For really small tests/examples, I have a playground directory:
<https://github.com/albertz/playground>

Everything else which is slightly more than a single file or has some other
justification to be an own project, I just created a repo for it.
<https://github.com/albertz> <http://www.az2000.de/projects/>

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jrussbowman
I've debated doing this a few times, but the stuff I haven't released is
usually such a mess of undocumented code that's been rewritten a few million
times I'd be afraid it would make me look bad. Congrats for having the
discipline to keep even the stuff you aren't releasing in good enough order to
be able to do something like that.

In case there's any doubt, the above statement is 100% sincere and includes no
sarcasm.

~~~
tikhonj
You know, I used to worry about that too. Now I realize that I was maybe a bit
arrogant--in the first place, almost nobody is going to read my code! In the
second place, when somebody actually _does_ read my code (e.g. a potential
employer or friend), they don't mind if I have a bunch of projects with
dubious code quality. I think every programmer understands that bad code is
unavoidable; sometimes it's even the best option! (Trying to write a 20 hour
project in a 16 hour hackathon does not leave time for neatness.) As long as
you have something to show you _can_ write good code (a halo project, of
sorts), it should be fine.

And, given this, there is no reason not to release your little projects. Let
the rest of the world back them up for you ;).

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zbruhnke
Nice gesture from an accomplished programmer. Makes me be appreciative of the
field I am in. SO much of what I have learned over the years has been the same
way. I always say Github has been the most humbling experience of my career.
Just when I start to think I'm the smartest guy in the room I'll crack open a
project I haven't seen before and be amazed at what other people have thought
of that never even crossed my mind before, yet I'll see the immediate benefit
in it.

This is seriously one of the cooler things I've seen any engineer do. Thank
you!

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rmATinnovafy
Yes, good idea.

I'm starting to open source some office tools that I use on innovafy. The kind
of tools that most offices could use, but no one ever bothers to build.

Anyhow, open sourcing is more of a gain than a loss.

------
why-el
Why does Alex's Heroku redirect to Twitter? I tried testing a couple of
projects he hosts there and it strangely asks for my Twitter credentials.

~~~
danielzarick
I believe that the app demos he is hosting on Heroku require Twitter
authentication.

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Void_
People, open source your code.

I never regretted that decision. ;)

------
corroded
hermes looks similar to fluent.io :) you might have some insight as to how
they can improve their app (it's a great app btw)

------
billpatrianakos
Way to be! I like this attitude because it's like if you're not going to
maintain it or try to profit from it then why keep it to yourself? I'm much
the same way. I'm sure we all have little projects that have the potential to
make us a few bucks but if you're not willing to keep them up and follow
through then you might as well share. Either way it's not like you were going
to do anything with them.

And you never know who might want to take over or what kind of great new
enhancements someone else might contribute that make you proud that you
started the project to begin with. Even if the code languishes on github or
sourceforge at least there's the possibility for someone to pick it up. What's
more, you never know who's picking up abandoned projects and using them
privately. Just because there's no cmaintainer or community activity that
doesn't mean there isn't the odd person here and there who finds an abandoned
project and uses the hell out of it. Contributions from the open source
community isn't the only measure of a project's success or usefulness.
Individuals finding a use for abandoned projects without contributing back is
still a great thing in my book.

I don't know about everyone else but I do it for the love of the game, not to
see my name in the source code of another project that uses my code. As far as
I'm concerned, unless I'm planning to make a profit (in which case I wouldn't
publish the source), you can fork, close, distribute and charge whatever you
want with my code.

I like Alex's style on this one a lot.

~~~
mceachen
Do you know of an example of someone taking someone else's unfinished project
and running with it?

(And just to be clear, I'm not trolling -- I'm actually asking.)

~~~
ericflo
The Cassandra project was in really bad shape when FB open sourced it, and it
languished like that for several months before Jonathan Ellis picked it up and
ran with it. Now it's a thriving Apache project, with contributors from many
companies, and even commercial support through DataStax.

