Chapter: The Cathedral and the Bazaar

Quote:

The fact that the bazaar style seemed to work, and work well, came as a distinct shock. As I learned my way around, I worked hard not just at individual projects, but also at trying to understand why the Linux world not only didn’t fly apart in confusion but seemed to go from strength at a speed barely imaginable to cathedral-builders. By mid-1996 I thought I was beginning to understand. Chance handed me a perfect way to test my theory in the form of an open-source project that I could consciously try to run in the bazaar style. So I did – and it was a significant success. This is the story of that project. I’ll use it to propose some aphorism about effective open-source development. Not all of these are things I first learned in a Linux world, but we’ll see how the Linux world gives them particular point. If I’m correct, they’ll help you understand exactly what it is that makes the Linux community such a fountain of good software – and, perhaps, they will help you become more productive yourself.

What I expect to learn:

To know what is the Cathedral and the Bazaar

Review:                    

I read the book “The Cathedral and the Bazaar” already as one of our requirements and one thing I got from it is the benefits of open source.

There was a lot of concept I had to understand for this concept to work for me. First of all is that I need to experience the Linux world myself because i started using Windows when I was 11 years old and can you imagine how long I have been using and trusting it? I never even tried any other operating system because I got used to seeing that colourful window already whenever I my personal computer is starting up. But it is time to change or at least try something new because if I stay with what I am using now, I don’t think I will be a versatile developer.

I have got to know Linux before I can totally review what I learned from this chapter but of course let me explain the use of open source. I love it! Yes, call me an advocate because I really do use open-source and I am inviting other people to do it as well because it doesn’t only makes our programming lives easier, it also helps the original developer by allowing other programmers to help him develop his program more. It is as though the original developer is trusting other programmers his complete or incomplete program to be developed more and to be used and reused because it is how things should work and honestly, that is what I think, the true sense of creating an object-oriented program because developers can use and reuse the objects present in an OO program.

What I learned:

·         The cathedral and the bazaar

·         The mail must get through

·         Characteristics of a good programmer

·         Importance of having users

·         Releasing early and releasing often

Integrative Questions:            

1.    Why should the mail get through?

2.    What is the “cathedral” mean?

3.    What is the “bazaar” mean?

4.    How will you know if one is a good programmer? Give at least two characteristics.

5.    Why is it really important to have users?