Comment by ryao
10 years ago
Bit keeper is a great example of what happens when you do not open source your code. I have cited it that way many times.
10 years ago
Bit keeper is a great example of what happens when you do not open source your code. I have cited it that way many times.
Except that we've been around for 18 years and made payroll without fail that entire time. Supported a team of 10-15 people every year. That's something, many many companies in the valley, including many that open sourced everything, have not done as well.
You may have done more by open sourcing whatever it is that you have done; if so congrats.
My remark was intended to cite how much farther bit keeper could have gone had it been open source from the start rather than belittle what bit keeper accomplished.
At work, many of my newer colleagues have backgrounds in closed source software development. We are developing software that has no exact analog to existing software, and we hope that it will have a big impact. If it becomes as important as we think it could be, then bit keeper vs git is a fantastic example of why our work should be open source from the start.
Except you're not Linus and you probably don't have a cult like following for any work you produce.
Linus brought DVCS to the masses, but to pretend there wasn't more at play than simply open sourcing a project and hoping it all works out is complete rubbish. People have families to feed. Closed source is not inherently evil.
It takes a unique situation to produce something like git that's product is beyond the sum of the project itself.
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I have no idea why people are down voting this. In an alternative universe, we would all be using bit keeper. The reason we are not is mainly because Larry McVoy ceded the market to git and mercurial because he was afraid of disrupting his existing business. git and mercurial would never have existed had he practiced at Bit Movers what he preached at Sun.