Forking Encouraged: Folk Programming, Open Source, and Social Software Development

Forking Encouraged Folk Programming, Open Source, and Social Software Development Kirrily Robert Yoz Grahame Jason Douglas Linden Lab Metaweb (creators of Second Life) (creators of Freebase)

How to contribute code to an open source project • Identify something • Build attempt #3 • Enjoy fix to fix • Something’s wrong • Create patch • Find the repository with the makefile • Submit patch • Install new trendy • Who the hell • Wait for patch source control tool understands make merge to trunk • Check out anyway? • Wait some more repository • Google • Snark about • Find build • Find and apply maintainer instructions makefile fix • Start nagging • Install the right • Build attempt #9 • Meanwhile, build on build tools • WORKING APP! fix, make more • Build attempt #1 • Search source for patches • Install missing bug • Provide own dependencies • Read API docs tarballs • Build attempt #2 • Fathom API docs • Multiple anguished • Install more missing • Create fix flamewars dependencies • Test fix • Fork

Please, for the sake of your project: REDUCE FRICTION

How to contribute code to an open source project • Identify something • Build attempt #3 • Enjoy fix to fix • Something’s wrong • Create patch • Find the repository with the makefile • Submit patch • Install new trendy • Who the hell • Wait for patch source control tool understands make merge to trunk • Check out anyway? • Wait some more repository • Google • Snark about • Find build • Find and apply maintainer instructions makefile fix • Start nagging • Install the right • Build attempt #9 • Meanwhile, build on build tools • WORKING APP! fix, make more • Build attempt #1 • Search source for patches • Install missing bug • Provide own dependencies • Read API docs tarballs • Build attempt #2 • Fathom API docs • Multiple anguished • Install more missing • Create fix flamewars dependencies • Test fix • Fork

Folk Programming is... • The social life of code • How it breeds, travels and evolves • ... especially amongst non-programmers beginning

Less like this... http://ﬂickr.com/photos/timsamoff/316400866/

... more like this http://ﬂickr.com/photos/brighterworlds/301705464/

(it’s not a new analogy)

Consumption

Minor Alteration

Conﬁrmation

Experimentation (pt 1)

Safe Failure

Investigation (pt 2)

Innovation

Cargo cult programming is not a problem (yet)

WAR ON DAUNT

Folk Computing: Revisiting Oral Tradition as a Scaffold for Co-Present Communities Rick Borovoy, Brian Silverman, Tim Gorton, Jeff Klann, Matt Notowidigdo, Brian Knep and Mitchel Resnick MIT Media Lab, 2000 SIGCHI’01, March 31-April 4, 2001 http://llk.media.mit.edu/papers/folk-computing.pdf (or just type “folk computing” into your favourite search engine)

• 128KB Flash • 48x32 pixels • 1-channel sound 3.15 inches • Replaceable batteries • 45 grams

The i-ball editor

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What are the easy ways to create, run and share code today?

LambdaMOO > exam rube Rube Goldberg contraption (aka #6498, Rube Goldberg contraption, Rube Goldberg, and contraption) Owned by Aladdin. An incredibly complicated contraption. There is a lever on one side. A sign on the other side says "To run contraption, 'pull lever on contraption'; to add parts to contraption, first 'enter contraption'" Obvious verbs: en*ter rube g*et/t*ake rube d*rop/th*row rube pull <anything> on rube > pull lever on contraption Rosy_Guest pulls down the handle on Rube Goldberg contraption. The lever pulls on a string, releasing a steel ball high up. The ball enters a maze of passages. Somewhere deep inside, the ball hits a switch with an audible click. A large television comes to life, showing re-runs of "Gunsmoke." The sheriff's bullets fly out of the screen A Kung Fu master catches them in his teeeth. The subtitles read "I should've ordered glutinous rice chicken!" He spits out the bullets, which fly toward poor Mel Torme. Sorrow drifts over the land for the death of Mel Torme. ...and now for something completely different... A gigantic puffball bursts, filling the air with spores. A hush falls over the contraption; everything has stopped. A horde of monkeys runs all over the contraption, setting everything back sort of the way it was.

What’s the power here? 1. Create your own code 2. View, clone and modify someone else’s code 3. Free, always-on, ubiquitous hosting 4. Huge array of diverse data sources/objects 5. Code creates new data for use by others

The Server’d Gentry

… begat…

We like: ... but we want: Easy! Features! Social! Ownership! Control!

Cloning on Ning

Developer Cloning User Pa ion ck ag lat ing tal Ins Distribution

The Child App

Timeliner

What makes this possible? • Create your own code • View, clone and modify someone else’s code • Free, always-on, ubiquitous hosting • Huge array of diverse data sources/objects • Code creates new data for use by others

Folk programming = more people in your project

Cloning.

Forking.

FLOSS licenses • View the code • Modify the code • Redistribute the code

There is strong social pressure against forking projects. It does not happen except under plea of dire necessity, with much public self-justiﬁcation, and requires a renaming. Eric S. Raymond, Homesteading the Noosphere

Hosted?

Hosted? Source Dev Distribution code platform

Hosted? Source Dev Distribution code platform wiki mailing bug tracker lists website

Hosted dev environments? • Google App Engine • EC2 • Dreamwidth Dreamhack • Heroku, Kodingen, Reasonably Smart...

Google App Engine

Google App Engine • Free (no cost) • Python or Java • Run your apps on Google’s infrastructure

Google App Engine • Free (no cost) • Python or Java • Run your apps on Google’s infrastructure • BUT... code them on your own

Amazon EC2 • Servers on demand • Pre-conﬁgured • Low cost (not quite free) • Any language

Dreamhack • Single project (Dreamwidth) • Shared server • Pre-conﬁgured • Free

But can you clone it?

Huge array of diverse data sources Proximity Openness Queryability

Proximity High Low

Proximity High • in memory Low

Proximity High • in memory • local key/value store Low

Proximity High • in memory • local key/value store • nearby database server Low

Proximity High • in memory • local key/value store • nearby database server • web API Low

Openness High Low

Openness High • US Govt public domain data Low

Openness High • US Govt public domain data • Creative Commons Low

Openness High • US Govt public domain data • Creative Commons • Friendly TOS Low

Openness High • US Govt public domain data • Creative Commons • Friendly TOS • Unfriendly TOS Low

Queryability Low High

Queryability Low • scanned, non-OCR documents High

Queryability Low • scanned, non-OCR documents • text documents High

Queryability Low • scanned, non-OCR documents • text documents • structured data High

Queryability Low • scanned, non-OCR documents • text documents • structured data • well-structured data High

Key points • FLOSS license • Easy cloning • Free, hosted development platform • Huge array of readily-accessed data

FLOSS Cloning Hosted Data Github Y Y N N App Engine ? N Y Y Amazon EC2 ? N Y Y Dreamwidth Y N Y N

• Openly licensed database • ~120M facts about 6.2M topics • Anyone can edit... including schema • Open API

Open Code for Open Data http://freebaseapps.com

*.freebaseapps.com

Open Code

Sharing Code

Examples

Data Games

Social Apps

Lessons Learned

Reduced Friction = Increased Collaboration

Collaboration → Dependencies • What happened? (diff, audit trail) • Undo the damage (revert)

Collaboration → Dependencies • What happened? (diff, audit trail) • Undo the damage (revert) • Don’t break me! (versioning)

is this the future?

we need better Web-based tools

CodeMirror http://marijn.haverbeke.nl/codemirror/ jsdifﬂib

Editors

Debugging

Collaboration

Collaboration • Source Control

Collaboration • Source Control • Diff/Merge

Collaboration • Source Control • Diff/Merge • Collaborative Editing

let’s make it happen

Thanks very much! • Find our slides on the OSCON site (later) • Kirrily Robert: kirrily@metaweb.com • Yoz Grahame: yoz@lindenlab.com • Jason Douglas: jason@metaweb.com

Forking Encouraged: Folk Programming, Open Source, and Social Software Development

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