On Sun, Jan 3, 2010 at 5:42 PM, Sean Corfield <[email protected]>wrote:
> Of course, what a lot of developers like about open source projects is > the continual release process where newly requested features are added > in a steady stream and the turnaround seems very quick. It feels very > responsive and with access to the source code and the ability to build > it yourself, there's much more of a sense of community ownership and > the ability to contribute. > Sure--it's a bit apples to oranges I suppose when you compare an open source project to a commercial one with a much longer "big bang" type release cycle, but I don't think that negates the value of the comparison. One of the things I think CFers are having trouble getting used to with open source since they've grown accustomed to releases of CF every two years or so is the notion of using interim releases of OpenBD, preferring to waiti unitl they're blessed as "stable" with an official version number. Personally I take the approach that if I need a new feature and it's in a nightly build, I test my app(s) on the nightly build and if it works, it works. I have no fear of putting it into production if I've tested and feel comfortable with it. Open source projects are by nature a moving target and I think a lot of people miss out on getting features in their hands immediately if they wait for an official release, which in the case of OpenBD is every 6 months. Of course the sooner people test things the better they get as well, so I highly encourage everyone to grab nightlies often and give them a whirl. The other thing I'm getting huge advantage from is considering the OpenBD libraries (meaning the JARs, etc.) to be part of my applications on a project-by-project basis, as opposed to installing a single version of OpenBD and running all my projects off of that. There are tradeoffs to either approach of course, but in the context of this discussion, considering the OpenBD libraries as part of the application or project itself means I can use a nightly if I need to on a specific project without worrying about how any changes in the nightly build might affect another application. When each application is independent it doesn't matter, and I don't have to re-test my other apps, so I can pick and choose versions of OpenBD for each project. I absolutely love having this flexibility. And amen on your last sentence. The sense of community ownership and direct ability to participate in numerous aspects of the project is my favorite thing about open source projects. -- Matthew Woodward [email protected] http://mpwoodward.posterous.com identi.ca/Twitter: @mpwoodward Please do not send me proprietary file formats such as Word, PowerPoint, etc. as attachments. http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/no-word-attachments.html -- Open BlueDragon Public Mailing List http://www.openbluedragon.org/ http://twitter.com/OpenBlueDragon mailing list - http://groups.google.com/group/openbd?hl=en !! save a network - please trim replies before posting !!
