(Off Topic ) Open Source: The Model Is Broken ??

Les Mikesell lesmikesell at gmail.com
Sat Dec 6 17:56:08 UTC 2008


Tom Horsley wrote:
> 
> Even worse, the lack of documentation forms a kind of positive
> feedback loop, increasing the feeling that things need to be
> rewritten, not because they really need it, but because it is
> easier to rewrite than to understand how to modify the existing
> code.

I wonder if there is any research or statistical work that looks at the 
upstream packages in terms of rate of code change, or more specifically 
at the rate of change of external API's or even non-backwards-compatible 
changes to those APIs?  A rating like that would give a real indication 
of how much choosing to use such a program is going to cost you in 
maintenance over time.

-- 
   Les Mikesell
     lesmikesell at gmail.com




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