On Mon, 02 Feb 2004 17:33:46 -0500, George M. Reagan wrote:
>> I've seen a number of projects where the author planned to release the
>> source code when the project was finished, only to find that they never
>> finished, often because they ran out of steam/interest. Then the
>> project died, instead of taking on a life of its own without the
>> original author, as can happen when the source code is released.
>>
>>
> Like I said, if someone feels they can contribute to either, I'd
> consider working with them. Otherwise, it's just hot air.
>
> G.
Yeah, it would be nice if someone would do that. Those kind of people
are extremely rare.
There are a lot of the kind of people who:
download an open source program, find one bug and create a patch, all
in the course of a day or two. They can't be counted on for long (or
medium)-term active development, but the one or two patches they
submit are good.
These kind of people are a lot less likely to work on your program if they
have to apply to you to get the source code first, and wait a day or two
for a response.
I count myself as one of these types of people (I can think of 3 open
source packages I've contributed patches to, but there's none that I'm an
active maintainer on)
Think about it: If you put the source code out there, a couple of people
could turn up over the next few months, each of them with a good small
patch or two, who never would have gotten involved otherwise.
On the other hand, maybe noone will bother to even look at your
source-code.
Either way, no harm done--you've wasted a minimum amount of time/effort
publi****ng the source code.
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