- Author: Editor Lydia Pintscher and 42 prominent contributors to Open Source projects
- Format: PDF
- Price: free
Free Software projects are changing the software landscape in impressive ways with dedicated users and innovative management. Each person contributes something to the movement in their own way and to their abilities and knowledge. This personal commitment and the power of collaboration over the internet is what makes Free Software great and what brought the authors of this book together.
This book is the answer to “What would you have liked to know when you started contributing?”. The authors give insights into the many different talents it takes to make a successful software project, coding of course but also design, translation, marketing and other skills. We are here to give you a head start if you are new. And if you have been contributing for a while already, we are here to give you some insight into other areas and projects.
Chapters include:
- Ideas and Innovation
- Code First
- Everyone Else Might Be Wrong, But Probably Not
- Out of the Lab, into the Wild
- Prepare for the Future: Evolution of Teams in FLOSS
- You’ll Eventually Know Everything They’ve Forgotten
- University and Community
- Being Allowed to Do Awesome
- Love the Unknown
- Backups to Maintain Sanity
- The Art of Problem Solving
- Cross-Project Collaboration
- Writing Patches
- Given Enough Eyeballs, Not All Bugs are Shallow
- Kick, Push
- Test-Driven Enlightenment
- Life-Changer Documentation for Novices
- Good Manners Matter
- Documentation and My Former Self
- Stop Worrying and Love the Crowd
- My Project Taught Me how to Grow Up
- Learn from Your Users
- Software that Has the Quality Without A Name
- Don’t Be Shy
- Use of Color and Images in Design Practices
- How Not to Start a Community
- Hindsight is Almost 20/20
- Things I’m Happy I Didn’t Know
- From Beginner to Professional
- Packaging – Providing a Great Route into Free Software
- Where Upstream and Downstream Meet
- Finding Your Feet in a Free Software Promotion Team
- Big Plans Don’t Work
- Who are You, What are You Selling, and Why Should I Care?
- People are Everything
- Getting People Together
- We’re Not Crazy . . . We’re Conference Organizers!
- How to Ask for Money
- Free Software in Public Administrations
- Underestimating the Value of a Free Software Business Model
- Free and Open Source-Based Business Models
- On being a Lawyer in FOSS
- Building Bridges
