Re: Cygwin participation threshold

[Steve Morris <smorris@nexen.com>]

Christopher Faylor writes:
 > On Wed, Feb 24, 1999 at 09:59:16AM -0500, Steve Morris wrote:
 > >Christopher Faylor writes:
 > > > It is interesting that you felt this way at first.  I wonder if the reason
 > > > has anything to do with the name "Cygwin" which sounds so similar to "Cygnus".
 > > > 
 > > > The reason I am saying this is because hundreds of people have contributed to
 > > > the Linux project and *many* companies make money from Linux.
 > >
 > >Actually I think you've hit on a major issue. Even though Cygnus makes
 > >cygwin available as sourceware it is obviously a Cygnus
 > >product. Cygnus controls the feature set. Design decisions are made by
 > >Cygnus. People can contribute but Cygnus is the final arbiter on
 > >design decisions and even code style.
... clipped ....
 > >On the other hand Cygwin is obviously branded. Even the mailing list
 > >is controlled by Cygnus. The developers mailing list access is
 > >restricted by Cygnus engineers. The official Cygwin web page is
 > >controlled by Cygnus. The bug list is an internal Cygnus system.
 > 
 > All this is true of EGCS, too, isn't it?
 > 
 > The developers mailing list is supposed to be open only to people who
 > are willing to contribute to the development of cygwin.  If the rest of
 > the (developers) mailing list thinks that that is too restrictive a goal
 > then I'd be happy to open it up.  We have maintained cygwin-developers
 > as a closed list to try to limit discussions to actual development
 > issues.
... clipped ....
 > >I guess the issue is not companies making money on free software.
 > >Instead the issue is companies being perceived as controlling the
 > >software development.
 > Well, if that is your feeling, I can't dispute it.  If I understand what
 > you're saying correctly, your philosophy for Cygwin is that you will use
 > it and hope that it improves from release to release but, if it doesn't,
 > the barrier of a company judging and profiting by your code submissions
 > is too high for you to consider attempting any improvements yourself.

Actually I wasn't stating my philosophy. I was generally responding to
your general question. As long as you are making it personal here is
my philosophy: People that use free software should give back to the
free software community where they can. This can be major software
development, helping with doc, or merely fielding questions where they
can from the supporting list or newsgroup. However I don't feel they
need to feel obliged to contribute to every free software package they
use.

Personal note: I attempted to sign up for the cygwin developers
mailing list. I wasn't ready to commit to specific work but I wanted
to get a feel for the level of mutual support and how the team
interacted. I intended to silently lurk a while and then step into a
more active role as I found a place to contribute. Apparently my
justification and commitment didn't seem strong enough because I was
silently excluded. No explanation, no apology. I just wasn't added to
the list. It didn't leave a good taste in my mouth or predispose me to
step up my level of commitment to this particular freeware project.

 > But, of course, maybe none of these observations matter.  We're talking
 > about perceptions, here.  It's my contention that if the EGCS project
 > had been named 'cyg-gcc' that it probably wouldn't have as large a base
 > of contributors.  It's probably the initial 'cyg' which is off putting
 > to people as well as the technical barrier of having to know both UNIX
 > and Windows code.

I think that you are exactly right. Perception is the key, although it
goes beyond just the cyg prefix. I suspect that as long as cygwin is
perceived as a company product people will be less willing to help
than for other projects which are lead by volunteers with no fiduciary
interest. Both are good but one is more attractive than the other.

Steve Morris
sjm@judgement.com


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