But, ( I really love that but- not the word 'but', but 'that' particular 'but' - you know the one at the beginning of this sentence - it should be pronounced with emphasis for full effect & very loud - shout ) not in any way that most people think its a revolution. The most popular pro-opensource arguments are:
1. Linus' Law - "Given a lot of eyeballs, all problems become shallow" : This seems to be the primary reason why opensource software is so high in quality. Hence, this seems to be the way forward.
2. Hiding the source is an atrocity of humongous proportions from a consumer point of view - you simply cannot restrict the users rights in this way: The car with welded hood argument.
3. The equation argument: Do we pay Newtons descendents a royalty each time we use his Law of Gravitation?
4. We hate micro###$$@**%!soft - anything that challenges microsoft world dominance is Good! (This is by far the best of the lot btw)
Methinks, though, that opensource is way more important - While popular opinion is that open source IS the next big paradigm shift in software engineering, I think that opensource will give birth to Formal Computer Science . I know, I know, this is where you, the reader goes, - What the FRINK is this Hobo @? Is he an idiot or what? Doesn't he know that Computer Science is well established already?
Woah ...... But is it well established? Is it established in the sense that Physics or Chemsitry is established as scientific disciplines? I think NOT. I think that the maturity of computer science is equivalent to the maturity of Physics in the Galilaec Age. I strongly suspect that computer scientists are still waiting for the Computer Science equivalent of Newton to come along and set things in order!
Now the question is, "Is the appearance of Newton like figures, a completely random occurrence?" I think not. I think that the free availability of knowledge catalyzes the process of Newton- like figures popping up throughout history and Formalizing Scientific Disciplines. The Renaissance Age which led to the publication of books resulted in knowledge of a few 'alchemists' and 'wizards' becoming accessible to a larger group of individuals. This was the knowledge build up which resulted in Newton formalizing the scientific discipline of Physics.
Is this always the case? What about the Einsteinien Revolution? Didn't that happen in a time of war? When scientific discoveries were closely guarded secrets? Well the answer is yes it did. BUT (again I love this but), scientific information was made freely available for a significant scientific community & funding made available to that community. So even the Einsteinien revolution took place in an age where information WAS shared - albeit amongst a small community - but a community that was not confined to a single company or even country!
So here is the jist of what I have said so far:
1. Formalization of sciences comes in the wake of 'shared knowledge'.
2. Computer Science is yet to be formalized
3. So far a lot of computer science knowledge has been locked up in 'closed source' Software.
So here's how I see the score( finally - I can almost hear the sighs of relief);
The Opensource Paradigm is poised to kick the doors of knowledge in Computing wide open! This will lead to a renaissance in computing which will inevitably(hopefully) result in a formalized Science of Computing!
4:05 PM