The Cathedral and the Bazaar: Musings on Linux and Open Source by an Accidental Revolutionary (O'Reilly Linux)
Author: Eric S. Raymond
List Price: $19.95
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ISBN: 1565927249
Publisher: O'Reilly & Associates (October, 1999)
Sales Rank: 10,689
Average Customer Rating: 4.07 out of 5
Customer Reviews
Rating: 5 out of 5
I could not put it down!
I read it in one evening. It was extremely well written. Eric Raymond is a hacker with a tremendous command of the English language. He imparts information and his beliefs in a way that even non-geeks should understand. I gave it to my boss and he was fascinated also. This book is an important work that juxtaposes the traditional "Cathedral" style of software development (i.e. Microsoft) with the contemorary "Bazaar" style in which open source software is written (i.e. Linux). It explains how hackers all over the world somehow came together to form a formidable revolution of open source software. Linus Torvalds started it. Eric Raymond explained it. Long live the revolution! I have been using Linux for 2 years so I am partial of course. But ask yourself - Why would you pay for mediocre software, created by good people with bad deadlines, when you can get better software, created by good people for the love of it, for free, that is better supported?
Rating: 4 out of 5
More analysis than manifesto, and better for it
The cult-like status of this book and its Web antecedents in the Linux community isn't surprising. But even for those of us who aren't staunch open-source partisans, it's a surprisingly well-argued (if a bit scattered) and concise collection.Taken as a whole, the book makes a series of good business cases for when opening the source code to software is appropriate and potentially profitable -- as well as maximally efficient. I was pleased that Raymond acknowledges that open source is _not_ always the best way to go, even while noting that it will probably be more prevalent over time.
Raymond's fervour about open source shows through, particularly late in the book, but it doesn't detract from the largely objective analyses he makes -- so his arguments carry force.
Worth reading for anyone who's a programmer, a hacker, or interested in the politics of the software business. Or anyone else, for that matter.
Rating: 3 out of 5
OSS Business Model
The major problem with this book is that ER NEVER really
discusses the "business model" used by the "software" industry
which is more of a form racketeering and money laundering
than any legitimate model. Since he does not do this and
does not offer a viable alternative business model - he
doomed open source to a quick death. Had he taken this
issue more seriously,Enron,WorldCom,Auther Andersen and Perigrine
debacles might have been avoided. Similar Products
The Business and Economics of Linux and Open Source
Free Software, Free Society: Selected Essays of Richard M. Stallman
Just for Fun: The Story of an Accidental Revolutionary
Rebel Code: Linux and the Open Source Revolution
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