Re: Open Source menu system

[Hans Boldt <boldt@xxxxxxxxxx>]

Winchester Terry wrote:
> Hans,
>
> First of all, I agree with everything else that 
> I "snipped" from your original reply ;-)
>
> But I wondered what your opinion would be regarding 
> the "open sourcing" of SEU and SDA.  Apparently, these 
> products are never going to be enhanced in the future.
> It sure would be nice if the AS/400 (iSeries) community
> could take these two programs and enhance them as they
> see fit.   Good idea or bad idea - in your opinion?
>
> Terry

Terry: I really don't have any opinion on those pieces of software. I 
think it's a moot point anyways since I doubt they'd ever be open 
sourced. The strategic direction is elsewhere, and is itself based on a 
piece of open source software.

That said, one of the difficulties in open sourcing something like SEU 
or SDA would be the logistics. Would some group within IBM be 
responsible for managing user-contributed patches? Would some other 
formal or informal group handle the management? Would the community be 
served by (probably incompatible) forks? Would there even be enough 
interest in the user community to maintain and enhance the code?

Unfortunately, of the few open source projects I've seen start up in the 
iSeries community, few (if any) are still active.

Cheers! Hans