The ugly, bad, good and great aspects of 30 years in open source

In this talk I talk about open source as a concept, how I got involved in open source and how it changed my life. I tell the story from my own perspective highlighting the good and bad sides of open source but also about how I was able to turn our business into an open source company that contributes to, learns from and adopts with the open source community.

If you are an open source contributor or your company is using open source technologies, this session will be a perfect for you! I will shed light on the dark corners and pains in open source, but I also highlight the financial benefits, market leadership and satisfied customers.

Transcript

1. The ugly, bad, good & great aspects of 30+ years in open source
2. You use open source • Your mobile phone • Your car • My TV • …
3. How I got involved in open source
4. 1981 - Commodore 64 • My first computer • Great for playing games • My first encounter with programming
5. 1981 - Commodore 64 / 2 The beginning of the end
6. 1992 - IBM OS2/Warp • 1st (part-time) job as developer • Working on OS/2 Warp
7. 1995 - Windows 95 • August 24, 1995 • Windows 95 was released
8. 1995 - Linux • My first Linux • 3 months required to compile my kernel • Picked up Perl
9. 1996 - Tina Linux User Group • Joined a Linux User Group • Learned more about Linux OS
10. 1997 - SUN Solaris • Had my first job as “web developer” • Building web shops in Perl • Running the website from my “desktop”
11. 2001 - PHP 1st exposure to PHP
12. 2006 - First contribution Contributed a typo in the Zend Framework documentation
13. 2007 - ZendCon International PHP community
14. 2007 - PHPBelgium Started a Belgian PHP community
15. 2008 - PHPBenelux Joind forces with phpGG in the Netherlands
16. 2009 - Founded In2it A company created from open source
17. 2009 - First conference talk I talked about SPL at the Dutch PHP conference
18. 2010 - Zend Bug Hunt Days A bug hunt I will never, ever forget
19. 2010 - PHPBenelux Conference Our very own PHP event in Belgium
20. 2015 - My 1st composer package I had an itch to scratch and others had that same itch
21. 2019 - In front of you So here I am: still talking, still contributing and still sharing
22. The ugly parts
23. You’re the cause of all evil • death treats • stalking • weird stuff in the mail
25. The bad parts
26. Expectations and delivery • Expected to deliver on SLA • Provide no funding
29. every time I send some thing you say it is the wrong email address and I know it is not the wrong email address and I was not born yesterday and I was born 53 year's ago and you better not say the next email I send you better not send it back to me any more because the next time I send one you better send it and If you do not send it the next email address you get will be from my Lawyer and that is a promise and If you do not what that to happen then the next one I do send you just better send it as of right now and that is an order and If you do not send it you can and will be shut down for good by my Lawyer and that is a promise.
30. every time I send some thing you say it is the wrong email address and I know it is not the wrong email address and I was not born yesterday and I was born 53 year's ago and you better not say the next email I send you better not send it back to me any more because the next time I send one you better send it and If you do not send it the next email address you get will be from my Lawyer and that is a promise and If you do not what that to happen then the next one I do send you just better send it as of right now and that is an order and If you do not send it you can and will be shut down for good by my Lawyer and that is a promise. The same scenario occurs for me: a small but important number of users lose the data in the session arrays (but not the session itself) - I believe when the protocol switches from http to https. I have tried many times on many machines to replicate it; so far of the customers I have been able to get data from, it seems they are all running IE6 on Windows XP, but that could easily just be statistical probability. I've tried to replicate the problem using the exact same IE version number, with no success. I can't tell how many people this is affecting, exactly, but I can tell that it's costing us money.
31. The good parts
32. You provide value • To yourself • To your peers • To businesses
33. The great parts
34. Return On Investement • You become the expert in the field of your project • You show your professional evolution with your code for everyone to see • You learn how to manage and work with other developers
35. What can you do?
36. Help a project forward • Use it • Provide feedback (report issues) • Fix typos in documentation • Write documentation • Solve issues (send in PR's) • Talk about it at events
37. Start a project yourself • If you have an itch, scratch it • Allow people to contribute by providing good guidance • Keep your passion
38. Sharing is caring Thank you