Codetown
Codetown ::: a software developer's community
Some thoughts on licensing from Google's Chris DiBona
Chris DiBona is the director of open source at Google, and he's been taking a big part in the open source and Free software ecosystem for a very long time--not least in his role with Google's Summer of Code. He recently posted on Twitter what he calls "a little rant" about software licensing -- well worth reading the whole (short!) thing.
Upshot: Be cautious and humble in selecting a software license; ones that have been around and used happily by others have advantages, including familiarity to users. This applies to open source licenses, but maybe not so surprisingly at least as much to licenses that offer some of the qualities of open source (availability of code) without all the freedoms that FOSS developers have come to expect.
New licenses, especially ones with complex restrictions on use, can make users shy away from them.
Comment
Happy 10th year, JCertif!
Notes
Welcome to Codetown!
Codetown is a social network. It's got blogs, forums, groups, personal pages and more! You might think of Codetown as a funky camper van with lots of compartments for your stuff and a great multimedia system, too! Best of all, Codetown has room for all of your friends.
Created by Michael Levin Dec 18, 2008 at 6:56pm. Last updated by Michael Levin May 4, 2018.
Looking for Jobs or Staff?
Check out the Codetown Jobs group.
InfoQ Reading List
Rspack Releases Version 1.7: Final 1.x Update Before 2.0 Transition
Rspack 1.7 has launched, enhancing performance and plugin compatibility as it prepares for a major version transition. Key features include improved SWC plugin compatibility, native asset importing as bytes, and default lazy compilation for dynamic modules. With performance gains reported up to 80%, Rspack offers a faster, Rust-based alternative to webpack while maintaining API compatibility.
By Daniel CurtisPresentation: WASM Components are a FaaS' Best Friend
Laurent Doguin shares why Wasm’s cold-start performance and security model make it the ideal FaaS runtime. He discusses the WebAssembly Component Model for polyglot interoperability and explains how to build distributed, provider-based architectures using CNCF wasmCloud and NATS. Ideal for architects looking to scale "scale-to-zero" infrastructure without the overhead of heavy containers.
By Laurent DoguinArticle: Autonomous Big Data Optimization: Multi-Agent Reinforcement Learning to Achieve Self-Tuning Apache Spark
This article introduces a reinforcement learning (RL) approach grounded in Apache Spark that enables distributed computing systems to learn optimal configurations autonomously, much like an apprentice engineer who learns by doing. The author also implements a lightweight agent as a driver-side component that uses RL to choose configuration settings before a job runs.
By Hina GandhiPodcast: The Technical Founder's Path: Code, Leadership, and Balance
In this podcast, Shane Hastie, Lead Editor for Culture & Methods, spoke to Trisha Ballakur about transitioning from coder to startup CEO, balancing technical leadership with business development, and avoiding burnout on the journey.
By Trisha BallakurMicrosoft Adds Custom Copilot Agents for .NET Developers with C# and WinForms Experts
Microsoft and GitHub have expanded the Copilot ecosystem with the first .NET-focused GitHub Copilot custom agents, designed to improve productivity and code quality for C# and Windows Forms developers. The announcement, part of the broader Copilot custom agents’ rollout, introduces two purpose-built agents: C# Expert and WinForms Expert in the form of agent instruction Markdown files.
By Edin Kapić
© 2026 Created by Michael Levin.
Powered by
You need to be a member of Codetown to add comments!
Join Codetown