In-class Activities

On day 23, the class continued on the Linux commands - filters. And there was a quiz about Git and Linux commands on day 24. I received the result via email, but I still don’t know the answers for Linux command parts. I briefly talked about it with my husband, and he said that he’s using those commands a lot in the field. So, I hope that I am going to be used to it by using them over time in practice. I skipped the day 25 for personal reason.

Blog

• I would like to work in a company that only produced open-source software. Because I can work for a living and at the same time for others in that way. No matter how small and significant it will be, anyway it will be awesome to feel that being one of the people who try to make a better world.

• My dream job would be something to make me feel that I am useful, part of the community, not just parts that can be replaced by anything, anyone, at any time easily.

The iconic moment in which Charlie Chaplin is swallowed up by the cogs of the factory machine. Modern Times © Roy Export S.A.S.

• Looking back past ten years, we have achieved so much. Twenty years ago, there were only a few people used the internet. Now, almost everyone can access it using computers and smartphones. At first, I thought that people will still trust and buy products from big companies that spend billions on marketing. But who knows? The world keeps changing. TV was dominant, now Youtube. Once people can access the internet, a lot of information is available, unlike the past. And people try to make a better decision. So, everyone might be used to open source by that time - ten years later.

Projects

[✔️] Created an issue
[✔️] Setup the development environment - Local or Docker
[✔️] Translated a document into Korean
[✔️] Created a pull request
[🔜] Not yet accepted

I finished the translation of the documentation into Korean. And I made a pull request, corrected my mistakes, not from the document, from the pull request itself following the moderator’s advise. However, my pull request hasn’t accepted yet. I don’t think mine is going to be merged soon. I looked some of previous closed translation pull requests, and found one got response six months later - Chinese version how-to-setup-locally. I guess that there is a lack of people who can review the actual translation, so they just kept it in the open for a long time. On the other hand, I saw one french translation pull request; one moderator was able to tag someone immediately to review it. When I created the issue before starting to translate, they asked me to look another similar issue - Improve Korean translation and change wording. I tried to review it, but I gave up on the middle of the document. No one reviewed it, and they just merged it after more than a month later, while other pull requests like fixing bugs were closed in a day.

Assignments

• Read the article about Humanitarian open source projects, Bringing Raspberry Pi to schools in Tanzania

  This project helps African students to have an opportunity to study by providing appropriate supports like computers, computer education, educational software, solar power to solve the problem of lack of electricity, management system, etc. I like this project.

  I heard that my country was the poorest country back in the days, but we are not now. We believe that this was possible because we put education first among all other values. The country didn’t have natural resources. The only thing we could do was studying for a better future.

  I know there are some places in the same situation that we’ve gone through. And catching up is getting harder and harder. However, I still believe education would be the ultimate solution for anything, and what this project is doing right now can be quickly adopted to those places with a little bit of help. Building a school and maintaining it is a tough task. And this project used open-source projects wisely to solve the problem. There are many learning resources on the internet, but to get this point, students need computers, and that is not cheap. So, they used Rasberry Pi. Electricity is another problem, and they solved it with solar power. I think as an Asian, language is another barrier to access to those free learning resources. Because there are many useful resources mainly provided in English, however, besides that, this project is an excellent example, and I hope I can use their case to help my neighbor countries in the nearer future. Especially my husband’s land - the Philippines.

“… After the Korean war, in 1953, South Korea was one of the world’s poorest countries with only $64 per capita income.” - From the article South Korea: a model of development?

“… The economy of South Korea is the 4th largest in Asia and the 11th largest in the world. South Korea is known for its spectacular rise from one of the poorest countries in the world to a developed, high-income country in just a few generations. This economic growth is called by some a miracle, and described as the Miracle on the Han River,[19] which has brought South Korea to the ranks of elite countries in the OECD and the G-20.” - From the Wikipedia Economy of South Korea

• Read the article about business models in open source, Musings on Open Source Software Business Models

  I am glad to know what kind of business model open source projects might have by reading this article. It would’ve been a better article if it gave more specific examples. It mentioned some companies like Red Hat and MongoDB, but I couldn’t get the full idea of how to apply this to the beginning stage of any company. So, these models are based on the assumption that there are a certain number of customers use that open-source software. All the open-source companies began without thinking of making any revenues. Once it gets popular, which needs some management and has the potential to apply the business model, then that’s how the company can be?

• Read 8 advantages of using open source in the enterprise

  The article describes some benefits of using open source for the business.

  1. Flexibility and Agility
  If the business wants something else, then they can either find another solution or even make their own. It is an open-source.

  2. Speed / 3. Cost-effectiveness / 4. Ability to start small
  The business can be started right away without handling licensing issues. Start small and fast. If the company keeps growing, and need support. There will be support, for example, Red Hat.

  5. Solid Information Security
  The open-source community is getting bigger, and they are willing to help others. If there is a bug, they will report. If someone can fix it, they will fix it.

  6. Attract Better Talent
  I am not sure. Is that better talent referred to as someone who knows how to use open-source projects? If it is so, it could prove what kind of developers they are. If someone is a part of an open-source community, then she or he could be caring, self-motivated, and team-player in a high-chance.

  7. Share Maintenance Costs
  Maintenance = Sustainability. For a small business, building a product is already costly. Having a separate team only for support would be difficult. However, using open source means getting help from all over the world.

  8. The Future
  Before writing down, I was still in a doubt that using open source would be a perfect solution. But, yes, it is. More people are attracted to open source community either as a giver and taker. I am trying not to make it like a utopia, but it is hard not to. I couldn’t find why not the startup company use open source. I am convinced.