From: "Geo." 

"Jeff Shultz"  wrote in message
news:pd5lvuc5pt91694ptpgob18j1vqu95p1mr{at}4ax.com...

> Not necessarily - but like someone who decides that they need to write
> a device driver - and can build on the work of all the other people
> who have written related device drivers.
>
> Or the guy who looks through the source code to a program he's found
> useful, and discovers that he can improve it - sends the improvements
> off to the original author.... and discovers he's a collaborator.

Back in the late 70's early 80's prior to IBM releasing the PC.. There were
a group of Apple ][ users who did exactly this. Almost all the software for
the ][ was written in assembler or in applesoft, applesoft was an
interpreted language so the program was the source and you could examine
and modify anything, assembler was basically source code to anyone who
wrote assembler. I personally spent countless hours writing things from
plotter drivers to joystick routines for a game called trisolitare to
utilities and graphics routines that were parts of other programs to bbs
software.

Apple ][ had tons of software, programmers everywhere, sharing was done via
the bbs networks. Write a program and people from NY to CA were using it
within a week. It was all free. It had little effect on the commercial
software markets.

Linux and Open source is nothing new (well maybe the level of co-operation
is, but software has become much more integrated since the 70's so that's
natural evolution). Open source is just experiencing a revival, in part
because of the internet but most recently because MS is pissing off way too
many people. How far that's going to drive Linux and Open source I don't
know but it is MS and the internet not some notion of "open
source" that is the driving force behind the recent popularity. It's
not happening because it's some cool new way of developing software..

Geo.

--- BBBS/NT v4.01 Flag-4