I'm not a much of a developer, but I use OSS in my work extensively and I've shared the scripts and simple tools when I think they'll be useful to someone else.
I use because:
- I feel much more confident supporting something which I know I can dig into and observe the function of. This can give me and understand of what I'm doing wrong, allow me to work around it or possibly patch it entirely. Contrast this with the helplessness of troubleshooting the black box of closed software.
- It's cost effective. Money not spent on expensive licenses and implied support contracts can be applied elsewhere. Since much of my work deals with public funds, I feel particularly obligated to maximize value.
- I feel what I learn using OSS is more transferable, and applicable to other systems and problems than closed software.
I contribute because:
- I think sharing discovery and tools and building on the work of others is key to our success as a species. It feels completely natural.
- It opens the door for symbiotic improvements. Personally, I seem to be pretty good at find a novel perspective on a problem, but have little knowledge of how to code it efficiently. Sharing my code with someone who knows how to do those things benefits us both.
I use because:
- I feel much more confident supporting something which I know I can dig into and observe the function of. This can give me and understand of what I'm doing wrong, allow me to work around it or possibly patch it entirely. Contrast this with the helplessness of troubleshooting the black box of closed software.
- It's cost effective. Money not spent on expensive licenses and implied support contracts can be applied elsewhere. Since much of my work deals with public funds, I feel particularly obligated to maximize value.
- I feel what I learn using OSS is more transferable, and applicable to other systems and problems than closed software.
I contribute because:
- I think sharing discovery and tools and building on the work of others is key to our success as a species. It feels completely natural.
- It opens the door for symbiotic improvements. Personally, I seem to be pretty good at find a novel perspective on a problem, but have little knowledge of how to code it efficiently. Sharing my code with someone who knows how to do those things benefits us both.
- To learn by practice and example.