O'Reilly News & Commentary

Robots.Txt and the .Gov TLD

By Carl Malamud
November 20, 2009

I'm on the board of CommonCrawl.Org, a nonprofit corporation that is attempting to provide a web crawl for use by all. An interesting report just got sent to us about the use of robots.txt files within the .Gov Top Level Domain, a standard known as the Robots Exclusion Standard. In examining about 32,000 subdomains in .gov, it turns at least 1,188 of these have a robots.txt file with a "global disallow," meaning robots are excluded from indexing this content. Even more curious, on 175 of these sites, while there is a global disallow, there is a specific bypass that allows the Googlebot to index the data.

Four short links: 20 November 2009 - Social Network Search for Morons, Bulking Up Bio Data, Better E-Mail, Better Standards

By Nat Torkington
November 20, 2009

Introducing the Open Web Foundation Agreement -- Applying the open source approach to better standards. The Open Web Foundation Agreement itself establishes the copyright and patent rights for a specification, ensuring that downstream consumers may freely implement and reuse the licensed specification without seeking further permission. In addition to the agreement itself, we also created an easy-to-read "Deed" that provides a high level overview of the agreement. This and more in today's Four Short Links.

Four short links: 19 November 2009 - Chumby One, Gorgeous IE Debugger, Freer Than Free, and Phone-a-Friend for Government IT

By Nat Torkington
November 19, 2009

Less Than Free -- Begins by talking about Google giving away turn-by-turn directions on Android, and then analyses Google's "less than free" business model: Additionally, because Google has created an open source version of Android, carriers believe they have an “out” if they part ways with Google in the future. I then asked my friend, “so why would they ever use the Google (non open source) license version.” Here was the big punch line - because Google will give you ad splits on search if you use that version! That’s right; Google will pay you to use their mobile OS. I like to call this the “less than free” business model. This is a remarkable card to play. Because of its dominance in search, Google has ad rates that blow away the competition. To compete at an equally “less than free” price point, Symbian or windows mobile would need to subsidize. Double ouch!! This and more in today's Four Short Links.

Four short links: 13 November 2009 - Open Source Design, Interesting NoSQL Use, Copyright Documentary, Location Intelligence

By Nat Torkington
November 13, 2009

Open Source Enters The World of Atoms -- An academic statistical analysis of open design. We indicated that, in open design communities, tangible objects can be developed in very similar fashion to software; one could even say that people treat a design as source code to a physical object and change the object via changing the source. This and more in today's Four Short Links.

Four short links: 12 November 2009 - CRM on Rails, Data Mining on Hadoop, Disappointing Keynotes, The Teapot Effect

By Nat Torkington
November 12, 2009

Bixo -- An open source data mining toolkit that runs as a series of pipes on top of Hadoop. Built on Cascading workflow system for Hadoop that hides MapReduce. This and more in today's Four Short Links.

Four short links: 11 November 2009 - Participation Tools, Open Data Requests, Go Programming Language, Why Open Source is Better

By Nat Torkington
November 11, 2009

Go -- new language from Bell Labs and Unix central figures Rob Pike and Ken Thompson, who now work at Google. Bits of C, bits of Google, it compiles to native binaries and runs nearly as fast as C. Built with concurrency and memory management as central figures. Not used in production at Google yet, but grew from a 20% project to something worthy of public release. This and more in today's Four Short Links.

Unlikely Group Working Happily Together To Solve Patent Problem

By Carl Malamud
November 9, 2009

People following the issue of open sourcing the U.S. Patent Database might have been surprised to read an announcement in the official business opportunities web site of the U.S. Government: Synopsis for Public Data Dissemination Sole Source Contract to Google, Inc. While the first reaction of many might be "OMG, WTF, how could they," this is actually good news, with an unlikely cast of characters working together including Google, Intellectual Ventures, and the Internet Archive.

Four short links: 4 November 2009 - Electronics Hacking FAQs, Speech-To-Text Democracy, Open Source Column Database, Massive Online Analysis

By Nat Torkington
November 4, 2009

Democracy Live -- BBC launch searchable coverage of parliamentary discussion, using speech-to-text. One aspect we're particularly proud of is that we've managed to deliver good results for speech-to-text in Welsh, which, we're told, is unique. I think of this as the start of a They Work For You for video coverage. I'd love to be able to scale this to local government coverage, which is disappearing as local newspapers turn into delivery mechanisms for real estate advertisements. This and more in today's Four Short Links.

Announcing O'Reilly Answers - Clever Hacks. Creative Ideas. Innovative Solutions.

By Allen Noren
November 4, 2009

We're launching the beta of O'Reilly Answers, and I'm inviting you to be part of it. In brief, O'Reilly Answers is a community site for sharing knowledge, asking questions, and providing answers that brings together our customers, authors, editors, conference speakers, and Foo (Friends of O'Reilly). O'Reilly is at the center of an amazing exchange of knowledge sharing and idea generation, and we want you to join us in changing the world by spreading the knowledge of innovators.

Defense Department Releases Open Source Memo

By Jim Stogdill
October 27, 2009

I've been holding my breath for so long waiting for this memo that I may not remember how to start breathing again, but here it is. The Department of Defense Deputy CIO Dave Wennergren has signed and released "Clarifying Guidance on Open Source Software."

Four short links: 26 October 2009 - Data Exploration, Evidence-Based Coding, API to the English Language, Dual Licensing

By Nat Torkington
October 26, 2009

Toiling in the Data Mines -- Tom Armitage describes the process that Berg calls "material exploration". "Programmers very rarely talk about what their work feels like to do, and that's a shame. Material explorations are something I've really only done since I've joined BERG, and both times have felt very similar - in that they were very, very different to writing production code for an understood product. They demand code to be used as a sculpting tool, rather than as an engineering material..." This and more in today's Four Short Links.

Thoughts on the Whitehouse.gov switch to Drupal

By Tim O'Reilly
October 26, 2009

Yesterday, the new media team at the White House announced via the Associated Press that whitehouse.gov is now running on Drupal, the open source content management system. That Drupal implementation is in turn running on a Red Hat Linux system with Apache, MySQL and the rest of the LAMP stack. Apache Solr is the new White House search engine. This move is obviously a big win for open source. While open source is already widespread throughout the government, its adoption by the White House will almost certainly give permission for much wider uptake.

Four short links: 23 October 2009 - Beautiful Information, Teen Game Designer, Creative Science Writing, Open Source Schools

By Nat Torkington
October 23, 2009

Information is Beautiful -- gorgeous descriptions of the design of infographics. This and more in today's Four Short Links.

Rails in a Nutshell Manuscript Open For Collaboration

By Keith Fahlgren
October 20, 2009

Following hot on the launch of the Building iPhone Apps with HTML, CSS, and JavaScript manuscript three weeks ago, I'm pleased that Rails in a Nutshell, from Cody Fauser, James MacAulay, Edward Ocampo-Gooding and John Guenin is now live and ready for your comments. Any book that starts with a section in the preface called "What makes you happy?" is worth your attention.

Four short links: 13 October 2009 - Open Source, Gov 2.0, Gaming, Education

By Nat Torkington
October 13, 2009

Google Replaces TeleAtlas -- Google has decided to go with a new source of data for its U.S. maps: Google's StreetView cars. Tele Atlas will no longer provide U.S. map coverage, but will continue being Google's source of data for non-U.S. based maps. A report about the change speculates that with Google's own data source, map error fixes may happen in as little as 24 hours. This and more in today's Four Short Links.

Four short links: 9 October 2009 - Negative Karma, Wal-Mart TQI, Idiot Airlines, and Native iPhone Apps in Lua

By Nat Torkington
October 9, 2009

Don't Display Negative Karma -- Are you building social software that visibly rewards users for participation? It is wise to consider the concept of karma bankruptcy among users. If a user's score drops below an initial zero, they are more likely to abandon the account and start a new identity. Check out this fascinating article by Randy Farmer and Bryce Glass, authors of the upcoming book from O'Reilly, Building Web Reputation Systems. This and more in today's Four Short Links.

Four short links: 7 October 2009 - Ongoing Palm Fail, YouTube Numbers, Plugin Patent Pain, Bivalve-Oriented Architecture

By Nat Torkington
October 7, 2009

Followup to jwz's Palm App Store Fiasco -- Redux: still nothing concrete from Palm, but they're saying they'll create a second-rate app store into which open source apps will go (along with apps that Palm hasn't reviewed). This and more in today's Four Short Links.

Questions (and Answers!) About the Federal Register

By Carl Malamud
October 7, 2009

When the White House retweets Cory Doctorow, you know something unusual has happened. As many of you saw, the Office of the Federal Register announced that source code for the Federal Register is now available in bulk - for free - and has been converted to XML. Ed Felten's shop at Princeton created a site called fedthread.org to see what you can do with the data and Public.Resource.Org helped the Government Printing Office in testing early stages of the XML work.

Four short links: 5 October 2009 - Bozo Cloud Talk, Annotation Fail(ish), Python MySQL Slash, and Infinite Books

By Nat Torkington
October 5, 2009

Brown Cloud Marketing -- An advertorial "interviewing" the general manager of a company offering "DNS in the cloud". This might be a worthwhile service, but the way he markets it (by saying open source is "freeware" and the market leader is "legacy") reveals a rich vein of bozo. This and more in today's Four Short Links.

Teams, architecture, and open source

By Andrew Stellman
October 5, 2009

When we were working on Beautiful Teams, I was really surprised to see just how much overlap there was between getting software teams to work well together and getting them to improve the architecture of the systems they were building. That was a big learning point for me. I really had those two areas, architecture and teams, in separate "buckets." It was really enlightening to me to talk to people whose opinions I really respect, and hear them draw a direct line between better software teams and better architecture.

Four short links: 29 September 2009 - Bletchley Park No Longer Blech, Contest Mania, Palm Process Fails For Free Software, Open Source Web Analytics

By Nat Torkington
September 29, 2009

Bletchley Park May Have a Future -- The UK birthplace of modern computing, where Alan Turing worked during WW II breaking German codes, is dilapidated and in need of major repair. They appear to have a supporter in the UK National Lottery, who have given them a grant to begin work and prepare for further grants. (See also The Geek Atlas) This and more in today's Four Short Links.

Four short links: 18 September 2009 - More Twitter Clients, GLAM Tech, Retro Homebrew Audio Hardware, Emerging Open Source

By Nat Torkington
September 18, 2009

Echofon -- Keep your unread tweets synced between your iPhone and your desktop. Formerly known as TwitterFon and TwitterFox, echofon is a suite of apps that that allow you to synch unread tweets between your browser and phone, and soon, the desktop. In addition to supporting multiple users and unread synching, the Echofon app offers multiple Twitter and user views, authoring, tracking, publishing and pushing. This and more in today's Four Short Links.

Four short links: 17 September 2009 - Involuntarily Opened Geodata, Sense Organ, Doc Vis, 3D Open Source Bodies

By Nat Torkington
September 17, 2009

Wikileaks Now Holds UK Postcode Database -- the UK does not have open geodata in the way that we know it. A state-owned enterprise, Ordnance Survey, is responsible for maintaining all sorts of baseline data and they charge (through the nose) for that data. This is the release of 1,841,177 post codes, geographic boundaries, and more. Postcodes in the UK are far more useful than US ZIP codes--they identify a handful of houses, rather than a few thousand houses. My New Sense Organ -- a strap with buzzers and a compass, so you always have physical reminder of orientation. For people like me who can get lost putting on pants in the morning, this would be a godsend. (via Slashdot)

Computerization in Nilekani's Imagining India

By Andy Oram
September 2, 2009

Imagining India: The Idea of a Renewed Nation promises to occupy a central position in discussions about India as well as the world economy this year. Author Nandan Nilekani can speak with quite a bit of authority on computers, having founded and led Infosys, an early success story in modern Indian commerce and a major player in the historic rise of outsourcing. Particularly relevant to this blog are the book's observations on computers' role in the economy and society.

The Dasein Cloud API

By George Reese
August 17, 2009

The Dasein Cloud API is the next step in the drive towards Open cloud programming standards. If you want to support multiple clouds or if you simply want to support the possibility of switching cloud providers, you are faced with supporting different programming models. This Open Source API enables programmers to write cloud management applications in Java against a single API that supports multiple clouds.

Upcoming Webcasts: Git in One Hour - Meet Experts Online

By O'Reilly Media
August 14, 2009

In this webcast, Git evangelist Scott Chacon covers the basics of the Git source control system. He'll introduce the audience to Git basics: staging and committing snapshots, viewing the commit log, pushing to and pulling from servers, and creating, switching between, and merging branches. Finally, he'll quickly cover a few more advanced features - code annotation, advanced log options and possibly more, time permitting. Attendance is limited for this August 13th event, so register now! More Upcoming Webcasts - Meet Experts Online: Energy Literacy Entity Framework Tips & Tricks Nuclear Energy: Future Directions Check out our Webcast page for on-demand videos of past webcasts and more upcoming live events!

Four short links: 12 August 2009 - Health Data, Python Term Extraction, Network Neutrality, New Database

By Nat Torkington
August 12, 2009

Improving Health Care -- Adam Bosworth has posted the text of a speech he delivered at the Aspen Health Forum. Among his points Bosworth notes "the importance of giving us all the right to our health data online." The speech starts strong and just gets better: "We should require sharing of population statistics across practices and hospitals in order to better determine what works for whom. We should reward practices and hospitals that are delivering the best most cost-effective long-term outcomes and penalize those that deliver the worst." This and more in today's Four Short Links.

Four short links: 7 August 2009 - Recovery.gov, Meme tracking, RFID Scans, Open Source Search Engines

By Nat Torkington
August 7, 2009

Defragging the Stimulus -- Josh Knauer of Rhiza Labs examines a range data sources related to tracking the Obama Administration's stimulus package investments and notes that getting a sense of the data can be difficult since facts and analysis are scattered across several sites. He proposes that "with already-existing technology, the federal government could easily revolutionize Recovery.gov in just a few steps," and shares his recommendations. This and more in Four Short Links.

Featured Video: Karl Schroeder, "The Rewilding: A Metaphor"

By O'Reilly Media
August 4, 2009

Five projects for Open Source for America, and other reports from the Open Source convention

By Andy Oram
July 24, 2009

A group of companies and projects announced Open Source for America at the O'Reilly Open Source convention on Wednesday. I already have five projects they could take on.

Maybe software services could harm free software after all (and other news from the Open Source convention)

By Andy Oram
July 23, 2009

Opening dispatch from OSCon: another look at the effects of Software as a Service on opens source plus awards, APIs, and more.

Slashdot Gives The Geek Atlas a Well-Deserved 10/10 - More Than a Travel Guide

By O'Reilly Media
July 21, 2009

Ben Rothke found plenty to like in his Slashdot review of The Geek Atlas: 128 Places Where Science and Technology Come Alive by John Graham-Cumming. Giving this travel guide for geeks a winning 10/10, Rothke writes: "The Geek Atlas is a fascinating and enjoyable read; in fact, I found it hard to put down. Lets hope the author is working on a sequel with the next 256 additional places where science and technology come alive." Read Rothke's review now.

Community Leadership Summit thrills over 200 attendees

By Andy Oram
July 20, 2009

An unconference such as the Community Leadership Summit 2009 feels like one of those long, lingering meals you can enjoy with friends in a fine European restaurant, full of lively conversation. Or an intense experience like an arts festival, which perhaps suggests why one participant at the end of the Community Leadership Summit suggested it be held in conjunction with South by Southwest instead of the O'Reilly Open Source convention.

Why Open Source Thrives During Economic Downturns - New O'Reilly Insights on Forbes.com

By O'Reilly Media
July 15, 2009

Recession-Proof Open Source — "When stocks are low, conventional wisdom says "invest in bonds." There's no conventional wisdom for what to do when the computer software market is low (for the second time in a decade). But if there were, it would say invest in open source," writes Allison Randall in the latest O'Reilly Insights on Forbes.com. Randal, co-chair of O'Reilly's upcoming Open Source Convention in San Jose, explains there are many young open source ventures worth watching this year. Read more.

Open Source is Infiltrating the Enterprise - Forrester's Jeffrey Hammond Says There's Plenty of it Around, if You Look

By James Turner
July 7, 2009

There's a persistent perception that open source software is being ignored in the enterprise, that they fear it and it ends up being more costly to deploy than proprietary solutions. That's certainly the perception that some major software vendors would like you to have. But it's Jeffrey Hammond's job to dispel those perceptions, at least when they aren't accurate. As an analyst for Forrester Research, Hammond covers the world of software development as well as Web 2.0 and rich internet applications, so he sees how open source is being used on a daily basis. He'll be speaking at OSCON, O'Reilly's Open Source Conference, talking about the true cost of using open source, and he gave us a sample of what's going on in the enterprise at the moment.

Pre-OSCON, Free Webcast Lineup - And a special offer - Save 40% off registration pricing

By Kathryn Barrett
July 2, 2009

The theme of this year's OSCON is "Open for Business." Times are tough, making open source technology a smart choice for staying competitive. It gives you the means to drive down costs while increasing system and staff efficiencies. In anticipation of the conference, we've lined up three free webcasts featuring OSCON speakers. And if you're planning to attend OSCON, you can save 40% off registration pricing right now. In celebration of Independence Day—and freedom from commercial software—we're offering the discount code os09jul4, good through July 7.

Calendar Component in ActionScript 3 Part 2

By Tom Barker
June 19, 2009

In my previous entry I discussed including and implementing the Calendar component in a new project. In this next entry I'm going to explore the Calendar class. The basic idea for the Calendar class is to assemble a collection of...

MySQL faster, better, and still unified: notes about Sun, Monty Widenius, Percona, and Drizzle

By Andy Oram
May 22, 2009

It might have seemed last week, with the announcement of the Open Database Alliance, that MySQL is forking. The ODA promises a "central clearinghouse for MySQL development" and claims to improve on areas where criticism has historically been aimed at MySQL AB/Sun: bug-fixing, performance, and community responsiveness. But what's going on behind the scenes is much more subtle and promises a much better outcome for MySQL.

Hackers wanted! Scholarships available to coders who'll come to journalism and help save democracy

By Brian Boyer
May 8, 2009

It's not news that journalism is in crisis. CNN turned newspapers into first-day fishwrap and Craigslist killed the business model. Solutions are scarce, and our democracy is at risk. I don't have a chart to guide our way through the darkness to Citizenry 2.0, but there are some who can navigate the singularity. Journalism needs great hackers. Not just nerds, but programmers who care -- about the values of journalism and the power of a free press to hold government accountable.

Results from Wolfram Alpha: All the Questions We Ever Wanted to Ask About Software as a Service

By Andy Oram
May 8, 2009

Software as a Service, known in earlier decades as Application Service Providers, upends the relationship between computer users and software. I'm seriously tempted to say that Wolfram Alpha takes the SaaS model to its extreme. So Wolfram Alpha's chances at scaling the heights of fame should force us to stop for a moment and run our own calculations concerning the value to us of data integrity, reliability, privacy, and innovation.

Favorite Linux Book of All Time: Linux in a Nutshell

By Kathryn Barrett
May 1, 2009

The Linux Journal's annual Readers' Choice Awards take the pulse of the Linux community, allowing readers to choose their favorites in a number of categories, and write-ins also are accepted. This year, more than 6,000 individuals voted for their favorite Linux solutions—one of the biggest turnouts in in Linux Journal history. And Linux in a Nutshell won the award for Favorite Linux Book of All Time. Our thanks to everyone who voted for this book. We think it's a classic and we're glad that you do, too!

Forge.mil Update and DISA Hacks Public Domain

By Jim Stogdill
April 29, 2009

Progress of open source initiatives at DISA.

MySQL conference begins: the resurgence of InnoDB and other current events

By Andy Oram
April 23, 2009

I sense a bigger enterprise theme at the MySQL conference this year. The pride of putting up a PHP- or Rails-backed web site lies in the past; now people are concerned with scaling into the clouds (figuratively and literally) and ensuring absolute reliability.

PhoneGap, the Mobile Platform Democratizer

By Brady Forrest
April 8, 2009

There's a gold-rush happening right now in mobile marketplaces. However not everyone is able to participate and not all platforms are receiving equal attention. PhoneGap has the potential to be a great democratizer. It lowers the bar for developers to create powerful applications out of very familiar web technologies. It also enables sites to support versions of their apps for mobile platforms other than the iPhone. If you don't have an iPhone (or even if you do) you should be cheering this project along.

Open Cloud Manifesto: about openness, standards, and the vitality of SMTP

By Andy Oram
March 30, 2009

Thanks to George Reese, I learned about the bruhaha over an Open Cloud Manifesto. Let's put the debate in the context of some basic and perennial issues about openness and standards.

Challenges from a book sprint: the great things about ignorance and disorder

By Andy Oram
March 24, 2009

I tried to write a conventional computer manual in two days, and the experience has made me reconsider the conventions of computer manuals. The computer field is still in the kindergarten stage of exploring serious questions of how people learn, questions at the center of psychology and pedagogy for many decades. Even those disciplines don't quite get it, because they're fumbling with the instant messaging culture that gives us so many more tools today for learning together.

From Open Source Software to Open Culture: Three Misunderstandings

By Andy Oram
March 23, 2009

The original practice and promise of open source software is unique. The software experience cannot be ported whole-hog into other areas such as sharing songs or organizing public forums. It's worth looking at what goes into creating open source software, and what unique traits of software make the open source process work well there.

Read an Excerpt from High Performance MySQL: Winner of a Productivity Award at the 19th Annual Jolt Awards

By Kathryn Barrett
March 17, 2009

We're delighted to announce that High Performance MySQL, Second Edition, was awarded a Jolt Productivity Award in the category of Technical Books. The Jolts are the Oscars of the software development industry, showcasing the books, tools, and other products that have "jolted" the industry. Congratulations to the authors of this title. To celebrate, we've posted an excerpt from the book.

Vivek Kundra: Federal CIO in His Own Words

By Timothy M. O'Brien
March 5, 2009

This article contains several audio excerpts and transcripts from Vivek Kundra's first conference call as the newly appointed Federal CIO. After weeks of speculation it was formally announced today that President Obama has appointed Kundra, who had previously been serving as the CTO for Washington D.C.. In his previous position, Kundra pushed the boundaries of Information Technology and set the standard for transparency and accountability adopting Google Apps as a collaboration platform, video taping vendor interactions, and instituting a rigorous regime of metrics and accountability for government contracts.

Twitscan: The Debate over "Open Core"

By Timothy M. O'Brien
March 3, 2009

There's a debate over the boundaries between open source communities and the business that tend to develop around them. Hang on readership, we're trying out a new idea: Twitscan. Many of the conversations that matter in technology are happening in and around Twitter. Some of these stories will include twitter exchanges, others will just follow a thread of responses and point you to some interesting individuals and conversations that are happening, right now in the "Twitvironment". This post covers some of the recent chatter around Open Core Licensing.

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