Alan’s Kiloblog

SourceForge is about projects. GitHub is about people. It is a very git-oriented world view. A world of programmers forking, hacking and experimenting. There is merging, but only if people agree to do so, by other channels.

This is a pivot of the traditional open source project website. A pivot from project to programmer.

I love the pivot.

GitHub gives me my own place to play. It lets me share my code the way I share photos on Flickr, the same way I share bookmarks on del.icio.us. Here’s something I found useful, for what it’s worth.

Naming a project is simple. I can give my project a name of my choosing. It is not a tedious affair akin to choosing a domain name, a dozen little stabs of disappointment, to land upon some hyphenated moniker.

Best of all, I’m not told that, before I start my project, I should go look for a similar project to join, before I set out on my own. I’ve always loathed this particular bit of pedantry.

I’ve got an idea, I’d like to try it out. As I work on it, I’d like to share it, to see if anyone is interested. I’d like to offer it to you, for what it’s worth.

Moreover, I’m sharing my code, for what it’s worth to me to share my code.

I am sharing my code. I am not launching an open source project. I am not beginning a search for like minded developers to avoid duplication of efforts. I am not showing up at someone else’s door hat in hand, asking for commit access. I am not looking to do battle with Brook’s Law at the outset of my brainstorm.

GitHub is code sharing with out the obligition of politicking born of centralized repository access.