What I've learned about Open Source community over 30 years

These are great things to do if you want to buld a community around a project (which does help keep it going). But it's also OK to just build what you want and publish that and then maybe accept contributions under whatever terms you feel like. Community management really is an entirely different skillset from software developement and I wouldn't want anyone to be discouraged from open sourcing their software if they are not a "people person" and don't want to deal with all that. Just sharing your work already makes the world better and you are NOT required to do anything more than that.

Congrats to FreeDOS for 30 years.

This is perhaps a good example of a project being more than the product. By which I mean, we don't really need it - it serves no practical purpose, and yet it continues.

Of course I generalise, but the original premise ("I liked the command line") is amply served by Linux, Mac or Windows. The other original motivations are similarly obsolete now.

All of which is irrelevant. It remains an active project "just because" and isn't that the purest form of Free Software? Sure it's "useless" but we make it because we can, and because we want to.

Perhaps that's the biggest Open Source Community lesson of all- build something that the community enjoys making, unburdened by a large userbase, unburdened by popularity, or usefulness. It's gathered like-minded people who enjoy the journey more than the destination.

So tip of the hat to you all. FreeDOS is an example of capturing the heart of programming - code that doesn't need a reason beyond "because we wanted to."

FreeDOS can be used for offline word processing, e.g. reducing information leaks when writing the next "Game of Thrones".

(2014) https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2021/07/dos-b...

> Twenty years ago this week, as Microsoft announced that it would end support for the MS-DOS operating system, James Hall announced to the world that he intended to create a public domain version of the OS in order to keep the universe of character-based DOS software alive. Hall’s “PD-DOS” project eventually became FreeDOS, which today supports an ecosystem of developers, retro gamers, and diehards who will give up their WordStar when you pry the floppies from their cold, dead fingers.. WordStar, George R.R. Martin's favorite word processor, also runs happily in FreeDOS.

"Maintain a Website" - this really means "publish" (your works)

Because even if you do tons of very good work - if you don't publish it, then it's as if you're doing nothing.

This is where a lot of non-profits fail.

A lot of them are doing very, very good work - but because they suck at documentation & publication ; then people doesn't know about it at all.

Extremely anodyne — given that the author has maintained FreeDOS for longer than I've been alive, I was hoping for slightly more interesting ideas than "have a website and be nice to people." Not that I disagree with his advice!

Off topic, but I notice FreeDOS still uses email mailing lists. What email mailing list software / platforms are people using these days? Can you get mail delivered if you install an OSS mailing list and stand up your own server (vps or whatever)?

There's a whole bunch of ways to run a project. Some of them don't really involve "running a project" in the first place and are just the work of one person. Others have very different social dynamics than FreeDOS. If you want to be an asshole to everyone you perceive to be an idiot, then ... you can do that. You're allowed. I'm not saying it's the kind of project I'm very likely to contribute to, but not everything needs to suit my preferences.

Besides, many social conventions "exclude" people. I was once reprimanded for using the phrase "getting shit done" because any profanity, no matter the context, is forbidden, apparently. I felt that was childish and infantile enough that I didn't really feel like being part of that.

In the end all that's needed is publishing the code. You don't need to care about community or anything. You can, but don't need to.

FreeDOS is something that seems useful in manufacturing of PC's and PC-like embedded stuff.

Like as a platform for running basic diagnostics and whatever not.