Fwd: Re: [OpenWrt-Devel] Introducing the LEDE project

[Daniel Dickinson]

-------- Forwarded Message --------
Subject: 	Re: [OpenWrt-Devel] Introducing the LEDE project
Date: 	Thu, 5 May 2016 15:29:47 -0700
From: 	Bill <bmoffitt at ayrstone.com>
To: 	Daniel Curran-Dickinson <daniel at daniel.thecshore.com>



Daniel-

No, of course not - please do.

I assumed, at least for the moment, the folks on LEDE are reading both,
but it appears that may not have been a valid assumption.

I should probably want to get on the LEDE-dev list, as well.

Thanks,

-Bill

On 5/5/2016 11:37 AM, Daniel Curran-Dickinson wrote:
> Do you mind if I forward this mail to the LEDE-dev list?  I'm not sure
> how much access the LEDE team still has to the openwrt list.
>
> Regards,
>
> Daniel
>
> On 16-05-05 12:33 PM, Bill wrote:
>> I confess I am one of those people who has benefited much more than I
>> have contributed to the OpenWRT development group. I run a small company
>> in which I am the chief developer, administrator, customer support dude,
>> marketer, and salesguy. I would LOVE to be able to contribute more to
>> the OpenWRT community, and I do try to test things that are in my way
>> and report what I find from those tests, but I certainly don't feel I
>> pull my weight.
>>
>> However, in my defense, as you can probably surmise from the description
>> of my job, we're not exactly rolling in extra money or time to
>> contribute. Which I regret, but it is what it is. Anyone interested in
>> joining a currently unfunded startup using OpenWRT, please get in touch.
>>
>> I recently purchased a WiFi access point that I realized upon plugging
>> it in was running a somewhat restricted version of OpenWRT. I won't say
>> who makes it, but it's a very clever, one might say ingenious, product
>> that I like very much.
>>
>> However, when I looked at the OpenWRT tree, I could not find an OpenWRT
>> build for this particular device. And that, I must say, has REALLY
>> annoyed me - the company clearly expended some resources to port OpenWRT
>> to their clever device, and certainly benefits from it, but they
>> apparently did not contribute the work they did to support this device
>> back to the community so it could be "officially" part of the OpenWRT
>> ecosystem.
>>
>> I have also been painfully aware of the infrastructure difficulties that
>> OpenWRT has faced, and I have been quietly admiring the work of those
>> who keep it running as well as it does. As scary as it was when IBM got
>> deeply involved in Linux back in the early 2000s, for instance, I would
>> say their involvement has benefited both parties.
>>
>> OpenWRT is actually a pretty mature and popular codebase, and it
>> deserves much better infrastructure than it has now. In order to get a
>> better infrastructure, of course, we need, as a community, to attract
>> partners with the ability to contribute that infrastructure. It's great
>> to be in a project that is not beholden to any big companies UNTIL you
>> actually want to get something significant done. Pragmatism has its place.
>>
>> That's why I was a bit taken aback at the reluctance to embrace prpl's
>> offer. I would like to see an organization in which all possible
>> partners should be welcomed into the community; while we should be
>> appropriately cautious about accepting code from anyone, and subject it
>> to strict review as to suitability, fit with mission and architecture,
>> and quality, we should be pulling partners in, not holding them at arm's
>> length. My hope is that LEDE will either bring this level of pragmatism
>> or will enable OpenWRT to be more pragmatic.
>>
>> Of course, we have to be clear about the mission, architecture, and the
>> standards of suitability and quality... perhaps that is the departure
>> point for LEDE? I, for one, am eager to better understand, in full
>> atomic granularity, the problems that have led to this departure and
>> what, again, in atomic granularity, LEDE proposes to do differently.
>>
>> My thinking is that, if OpenWRT or LEDE is able to attract more support
>> from the corporate world, it will serve as an example to those who are
>> using OpenWRT/LEDE of what is expected of a larger company that is
>> gaining from the use of the software, hopefully pressuring them to step
>> up and be better members of the community. I also think that it will
>> lead to more visibility, which can help bring in folks like me who have
>> an idea and can leverage off of OpenWRT/LEDE to produce products that
>> are out of the mainstream.
>>
>> I'm not privy to all, indeed, any, of the discussions that have led to
>> this point of departure; I am commenting as a strict outsider. My simple
>> desire is to see the codebase continue to grow, in both code and users,
>> and the community to be as open and welcoming as possible. I hope that
>> this move will help achieve that for at least one of the resultant
>> groups. And I shall do what I can to help either or both. My last
>> comment is that the more open of the two communities is likely to be the
>> one where I can most easily see how I might contribute.
>>
>> -Bill
>>
>> -- 
>> Bill Moffitt
>> Ayrstone Productivity LLC 
>>
>>
>>
>> _______________________________________________
>> openwrt-devel mailing list
>> openwrt-devel at lists.openwrt.org
>> https://lists.openwrt.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/openwrt-devel
>>

-- 
Bill Moffitt
Ayrstone Productivity
http://ayrstone.com