Over the past few days, I've spent quite a lot of time revisiting some tools I wrote for Linux many years ago. Some of them have been running in production for well over a decade. They work well, I've kept improving them over the years, and I think they could be useful to other people too.

So I started cleaning up the comments (in Italian, mostly), reviewing a few things, thinking about making them public. And then I stopped.

I'm not sure I want to release them anymore.

It's not about the work involved. I enjoy writing things, and I enjoy sharing them. I've been doing both for almost thirty years. But lately, with some of my projects, I've found myself spending more time explaining why I chose to do things in a certain way than discussing the software itself.

Why didn't I use this? Why didn't I follow that convention? Why isn't the development history publicly visible? Why not simply do what everyone else does?

And, to be clear, I have absolutely nothing against these questions. Asking questions is perfectly legitimate. What bothers me is the assumption that, if someone does things differently, there must be something wrong with their approach. Sometimes even something suspicious.

Last Saturday, during my talk at Linux Day, I mentioned something that I consider fundamental: Open Source is about freedom. Not about replacing one set of imposed conventions with another.

Thirty years ago, people asked me why I didn't just use Windows. Today, when something doesn't compile on a BSD, someone inevitably asks why I don't just use Linux. Which is rather funny, considering that I use Linux extensively and have done so since 1996.

But that's not the point, is it?

I don't dislike conventions. I don't dislike Git, public development or any of the practices that have become common over the years. I use many of them myself. I simply don't think they should become requirements for being considered a legitimate member of the Open Source community.

I have always disliked monopolies, including monopolies of thought. And I find it rather sad to see the same pressure to conform appearing in a world that attracted me precisely because it offered an alternative.

Perhaps I'm just getting a little tired. Not of developing things, but of having to justify my choices every time they differ from what people expect.

So, for now, I think those tools will remain where they've been for all these years: running on my servers, doing their job. Maybe I'll change my mind. I hope so, actually.

But right now, I don't feel like going through all of that again.

And that's a pity, because I still believe that sharing what we create is one of the best things about Open Source.

#OpenSource #BeFree