open sorce questions

Have you worked on open source projects before? How did you get involved? Has your help ever been rejected?

Have you started an open source project before? How did it go, and did it attract other developers?

How do open source projects function? Do random people make commits to a repository? Is someone in charge of reviewing, or rejecting the commits? How do the developers coordinate?

Is it possible to publish a piece of software with a license, maybe using a cryptographic signature?

Has a prior place of employment, or your current company, ever found your open source work by searching your name, and then searched through the code and accused you of violating their non disclosure agreement? How specific are non disclosure agreements? If I implemented a red black tree in my open source work, and a red black tree as a part of my job, should I change the way the two projects are written? Would a company be dumb enough to claim to own the concept of a red black tree?

>>1

| Is it possible to publish a piece of software with a license, maybe using a cryptographic signature?

Wups, left out an important word..

Is it possible to anonymously publish a piece of software with a license, maybe using a cryptographic signature?

>>2
|
Please, learn to quote.

Just use p2p networks and igoner all legal issues. If you want to monetize, you can always use something like bitcoins for transactions.

>Would a company be dumb enough to claim to own the concept of a red black tree?

if they'll claim ownership of timezone data they'll claim ownership of literally anything

>>2
Why would you use a cryptographic signature if it was anonymous. It's either anonymous and public domain or it's pseudononymous and it has some license or is possibly public domain.

>>6

Thanks, just releasing it into the public domain would work fine.

How do open source projects function? Do random people make commits to a repository? Is someone in charge of reviewing, or rejecting the commits? How do the developers coordinate?
It's up to whoever starts the project.  For the more substantial ones, there's generally some sort of governing body, usually, the program's original authors.

So anyone can do a "check-out" of the software and start making changes.  But then you submit your change and it's reviewed by the governing body.  If they approve it, it goes into the next release, but they might make some changes of their own.

Have you worked on open source projects before?
I've reported bugs and submitted patches to Blender.  It has  one of the better open-source communities.

How did you get involved?
You check out the source and start fixing stuff or adding features.  You need to know what you're doing, though.

http://aimind-i.com

| Have you started an open source project before? How did it go, and did it attract other developers?

Up above is a link to the AI project spun off from Mentifex MindForth AI after the original Open-Source AI project attracted another intrepid Forth programmer. In JavaScript, the Open Source AI Tutorial version is at

http://www.scn.org/~mentifex/AiMind.html