On Sun, Nov 22, 2009 at 8:23 PM, Murigi Muraya
<mmskunkworks@gmail.com> wrote:
What is most ridiculous in Kenya is developers not occasionally getting together to lift each other up - skill and reputation (business) wise - resulting in few notable apps to speak off - which probably exist in many developer heads & hard drives in Kenya.
I don't consider myself a developer and not for another 2 years at least, thus my involvement is based more about what the future holds.
Murigi, what you describe above is self inflicting suicide if developers are doing these things. It benefits no one and neither is anyone going to hit at some magic wand app that will change their lives over night. Such things belong in a " fairy tale " or a distant mirage. Reality is we have to struggle 10 times more than other countries to even get where they are with apps etc and chances are even greater that the app has already been done.
As " under dogs " from a developing country who have more to prove than necessary, unless we change and become atheletes, that recognition is not going to happen. We don't have an iota of code out there neither do we have commercial apps that would place us anywhere.
Why would we choose such a self destructive path? What excatly is causing these problems? What are the solutions?
I definately see the strengths of software developers/coders/etc association where all java, php, .net, c++, c can come together under one umbrella and a common cause, with guidance from those in the industry.
The above is a good example of a .Net language, though you may need to clarify about Point 1 ? . What about other languages like php, java etc? Can they also not operate under a single umbrella?
It is part of the Java / FOSS culture to engage in MS bashing. This is the reason why most .Net developers are not interested in skunkworks. Many started out as hard core FOSSists until work (not college) got them into .Net. As such many of them also work with PHP. One told me last week they have no time for types who know nothing about .Net but specialize on negative commentary about anything MS. Now, guess who is doing most enterprise (intranet and extranet) apps in Kenya today?
I read an interesting article the other day and the comments from a CEO made a lot of sense. When people are in college, foss is all fine etc but when someone has a family and bills to pay, going out on commercial proprietory systems pays. The problem with foss is that its commercial payback is based on support. That demand for support is reducing as companies are encouraging their inhouse IT people to learn and support such systems and with google, well need I say more....
A further research on the net revealed that 92% of all desktop apps are Microsoft while others hold the other %. So those going after MS in developing countries are people who have been paid to do so through commercial undertakings or partnerships, or have other revenues to sustain their rants or are just plain silly.
There is a bottom line to this. Politics and Economic change will bring good or bad news world over, we are no different. How long before we see that in Africa we are just simple END USERS of commercial games being played out in corporate board rooms out there whether proprietory or open source. We are the test bed of many things so until we write our own code, develop our own OS etc there is no justified reason to build defensive lines just because of systems. I would add that .Net guys should join skunks and also add their veiws, get a thicker skin and move on to what is more important than rants.
BTW, I'm a FreeBSD believer but I can tell you that even Linux people have a problem with this. I personally do not care, I get my work done and results whether proprietory or open. And now Iphone and steve jobs seem to be a new target, the net is full of articles. :-)