September 24th, 2007
Yahoo, another list of open source projects
Mashable, which blogs about social networking, has launched what it calls Open Source God, a directory of over 480 downloadable open source projects, divided into categories.
It’s far from exhaustive. The same blog previously produced similar lists for WordPress and Firefox add-ons. The headline above is a reference to the origins of Yahoo, which was originally a list of Web sites whose name was short for Yet Another Hierarchical Officious Oracle.
Each entry includes a link to the code and a brief description. Each section is headed by a large graphic, generally a screen capture from one of the vendors.
In giving you some idea of the breadth and depth of consumable open source production the list is a good one. As a shopping center it needs work. There are no references to the operating systems these programs run on, nor the system requirements, nor much of anything else.
While the list tries to be exhaustive, it would be hard to call it authoritative. There are 11 RSS feeders listed, and 9 browsers, but it’s hard to understand what’s meant by “system utilities” — seems like a bit box to me.
Sourceforge does a great job serving developers, and Slashdot does fine with kibbutzers, as we do with news, but it would be shocking to me if no one turned this basic idea into a full-fledged, full-time site with its own URL.
If this sounds like a business plan to you, please let me know.
Dana Blankenhorn has been a business journalist for 30 years, a tech freelancer since 1983. You can follow Dana on Twitter. See his full profile and disclosure of his industry affiliations.
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| 09/24/07
