DotNetNuke is an extremely successful open source project that targets the
Windows platform and .NET Framework.  In this interview, we talk with Shaun
Walker about bringing DotNetNuke forward from its humble beginnings as a .NET
sample project, to the premier open source content management system for
Windows.

• The beginnings of DotNetNuke and engaging with Microsoft on open source
• Open source development paradigms interacting with proprietary software
• Seeking venture capital and monetizing DotNetNuke
• Response by the community to creating a commercial version
• Overcoming the pressures of a down economy
• Future directions: cloud platforms and improved distribution channels

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It’s not exaggeration to say that Ian Clarke takes on some of the hardest problems in computing. Ian invented Freenet, and open-source network that remained uncracked, and is today contemplating Swarm, which has ambitions goals about moving computing closer to distributed data. But Ian isn’t just a geek’s geek. In this interview, he throws in some thoughts about the business side of software development too.

• The origins of Freenet and anonymous peer-to-peer architecture
• On the mathematics behind “Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon”
• Observations about optimal strategies for managing an open source community
• The Swarm project’s approach to distributed data
• Implementing fork/join and related concepts in distributed systems
• Relative beneits of open source and proprietary approaches to development
• Incorporating open source into an overall business strategy

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Eucalyptus is an open-source project that gives you the Amazon cloud API for
non-Amazon clouds.  In this interview, we chat with Rich Wolski, CTO of
Eucalyptus Systems, about the project and the company.

• Eucalyptus as a technology-neutral abstraction layer for cloud computing
• Enabling utility pricing models for compute resources
• Toward the ability to mix and match platform services with infrastructure services
• Open source significance and strategy in Eucalyptus
• The evolving role of community in the Eucalyptus project
• Real-world implementations and usage scenarios

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Cloudera has built a business around the open-source Hadoop project, and in this
interview, we chat with Cloudera CTO and cofounder Amr Awadallah about all
things Hadoop.

• Background on Hadoop and its origins
• Implementing support for MapReduce to handle distributed data
• Suitability of Hadoop for cloud computing
• The relationship between Cloudera’s Hadoop version and the Apache version
• Cloudera’s business and monetization model around Hadoop
• Licensing models as they apply to Cloudera and Hadoop

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We had the chance to interview James Vasile, an attorney with the Software
Freedom Law Center (SFLC).  Now people often think of the SFLC as the
group that “goes after” people who violate the GPL, and that’s certainly the aspect that the press focuses on, but James points out that enforcement is a very
small percentage of what they do.  More interesting were James insights
into how businesses learn that their secret sauce has very little to do with
locking up the code. And if you’re looking for more, James maintains his own blog at hackervisions.org

• The role of the Software Freedom Law Center in the world of free software
• Fostering voluntary compliance with the GPL
• Handling violations without putting people on the defensive
• How communities protect themselves with self-regulation
• Negotiating the urge for proprietary “secret sauce” in the marketplace
• Niche markets where open source has not had much impact

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If you look at any list of open source content management systems, you'll find
Joomla right in top.  In this interview, we talk with Louis Landry, who
started as the
principal architect of Joomla 1.5 and the Joomla Framework and today acts
as the development coordinator.  If you're interested in where Joomla's at,
and where it's going, read on…

• Joomla and its relationship to website owners
• The difficulty of creating success metrics for free software
• The relationship between the core Joomla environment and extensions
• Cloud computing and platform independence
• Transitioning the web to new platforms and the semantic web
• The future of rich applications in a web browser

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If anyone knows Linux kernel driver development, it's Greg Kroah-Hartman, who's
been working deep in Linux for over a decade.  In this interview, Greg
talks about how the Linux project has accommodated the accelerating rate of
change for the kernel, and offers some insight on where Linux is headed.

• How development on the Linux kernel has changed in the past several years
• Drawing in the larger community with the Linux Driver Project
• The breadth of uses for and contributors to the kernel
• The future trajectory of Linux, including functional balance with hardware
• Overcoming the challenges of maintaining universal hardware device support
• The range of change and growth in the kernel

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The cloud providers are splitting into a few camps.  On one side, you have
companies like Amazon that offer infrastructure as a service (IaaS), and Google
who offers platform as a service (PaaS).  PaaS offers rapid development,
and no server administration, but it locks you into a specific provider. 
Enter Engine Yard, a company that's enhancing Ruby on Rails to run on on top of
arbitrary IaaS.  In this interview Ezra Zygmuntowicz paints the picture.

• Defining platform as a service and the creation of Engine Yard
• Advancing cloud computing beyond buzzwords
• Opening cloud computing as a simple, provider-agnostic framework
• Operating system and programming language flexibility
• Providing flexible scalability of data stores
• Paradigm shifts created by cloud computing, including admin roles and rapid start-ups

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I would say that we did thin interview because the world needs just one more
"cloud" post, but that's hard to justify.  Still, the cloud seem to be
segmenting into infrastructure as a service (IaaS) providers, and platform as a
service (PaaS) providers.  IaaS (like Amazon Web Services) is basically
virtual machines in the sky, and this differs from traditional hosting because
with a cloud provider, you should be able to start and stop dozens or hundreds
of VMs through an API, and pay only for the CPU hours you use.  PaaS (like
Google App Engine) gives you a framework to code against, and it's a much more
restrictive environment (moving to PaaS is usually a rewrite), but you never
worry about individual machines, patching, or all that Jazz.

In this interview, we explore the concept or layering an arbitrary PaaS
implementation on top of an arbitrary IaaS provider.  Hmmm…

• How Open Platform as a Service fits into the development process and the industry as a whole
• Building an open software architecture for loosely coupled components and environments
• Developer interaction with Open Platform as a Service
• Dealing with elastic resource demands

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This interview reminds me a little of those sci-fi stories that start with the
big bang, and end 40 billion years in the future.  Con Zymaris has the
depth of experience to pull this off in the software space, offering some very
astute insights and provacative food for though along the way.

• The early days of computing as the foundations for open source
• Open source growing up alongside proprietary technology
• Circumstances that led to the dominance of Linux among open OSs
• The economic motivation for open source as the result of technological progress
• On the rise of commercial entities as open source guardians
• The effects of OEM momentum behind particular open source technologies
• Low-cost, lightweight computing as an upcoming nexus of power
• Keeping customers for the long haul without being able to lock them in

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In this interview, we talk with Intel's Dirk Hohndel about Moblin, the explosion
of devices, and how large companies do (or don't) really "get" open source.

• Moblin and its transition from Intel to the Linux Foundation
• Linux as a multi-purpose OS across device types
• On the limitations to how many devices people really want
• Data synchronization capabilities and limitations
• Integrating open source ethos into a large company’s business model
• Public acceptance and skepticism of commercial involvement in open source

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If you’ve ever used a Wii control or played an iPhone game, you’re familiar with the kind technology that Hillcrest Labs makes, and they make some of the best. In this interview, we talk about their decision to open-source their library and the benefits this brings back from their developer community.

• Freespace products and the air pointer market
• Bringing order to the expanding world of digital content in the living room
• Building new devices for human-computer interaction
• Distributing open source libraries to spur innovation
• The math and alorithms behind motion tracking and control
• The Loop: a next-generation pointing device

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We came across David Dennis and Simon Bennett at GroundWork Open Source, because they seemed to do something that didn’t entirely make sense. GroudWork is an open source company that released a plug-in for a completely proprietary product – a connector for Microsoft System Center Operations Manager, of all things.

Read on to see how they explain this, and how they school us on open source management tools.

• Pulling together various open source monitoring tools into a comprehensive package
• Native capabilities of Microsoft Systems Center Operations Manager for limited non-Windows systems
• The impact of tough economic times on software choice by customers
• Contrasting contributions from sysadmins with those from developers
• Benefits to Groundwork of the open source approach
• Drawing from and contributing to the larger open source community
• Choosing components to include in the overall project

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Interviewers: Scott Swigart and Sean Campbell

Interviewee: Joseph Smarr

In this interview we talk with Joseph Smarr, CTO of Plaxo. In specific, we talk about:

• Plaxo’s foundations before the social web
• The value of rich user profiles
• Grassroots development and ownership of personal data
• Sharing personal data as a prerequisite for interoperability
• Navigating irregularly structured data as a coherent whole
• Managing authorized access to personal data across websites
• Relative timelines of media buzz and industry adoption
• Efficiencies from standards as a streamlining force in business development
• The corporate opportunity for social media and its impediments

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Interviewers: Scott Swigart and Sean Campbell

Interviewee: Michael Hart

In this interview we talk with Michael of Netflix. In specific, we talk about:

• Netflix’s offerings in terms of open architecture
• Balancing the need for product consistency with innovation
• Openness as a spur to expansive success
• The role of Linux on CE devices in the future of entertainment media
• The primacy of browser technology in delivering the future
• Harnessing cooperation as a creative force

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Interviewers: Scott Swigart and Sean Campbell

Interviewee: Stephen Lau

In this interview we talk with Stephen of Songbird. In specific, we talk about:

• How Songbird fits into the Mozilla pantheon
• Aligning user interests with those of content providers
• How Songbird fits into the larger world of open source media players
• Songbird’s business and revenue model in the near term and beyond
• Usability and expandability as strategic precepts
• Apple as an inspirational model

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Interviewers: Scott Swigart and Sean Campbell

Interviewee: Paolo Juvara

In this interview we talk with Paolo of OpenBravo. In specific, we talk about:

• Openbravo and the niche for open source ERP
• Drawing developers to an ERP project
• The roles of modularity and customizability in Openbravo
• Acquisition by external companies as a goal of some open source projects
• Effectively differentiating free from paid product versions
• Openness as a core Openbravo value

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Interviewers: Scott Swigart and Sean Campbell

Interviewee: Daniel Jacobson

In this interview we talk with Daniel of NPR. In specific, we talk about:

• Providing open access to content at NPR
• Extending content to multiple platforms
• The role of open source in NPR’s public mission
• Relevance of open source ethos to no-for-profit endeavors
• Hurdles to making their technology public
• Significance of commercial acquisition of open source projects
• Choosing technologies and technology philosophies
• The elusive nature of content control in a connected world

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Interviewers: Scott Swigart and Sean Campbell

Interviewee: Stefano Fornari

In this interview we talk with Stefano the CTO of Funambol. In specific, we talk about:

• Defining synchronization as a core technology for the future of mobile computing
• The protocols underlying synchronization scenarios
• Various mechanisms used to initiate synchronization
• Characteristics of the open source community specific to mobility
• Conventions that govern contributors and contributions
• Core technical problems in synchronization

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Interviewers: Scott Swigart and Sean Campbell

Interviewee: Matt Mullenwegr

In this interview we talk with Matt Mullenweg of WordPress and Automattic. In specific, we talk about:

• Successfully making the culture shift when an open source project is acquired by a corporation
• Scaling skills and physical resources effectively as a project gets larger
• Handling comment spam in blogging environments
• Achieving usability for a technically diverse user base
• The value of an open source community in recruiting people
• The place of blogs in a world of open-ended communication options

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