Eric S. Raymond

The Cathedral and the Bazaar

1. IDEA 1

   Open development can beat closed

   Raymond contrasts two ways of building software. In the cathedral model, a small group works in private before releasing, while in the bazaar model, used for Linux, code is shared openly and many people contribute.

2. IDEA 2

   Linux surprised the experts

   Raymond describes how Linus Torvalds built the Linux operating system by inviting contributions from programmers around the world. Raymond had expected such an open process to produce chaos. The outcome showed that openness could work.

3. IDEA 3

   He tested the idea himself

   Raymond describes running his own open project, an email tool called fetchmail, using the bazaar method. Its success convinced him the approach worked. He saw first hand how outside helpers could improve a program quickly.

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