[Python-Dev] Coverity Open Source Defect Scan of Python (original) (raw)

Michael Chermside mcherm at mcherm.com
Mon Mar 13 15:16:46 CET 2006

Dennis Allison writes:

I'd also encourage Coventry to explain their business model a bit more clearly.

Ben Chelf writes:

Of course it's no surprise that I see open source projects everywhere -- as part of infrastructure or part of code bases that people are developing. So from a Coverity perspective, clearly we want to provide source code analysis for the projects that our customers care about [...] I really just want every developer to use source code analysis while they write code [...] We got a lot of the good publicity in the research lab because there existed this big open source OS that we could test our theories on. [...] I think it makes sense for Coverity to have a strong relationship with the open source community since that community has been helping us pretty much since day 1

I work for a business... and we pay full price for the tools that we use in our work. I am aware of and follow the work that I and my colleagues do -- when someone has a good idea, I tend to learn from that and introduce the same idea in future projects. I also am aware of and follow the work of quite a few open source projects (to different degrees depending on the project). In fact, I see far more open source projects than I do other projects. I learn a lot of good ideas from these projects also, and I use them in my paid work. For example, it was my experience with open source projects that convinced me that extensive unit tests that are expected to always pass was a feasable and useful idea. Many of the ways that open source projects are managed are also beginning to work their way into my professional life also. It's just that I see far more open source projects than others, and frankly the open source projects are almost always better run, with higher standards.

I doubt I'm the only one... I think open source will be leading the way in software development standards for some time now. So I think offering a software development tool FREE to open source projects in hopes of selling it for money to comercial projects is a WONDERFUL business model. Good luck!

-- Michael Chermside

(PS: too bad I can't buy stock in Coverity. How come all the GOOD companies are private? I had to wait around 6 years before I could buy stock in Google.)

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