Producing Open Source Software

Chapter 6. Communications

The ability to write clearly is perhaps the most important skill one can have in an open source environment. In the long run it matters more than programming talent. A great programmer with lousy communications skills can get only one thing done at a time, and even then may have trouble convincing others to pay attention. But a lousy programmer with good communications skills can coordinate and persuade many people to do many different things, and thereby have a significant effect on a project’s direction and momentum.

There does not seem to be much correlation, in either direction, between the ability to write good code and the ability to communicate with one’s fellow human beings. There is some correlation between programming well and describing technical issues well, but describing technical issues is only a tiny part of the communications in a project. Much more important is the ability to empathize with one’s audience, to see one’s own posts and comments as others see them, and to cause others to see their own posts with similar objectivity. Equally important is noticing when a given medium or communications method is no longer working well, perhaps because it doesn’t scale as the number of users increases, and taking the time to do something about it.

All of which is obvious in theory—what makes it hard in practice is that free software development environments are bewilderingly diverse both in audiences and in communications mechanisms. Should a given ...