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When we were working on Beautiful Teams, I was really surprised to see just how much overlap there was between getting software teams to work well together and getting them to improve the architecture of the systems they were building. That was a big learning point for me. I really had those two areas, architecture and teams, in separate "buckets." It was really enlightening to me to talk to people whose opinions I really respect, and hear them draw a direct line between better software teams and better architecture.

I'm interested in hearing about good open-source training materials for GNU/Linux use and administration.

The Dasein Cloud API is the next step in the drive towards Open cloud programming standards. If you want to support multiple clouds or if you simply want to support the possibility of switching cloud providers, you are faced with supporting different programming models. This Open Source API enables programmers to write cloud management applications in Java against a single API that supports multiple clouds.

A group of companies and projects announced Open Source for America at the O'Reilly Open Source convention on Wednesday. I already have five projects they could take on.

Opening dispatch from OSCon: another look at the effects of Software as a Service on opens source plus awards, APIs, and more.

An unconference such as the Community Leadership Summit 2009 feels like one of those long, lingering meals you can enjoy with friends in a fine European restaurant, full of lively conversation. Or an intense experience like an arts festival, which perhaps suggests why one participant at the end of the Community Leadership Summit suggested it be held in conjunction with South by Southwest instead of the O'Reilly Open Source convention.

The theme of this year's OSCON is "Open for Business." Times are tough, making open source technology a smart choice for staying competitive. It gives you the means to drive down costs while increasing system and staff efficiencies. In anticipation of the conference, we've lined up three free webcasts featuring OSCON speakers. And if you're planning to attend OSCON, you can save 40% off registration pricing right now. In celebration of Independence Day—and freedom from commercial software—we're offering the discount code os09jul4, good through July 7.

It might have seemed last week, with the announcement of the Open Database Alliance, that MySQL is forking. The ODA promises a "central clearinghouse for MySQL development" and claims to improve on areas where criticism has historically been aimed at MySQL AB/Sun: bug-fixing, performance, and community responsiveness. But what's going on behind the scenes is much more subtle and promises a much better outcome for MySQL.

Nobody expected Microsoft to make its proprietary OOXML format really work with products that support ODF. But an office suite has to hook into a huge number of outside pieces in its environment. We're just going to have to live with a fuzz factor.

Software as a Service, known in earlier decades as Application Service Providers, upends the relationship between computer users and software. I'm seriously tempted to say that Wolfram Alpha takes the SaaS model to its extreme. So Wolfram Alpha's chances at scaling the heights of fame should force us to stop for a moment and run our own calculations concerning the value to us of data integrity, reliability, privacy, and innovation.

I sense a bigger enterprise theme at the MySQL conference this year. The pride of putting up a PHP- or Rails-backed web site lies in the past; now people are concerned with scaling into the clouds (figuratively and literally) and ensuring absolute reliability.

Thanks to George Reese, I learned about the bruhaha over an Open Cloud Manifesto. Let's put the debate in the context of some basic and perennial issues about openness and standards.

I tried to write a conventional computer manual in two days, and the experience has made me reconsider the conventions of computer manuals. The computer field is still in the kindergarten stage of exploring serious questions of how people learn, questions at the center of psychology and pedagogy for many decades. Even those disciplines don't quite get it, because they're fumbling with the instant messaging culture that gives us so many more tools today for learning together.

The original practice and promise of open source software is unique. The software experience cannot be ported whole-hog into other areas such as sharing songs or organizing public forums. It's worth looking at what goes into creating open source software, and what unique traits of software make the open source process work well there.

Update to my posting about a book-writing project this coming weekend in Cambridge, Mass. (March 21-22). RMS will write a foreword for the book.

Next weekend, March 21-22, in Cambridge, Massachusetts, the Free Software Foundation and FLOSS Manuals are coordinating volunteers to write a book about the command line in two days.

Last week I engaged with 150 people in a unique and moving set of experiences at a Winter Camp. It suggested to me that the people for whom free software developers are coding need to be brought into development through something more than a mailing list or occasional conference.

There's a debate over the boundaries between open source communities and the business that tend to develop around them. Hang on readership, we're trying out a new idea: Twitscan. Many of the conversations that matter in technology are happening in and around Twitter. Some of these stories will include twitter exchanges, others will just follow a thread of responses and point you to some interesting individuals and conversations that are happening, right now in the "Twitvironment". This post covers some of the recent chatter around Open Core Licensing.

This evening's SCALE blog covers Bradley Kuhn's keynote on Software as a Service, Jono Bacon on security, Red Hat's counsel on patents, and much more (with ample indulgence for my own opinions).