Not that I am against innovations but I would like authors of OpenSource libraries, products and frameworks use the following template on the very first page of their site and documentation:

1. I(we) had a need to do: <Two phrases to describe>
2. I(we) have tried the following frameworks: <insert names> before starting to develop my own
3. They are supposed to address my needs but I was not happy with them because: <reasons why those frameworks are not satisfactory>
4. I(we) decided not to contribute to any of the existing open source frameworks because: <describe why>

Feb-2004

This template seems to be taken by many as an attempt to say: lets not start new Open Source projects ( see TSS) . It is not. It is appeal to creative people to be humble and consolidate efforts and improve tools which we use today and create new ones if necessary.

No, I do not believe that everybody should use the same tool or library, but I believe that it should be 10 different tool in every category. I yet to see 10 radically different ways of doing the same thing, so I suggest just choosing whatever is close to your personality, technical preferences, etc. and start working on improvements.

Remember Murphy's law: Nothing is as easy as it looks. Please keep this law in mind when you start doing something:

1. There are people who are(were) trying to solve the same problem and if that solution is not that simple as you like, then there might be a good reason for that.

2. Amount of efforts to get something done might exceed your capacity and it is better to bring that great idea to life as a part of another project then just get tired and abandon it eventually.

Suggested reading: Overcoming "Not Invented Here" Syndrome

Mar-2004

There are some projects which follow my favorite way of project introduction:

• Supervision (Subversion client) - look at "Reinventing the wheel?" section;
• Hivemind - see difference in philosophies blog and this post ;