Thoughts on the Cathedral vs Bazaar Model

I feel that the Bazaar model is superior. Even in the ideal theoretical world of the cathedral model, where small groups develop a system behind closed doors, they are still going to be utilizing tooling from larger systems and groups. So I don’t believe in this individual siloed approach where any time, no matter how large, can build something and make it wonderful on their own. Also just working on polishing a version within a group can lead to group think especially in regard to over-engineering features that real users don’t want. The Bazaar model is also more connected to the spirit of software, as it allows many people, to contribute but to be free in exploring what they desire and are curious to work and contribute on. It is curiosity that allows individuals to really dive and explore novel architectures, and that can’t exist if developers are stuck behind closed doors.

Effect of AI Tools on Development

I think that AI tools accelerate this Bazaar-like development loop. Even if the first iteration is largely slop and not scalable, being able to use AI to quickly prototype a new feature and get user feedback accelerates this loop and thus lowers the barrier to adding new features. Another useful aspect is that AI allows more junior developers to talk to it and describe how a codebase works, that paired with reading the code, helps new developers onboard quicker without using the time of experienced maintainers.

Progress in Frosty Project

Submitted PR to fix the double play button issue and currently working on getting the audio working.

Outlook for Frosty Project

Though it appears that the audio change will have to be larger as the current way that the system works prevents audio from being played when the app is closed either on the lock or home screen.

Reports on other Groups

I appreciated how the Pandas’s project group focused on adding example usage for the project, and how that would be helpful without having to write any code.