Book: Producing Open Source Software

[mdlbear]

Producing Open Source Software by Karl Fogel:

Producing Open Source Software is a book about the human side of open source development. It describes how successful projects operate, the expectations of users and developers, and the culture of free software. It is available in bookstores and from the publisher (O'Reilly Media), or you can browse or download it here.
Producing Open Source Software is released under an open copyright that allows everyone to share and modify the book freely. The latest version is always here. The online version is the same as the commercially available print version — in other words, you can buy a printed copy and know that it's up-to-date. When and if there are significant differences, we will list them here.

It's available online as HTML, multi-page HTML, PDF, XML, and even as a Subversion repository.

This is a good introduction to the art of starting and managing an open source project. Starting and maintaining a community is very different from starting and maintaining a piece of software, so even an experienced hacker is likely to find something new and interesting here. Most of it is based on Fogel's experience with the Subversion project, but it's widely applicable, and the appendix listing free version control systems is reasonably comprehensive.

I'm not going to bother posting the TOC -- just go here for the real thing.

Well worth a read, and the price is right.