I’ve released Socialight’s mobile client as open-source software. There are a few reasons why this is a Big deal with a capital ‘B’:

A. The Java mobile world has been around for at least ten years now but doesn’t have the same excitement around development as Android and iPhone have managed to get in the last year. From a developer’s standpoint, this is mainly due to ease-of-use. J2ME still does not have a reliable base from which to build GUI systems. This means that everything has to be coded from scratch. This includes interface elements such as lists, buttons, scrolling and word wrapping. Android and iPhone come with these toolkits. No longer do developers have to waste half their waking hours putting together text-coloring code. The code base I’ve put together has some of this basic functionality: Yes, Virginia, there is a scrollbar. [1] I’m no wizard at GUI development in Java, but the code is open and is waiting to be improved and reused.

B. Big companies (unless they are heavily software focused) usually will not allow you to release your work into the community. You could be a great developer and could have stumbled upon something big, but the chances are great that it will remain locked up. Actually, the chances are high that another really smart developer somewhere else has also done the same thing. Now you have two silo-ed solutions to the same problem. Imagine how much further you could’ve taken the solution if only these two people were able to collaborate and share thinking.

C. These days, there are a lot of startups doing mobile development. You might think, “ok great, these good hackers are no longer constrained by a big company telling them what to do with their code.” However, still many of these small companies are usually hesitant to release code they’ve work so hard to build. [2] These teams have poured lots of money into a solid development team. Their work is great but they do not want their competitors taking advantage of the time and effort they put into it. This means that there is a lot of well-designed mobile software in the marketplace, but every development group still codes their own stack of toolkits.

D. This is the most significant piece of open software that has my name on it. It’s a little like baking a cake and giving it and the recipe to your friends. Those that can appreciate good taste will look at, eat and comment on the cake itself. Friends that are cooks will not only taste it but will pore through the recipe and will be sure to point out both the good and the bad.

So there you have it. If you are the hacker-type, get the code and play with it. Let me know your thoughts.

Notes:

1. Yes, I realize some UI frameworks exist. TWUIK has some great elements but the cost turns away a startup or an individual developer. J2ME Polish is open and is a nice idea but I don’t like that you have to embed CSS code inside your Java code. Whatever happened to separation of content and presentation?

2. Of course, recently, this trend seems to be changing. Twitter recently released their backend queue server, Starling. Imity‘s proximity client is also open.