Open Source Friday with Jordan Harband and NPM

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Open Source Friday

Open Source Friday discusses package dependencies and their impact on projects.
Jordan Harband, a principal open-source architect at Herodevs, shares his experience in open source.
Herodevs provides long-term support for end-of-life open-source software, ensuring security and stability for users.
Herodevs partners with maintainers and contributes financially to open-source projects, supporting the ecosystem and allowing maintainers to focus on development.

Maintaining Open-Source Software

Jordan Harband's journey in open source began with small contributions and gradually led to maintaining impactful packages.
Maintaining JavaScript shims led to involvement in the TC39 standards committee.
The speaker expresses concern about the wide reach of their code and the potential impact of breaking changes, emphasizing backward compatibility and semantic versioning.
Jordan highlights the potential unintended consequences of moving fast and breaking things, citing the example of a social network's motto potentially contributing to the erosion of democracy.
The speaker advocates for a cautious approach, emphasizing the importance of considering the impact on users and the responsibility that comes with maintaining widely used software.
Breaking changes in popular packages can have significant consequences for users, especially if they are widely used transitively.
Maintainers of popular packages face difficult choices when making breaking changes, as they may have to choose between supporting older versions or leaving users vulnerable to security risks.
It is important for maintainers to minimize breaking changes and to provide users with ample time to upgrade before forcing them to do so.
Backporting security fixes to older versions can help to mitigate the risks associated with breaking changes.
Encouraging financial contributions to open-source projects can help to support maintainers and allow them to spend more time on maintaining their projects.
Maintainers should avoid finding themselves in scenarios where they have to make difficult choices about breaking changes by minimizing breaking changes and providing users with ample time to upgrade.
The speaker discusses the challenges of maintaining open-source software and the importance of making breaking changes at the right time.
Encouraging users to adopt new versions of software can be difficult, especially when there is no clear benefit or incentive.
Two-factor authentication can be an effective way to protect packages from being compromised, but it can also limit adoption.
When making breaking changes, it is important to make it as easy as possible for users to upgrade.

Supporting Open-Source Software

Developers can set up their projects for success by using packages from a registry, writing thorough tests, and using linting and type systems.
Companies should encourage their employees to participate in the sustainability of open-source software by contributing financially and otherwise.
Open-source software maintainers need financial support to continue their work.
GitHub Sponsors, Tidelift, and Open Collective are platforms that allow individuals and organizations to sponsor open-source projects.
It is important for companies to actively participate in the open-source ecosystem by financially supporting the projects they depend on.
Contributors can support open-source projects by contributing code, documentation, or money.
HeroDevs recently partnered with Bootstrap to support versions 3 and 4.
Developers should keep their dependencies updated using tools like Renovate or Dependabot.
Employers should sponsor open-source projects instead of individuals.
Maintainers appreciate any amount of financial support, even small donations.