Ethics 101: To re-use or not to re-use?

[Bharat Nain]

Originally Posted by MikeDubreuil

Let me start off by making a bad analogy to hardware. In the past 5 years the hardware guys have made a significant improvement in the FIRST program by encouraging the spread of designs. From multiple speed transmissions to omni-wheels to some craziness called swerve drive- they are sharing everything! Yet, on the software side we want to keep our code hidden. Teams put their electronics in black boxes. It's getting bad. Maybe we should take a play out of the hardware guys book?

Here's my 10 cents...
Teams have a 1 season monopoly on their software. If a veteran team wants to re-use code from a previous year they should be required to post it in a "Software Portfolio" hosted by FIRST. The portfolio is publicly available to everyone. A new regional award can be created for veteran teams who share code, "The Software Award." An award that celebrates a teams generosity and their ability to write good software with even better documentation.

There is still a difference between hardware and software. Many teams did not share their exact design on hardware but what they did was visible and people caught up on their idea. Most teams took the time to teach people what they did too. Software is just like that and people do not need to see a team's code to understand the concept. It is easy enough to write something based on a concept but not for high schoolers. It is easy for professionals or the more experienced. Therefore, Sharing code is the team's business and it should be upto them if they want to share it or not.