Blog by Paul Golding

Webkit was just for 'fun'

Paul Golding - Tuesday, March 31, 2009

Having ideas is fun

I'm currently planning a book about mobile web technologies and have been doing some historical research. I really enjoyed watching this YUI video of a presentation by Lars Knoll and George Staikos about the origins of KHTML, which became Webkit. I'm sure that most of my readers will know that Webkit is the browser core engine that sits beneath Safari on the iPhone and beneath the S60 browser, among many other mobile browsers.

There are many interesting technical aspects to the KHTML/Webkit story, but what caught my attention in the presentation was Lars justification for coding the KHTML engine from scratch in the first place instead of using Mozilla. He said that it would be more fun to do it themselves - a more interesting project.

This is the fun factor of developing software. There is another version called the fame factor, which I heard discussed by the Oracle rep during the OneAPI seminar at MWC 09.

Sometimes the fun factor is in opposition to the commercial interests, or at least the perceived commercial interests of an organization. I recently worked for someone who warned staff not to engage in 'science projects,' which was another way of saying fun projects that don't have commercial value.

Of course, I totally agree that in industry we are here to make a profit, but the path to profit isn't always obvious and needn't preclude having fun. However, there are still a good number of commercial managers who don't yet seem to understand how innovation, particularly in technology and software, sometimes (often?) works. Essentially, the fun factor has to be embraced as a genuine and valid part of the commercial process. Google allows employees one day a week to work on their own ideas, which seems a smart move. Do you want thousands of people coming up with the ideas, or just a few high priests in marketing?

In my experience, the source of the problem is usually related to control. Managers want to do what they do best, which is to manage. This includes controlling the business processes under their care. Things can only be controlled, at least in one way of thinking, by definition and measurement. Doing something 'for the hell of it,' or because it's fun, can't be defined or measured, so it is often resisted.

In all the chatter recently about app stores, it is always assumed that the developers want to make money. This certainly attracts developers to the iPhone app store - including the gold rush effect. However, the fun factor is still very much present. Many of the apps are free and many brands and sites have produced an iPhone app when they don't really need one - just for 'the fun of it' (translated into other feelings, like 'coolness'). Interestingly, some of the underlying technology - e.g. Webkit - we now know was developed just for the fun of it.

What's your fun strategy? (Sounds like a book title.)

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Webkit was just for 'fun'

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