Fossjobs: A website for free and open-source software jobs(fossjobs.net)
fossjobs.net
Fossjobs: A website for free and open-source software jobs
https://www.fossjobs.net/
98 comments
Indeed. I clicked the US link and the newest post is from August 2016. And that's the only one from 2016. The next newest is from August 2015 and they quickly get much older than that as you move down the list.
I guess the one benefit is seeing a list of potential employers of FOSS developers even if it means researching current possibilities elsewhere...
I guess the one benefit is seeing a list of potential employers of FOSS developers even if it means researching current possibilities elsewhere...
As I write your post is 7 hours old. I saw 4 posted in the US for 2017 so perhaps being on HN is getting them some attention. But yes, there were things from 2012.
That's great! As mentioned my initial take away was at least it was a good place to start researching companies that actually have FOSS positions available whose focus is on contributions and not just using/understanding FOSS.
After my comment I read more and it looks like they want more contributions and, I agree, being on HN probably helped!
After my comment I read more and it looks like they want more contributions and, I agree, being on HN probably helped!
An issue requesting automatic expiry was created a bit before you commented: https://github.com/fossjobs/fossjobs/issues/14
If you’re up for contributing a simple timeout or something like that I guess the developers would appreciate that a lot :) https://github.com/fossjobs/fossjobs/
I don't think so, somewhere else in this thread the developer of this job board says that his intention is to keep all listings forever, as this would prove that paid FOSS jobs exists in abundance. IMO a debatable approach.
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13920594
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13920594
No. I want to keep them around, sure, but of course they can be styled differently.
I don't know what makes everyone so upset at old listings. They are listed chronologically, there is an RSS feed to follow for fresh things. It's not like it's thousands of mixed jobs where you have to hunt for the recent postings? I definitely don't object to someone adding an archive/expiry functionality that does not completely delete old job listings. If you look at the referenced ticket on github, I created it.
I don't know what makes everyone so upset at old listings. They are listed chronologically, there is an RSS feed to follow for fresh things. It's not like it's thousands of mixed jobs where you have to hunt for the recent postings? I definitely don't object to someone adding an archive/expiry functionality that does not completely delete old job listings. If you look at the referenced ticket on github, I created it.
Nobody is suggesting old jobs should be deleted from your database (I doubt any job listing website would do this). Just that the old jobs are too irrelevant to display by default as visitors are generally only interested in current vacancies.
Keeping the old jobs as a separate search option (eg "[ ] include historic items") de-clutters the primary purpose of the site. That matters when you consider that few people enjoy the process of job hunting so will quickly abandon any platform with a poor signal to noise ratio.
Keeping the old jobs as a separate search option (eg "[ ] include historic items") de-clutters the primary purpose of the site. That matters when you consider that few people enjoy the process of job hunting so will quickly abandon any platform with a poor signal to noise ratio.
So, where's the patch?
I spend some of my free time to collect and post open source jobs someplace. That's my goal.
I spend some of my free time to collect and post open source jobs someplace. That's my goal.
I think that's silly. There could have been hundreds of well-paid FOSS jobs in 2013. That doesn't matter at all if there are none in 2017. It doesn't even prove anyone was ever hired for that job, only that it was posted.
There's certainly analytical value in having every FOSS job you could have ever seen, but none for the end user.
There's certainly analytical value in having every FOSS job you could have ever seen, but none for the end user.
It certainly matters to a lot of people around me, and in conversations I have. It may not matter to some random people on Hacker News.
The market for FOSS programmers will grow in Europe. A report has just been published that says “open source is important for the future of the European software industry.” [1]
In the UK, Government Digital Service already has a strict policy that software it writes should be open.
Being able to write FOSS in your day job is a wonderful boon . Especially in government it will help offset the lower salaries of the public sector.
[1] https://joinup.ec.europa.eu/community/osor/news/ec-study-rec...
In the UK, Government Digital Service already has a strict policy that software it writes should be open.
Being able to write FOSS in your day job is a wonderful boon . Especially in government it will help offset the lower salaries of the public sector.
[1] https://joinup.ec.europa.eu/community/osor/news/ec-study-rec...
> In the UK, Government Digital Service already has a strict policy that software it writes should be open.
And they pay contractors 1000 a day for that.
Why the hell would anyone want to work for open source projects that can't pay for their housing and food.
And they pay contractors 1000 a day for that.
Why the hell would anyone want to work for open source projects that can't pay for their housing and food.
I wonder how much of an incentive writing open source at somewhere like GDS actually is. While its certainly nice to develop in the open how much of what you write is actually useful in future jobs?
Surely the idea is that it is useful to your future colleagues?
Congrats, there seem to be interesting offerings and employers on fossjobs.net.
What are the criteria to be listed on fossjobs.net? Right now, I'm also seeing some admin/devops jobs that are only related to F/OSS insofar as eg. Linux is being used, but won't contribute to anything distributable under F/OSS licenses.
(Hi! This is Moritz, who currently maintains the fossjobs site)
It's hard to define clear criteria.
We do want to avoid jobs where people just "use" FOSS. The focus is definitely paid positions where you /contribute/ to FOSS in some way. Besides obvious developer positions, that might be administrative or sysop jobs at FOSS projects/orgs or other non-profit environments, more than sysop jobs at random web startups.
It's hard to define clear criteria.
We do want to avoid jobs where people just "use" FOSS. The focus is definitely paid positions where you /contribute/ to FOSS in some way. Besides obvious developer positions, that might be administrative or sysop jobs at FOSS projects/orgs or other non-profit environments, more than sysop jobs at random web startups.
Since you're currently maintaining the site, you might want to consider splitting "Serbia and Montenegro" into two separate countries, since they've been independent from each other for over a decade now.
Documentation! It's the one thing no project does right. A google search and stack exchange answer from 5 years ago is no where near good enough.
The repository and website should have these criteria mentioned explicitly. I'll probably send a PR to that effect :)
ps - amazing initiative, congrats!
ps - amazing initiative, congrats!
As I've said, there are no criteria, it is a case-by-case decision. The general guideline is on the website, "We only list jobs that directly improve and involve FOSS or Open Hardware projects."
That being said, I welcome suggestions on how to improve the wording, some examples what fits and what does not, etc. -- Thanks!
That being said, I welcome suggestions on how to improve the wording, some examples what fits and what does not, etc. -- Thanks!
I've been looking for something like this.
I just want to say I appreciate the effort! :)
Yay FOSS!
I just want to say I appreciate the effort! :)
Yay FOSS!
It would be interesting to have an option to pay for desired new features in existing projects. You could call it "bid for code" or something: people who need a certain feature in an open-source project would commit to paying some amount of money for it. Other people interested in the same feature could also join. A bit similar to a kickstarter, but for feature requests. Developers would choose what to work on, depending on how much money is being offered.
Is there something like this out there already? This could be a feature in this site or a completely new site if someone wants to take on this idea. Github should offer this option!
Is there something like this out there already? This could be a feature in this site or a completely new site if someone wants to take on this idea. Github should offer this option!
Check out the history of such sites, starting from the late 1990s: https://wiki.snowdrift.coop/market-research/history/software...
Lots of research on bounty sites and other funding platforms: https://wiki.snowdrift.coop/market-research/other-crowdfundi...
Lots of research on bounty sites and other funding platforms: https://wiki.snowdrift.coop/market-research/other-crowdfundi...
I think you are searching for something like this :
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open-source_bounty
https://www.bountysource.com/
I do this all the time. My company uses BountySource where we can.
And sometimes I just walk into GitHub and @ the contributors and offer money like this https://github.com/jekyll/jekyll/issues/3337 Some people complained but fuck 'em. End result, hired somebody and got the job done.
And sometimes I just walk into GitHub and @ the contributors and offer money like this https://github.com/jekyll/jekyll/issues/3337 Some people complained but fuck 'em. End result, hired somebody and got the job done.
Do you mean something like Bountysource? https://www.bountysource.com/
Oh, that's nice, thank you. And it looks like they already have some integration with github: http://blog.bountysource.com/post/48954271533/improved-githu...
Codemill also has github integration but it's not very actively used.
Wow this is great! I've grown tired of the typical agency world of billable hours and conversions. Looking forward to seeing more jobs posted across the gamut of IT.
Also happy to see this working without javascript or unnecessary marketing tags. It's refreshing.
Also happy to see this working without javascript or unnecessary marketing tags. It's refreshing.
I guess the Red Hat job openings are not FOSS enough?
;-) (disclaimer: I work at Red Hat, happy to hook site maintainer up with our team to coordinate)
;-) (disclaimer: I work at Red Hat, happy to hook site maintainer up with our team to coordinate)
Another Red Hatter here to give a recommendation for Red Hat. All of my work is in the open. Furthermore I can say just about all code written at RH is upstream-first. Red Hat has a great culture and is very remote friendly. (My team is fairly distributed)
Is it possible to work at Red Hat without using any proprietary software, let alone write any?
It's not possible to work ANYWHERE without using proprietary software, running on patended hardware, coming partially from China.
Hardware and patents are both unrelated to my question.
Not only possible, I'm pretty sure it's impossible to work exclusively on closed-source at Red Hat.
I would say it depends on the specific job. :)
Happy to talk about it, I am just a bit afraid that it will flood the site and make it hard to see other offers.
Happy to talk about it, I am just a bit afraid that it will flood the site and make it hard to see other offers.
I think the majority of the jobs in our technology category would qualify:
https://www.redhat.com/en/jobs/categories/technology
Again, happy to coordinate a direct contact.
You can get me at jwildebo [at] redhat dot com
https://www.redhat.com/en/jobs/categories/technology
Again, happy to coordinate a direct contact.
You can get me at jwildebo [at] redhat dot com
What a great resource! I used weworkremotely.com to find my current job. A combination of the two would be perfect for me, but I see that many of the jobs are already remote. I'm also pleased to see the term "Programmer" used instead of "Software Engineer." I always identify myself as the former.
I identify as the latter; "programmer" narrows your job title down to someone that writes code, while the latter opens up the full scala involved in software development. Most time is spent not on writing code, but talking about it - this is even more true in a lot of OS projects I've seen, where there can be very long mailing list discussions about changing small pieces of code. And besides that, there's also things like server administration, datacenter automation, data modelling, analytics configuration and statistics processing, knowledge sharing / transfer (blogs, conferences if that's your thing), etc.
I worked on a FOSS project. Part of the Kuali consortia, making software for higher education.
I took the job to learn how these kinds of projects work. Specifically, the governance model. Well, it didn't.
I wish I understood why.
Writing about open sourcing Solaris, I think it was btilly who said that others had the right to fork, but not the power.
That describes Kuali perfectly. We consortia members couldn't do anything to help ourselves improve things, like simple bug fixes, without it being a major production. Very disempowering, pretty much the opposite of why I wanted to work on FOSS.
We need academic style comparative analysis of FOSS governance models, funding models, project methodologies, etc. Learn from our mistakes, help people in the future.
I took the job to learn how these kinds of projects work. Specifically, the governance model. Well, it didn't.
I wish I understood why.
Writing about open sourcing Solaris, I think it was btilly who said that others had the right to fork, but not the power.
That describes Kuali perfectly. We consortia members couldn't do anything to help ourselves improve things, like simple bug fixes, without it being a major production. Very disempowering, pretty much the opposite of why I wanted to work on FOSS.
We need academic style comparative analysis of FOSS governance models, funding models, project methodologies, etc. Learn from our mistakes, help people in the future.
I figure any percieved inertia in Kuali is a reflection of it's constituents. If all consortia members' IT dept are on an annual upgrade cycle over summer break, there's little incentive to push out daily bug fixes.
Plus, I'm guessing Indiana University has outsized influence on the shape of the project, since they founded it.
> We need academic style comparative analysis of FOSS governance models, funding models, project methodologies, etc. Learn from our mistakes, help people in the future.
I have a book here on my desk: "The business and Economics of Linux and Open Source" by Martin Fink. It's from 2002, and could use an update clearly.
Plus, I'm guessing Indiana University has outsized influence on the shape of the project, since they founded it.
> We need academic style comparative analysis of FOSS governance models, funding models, project methodologies, etc. Learn from our mistakes, help people in the future.
I have a book here on my desk: "The business and Economics of Linux and Open Source" by Martin Fink. It's from 2002, and could use an update clearly.
A site like this would be nice, but it would need a steady team of volunteers to source job listings.
I suspect most job openings and offers are launched on country-specific websites and systems, many which probably (even intentionally) are locked in and lack a public API.
Right now, checking Norway, there are zero listing. That may be true (I wouldn't know), but from that alone I'm guessing this site does not know how to source jobs from the "typical" Norwegian employment sites.
So who are going to bother to volunteer for a site which lands everyone else a job but themselves? It seems like a hard thing to get right.
I suspect most job openings and offers are launched on country-specific websites and systems, many which probably (even intentionally) are locked in and lack a public API.
Right now, checking Norway, there are zero listing. That may be true (I wouldn't know), but from that alone I'm guessing this site does not know how to source jobs from the "typical" Norwegian employment sites.
So who are going to bother to volunteer for a site which lands everyone else a job but themselves? It seems like a hard thing to get right.
Well, what about me? I _am_ volunteering, and a couple of others CC @fossjobs.net on Twitter whenever they come across a job offer.
Yes, you are right, this site depends on volunteers. So what? Wikipedia does as well. Why would anyone contribute their knowledge to something that does not help them? Well, maybe it will one day.
We don't have to start a debate about why anyone would volunteer anything, but I find your reasoning pretty self-centered. Also, you're arguing as if this was a mere proposal for a job site that lists FOSS jobs. No, it's not. Is is an actual site that lists FOSS jobs, and it works.
And don't forget about FOSS companies/NGOs who are looking for talent. Some of them actually like to post their job listings at our site, and do so with a very self-centered desire: To fill a position, potentially with less noise than using one of the other platforms. Why would FOSS developers want to look at all the depressing proprietary jobs on other platforms? :)
Yes, you are right, this site depends on volunteers. So what? Wikipedia does as well. Why would anyone contribute their knowledge to something that does not help them? Well, maybe it will one day.
We don't have to start a debate about why anyone would volunteer anything, but I find your reasoning pretty self-centered. Also, you're arguing as if this was a mere proposal for a job site that lists FOSS jobs. No, it's not. Is is an actual site that lists FOSS jobs, and it works.
And don't forget about FOSS companies/NGOs who are looking for talent. Some of them actually like to post their job listings at our site, and do so with a very self-centered desire: To fill a position, potentially with less noise than using one of the other platforms. Why would FOSS developers want to look at all the depressing proprietary jobs on other platforms? :)
Fortunately the site does use FOSS software itself: https://www.fossjobs.net/about/
Some of the jobs listed on the site date from 2013 - it seems as though some housekeeping is required.
No. Of course it makes little sense to apply to old jobs, but one of the goals here is to demonstrate that there _are_ actually paid jobs in FOSS. We keep old job listings around on purpose, also because it helps to find interesting organizations which you can then get in touch with.
On the other hand, if the number of jobs in recent time has to be padded with job openings in ancient history, is there really a substainable number of paid jobs in FOSS?
How does this matter? What do you mean by "sustainable"? One job is a job. Two jobs is two jobs.
Sustainable as in "I can make a career of this" or "if this particular project wanes, I can always hop over to one of the many other projects."
If you pad your listings, people will assume you need to because there _aren't_ many such jobs. Moreso over time as the ratio of filled listings to active recruitment grows -- if all visitors ever see are jobs that no longer accept applications, they will not come away with a positive outlook on the field.
If you pad your listings, people will assume you need to because there _aren't_ many such jobs. Moreso over time as the ratio of filled listings to active recruitment grows -- if all visitors ever see are jobs that no longer accept applications, they will not come away with a positive outlook on the field.
Again: We am not "padding" anything. The site exists since 2012, and we keep old job listings around, as an archive and to help find interesting potential employers that may have jobs apart of what is listed. There's an open ticket about "fading them out" a little to make it even more obvious. There's plenty of recent jobs listed, so your point about "only ever seeing jobs that no longer accept applications" is moot. Also, subscribe to the RSS feed (or Twitter/Facebook), and "all you will ever see will be fresh, open positions".
It's like arguing that a news site should delete yesterday's news instead of keeping an archive, because "you're only interested in today".
As for your "sustainability" and "career building", I disagree there too, but that's for a different conversation.
It's like arguing that a news site should delete yesterday's news instead of keeping an archive, because "you're only interested in today".
As for your "sustainability" and "career building", I disagree there too, but that's for a different conversation.
> There's an open ticket about "fading them out" a little to make it even more obvious.
As someone who recently was job hunting and come across another site with this problem: absolutely do this. You get the bonus of instantly showing the user which jobs are current, so they don't notice only after wasting time and then jump to the assumption the site is dead. You show users that you take the up-to-dateness of the data seriously. And lastly you get to keep the archive around, which I agree with you is a good thing to do.
> There's plenty of recent jobs listed, so your point about "only ever seeing jobs that no longer accept applications" is moot.
Not for me there's not. I'm in the UK and it's all 2 years old.
(Good idea tho, hope it continues well!)
As someone who recently was job hunting and come across another site with this problem: absolutely do this. You get the bonus of instantly showing the user which jobs are current, so they don't notice only after wasting time and then jump to the assumption the site is dead. You show users that you take the up-to-dateness of the data seriously. And lastly you get to keep the archive around, which I agree with you is a good thing to do.
> There's plenty of recent jobs listed, so your point about "only ever seeing jobs that no longer accept applications" is moot.
Not for me there's not. I'm in the UK and it's all 2 years old.
(Good idea tho, hope it continues well!)
Plenty of recent jobs are open to remote workers, which includes UK.
Nice, just posted a job! Hope they verify my email soon :]
What I'm trying to do with http://letsopensource.com is similar except offer structured incentives for developers that contribute to FOSS.
Bug: seraching for partime jobs take to https://www.fossjobs.net/page-unavailable/. ie. https://www.fossjobs.net/jobs-in//parttime/ takes to https://www.fossjobs.net/page-unavailable/
Might be best to report it at https://github.com/fossjobs/fossjobs/issues :)
That's probably https://github.com/fossjobs/fossjobs/issues/9 :)
You mentioned open hardware in an answer to another comment, but I see no obvious category for a hardware developer in the menu! "Programmer" or "designer" do not quite fit the bill.
What category would you suggest to add? If it's about actual development, I think "Programmer" will do just fine. I am a bit reluctant to add a new category specifically for this.
I'd suggest "Hardware".
It is niche, but without it, it really does not send any signals that Open Hardware jobs are welcome. A hardware designer definitely is not a "Programmer".
(Edited for clarity)
It is niche, but without it, it really does not send any signals that Open Hardware jobs are welcome. A hardware designer definitely is not a "Programmer".
(Edited for clarity)
There is also https://www.fsf.org/resources/jobs
... which can be a great resource to find jobs appropriate also for fossjobs.net.
but: "usual price $250/30 days"
but: "usual price $250/30 days"
At the bottom of each job offer, the site asks "Is this job fake?" and then offers "Report it!" or "Recommend to a friend" options.
I certainly hope people aren't recommending fake jobs to their friends! That's a funny UX issue.
I certainly hope people aren't recommending fake jobs to their friends! That's a funny UX issue.
Thanks, we will be trying that out for our openings in the developer team.
The markup syntax to post jobs is referred as "textile" (which I don't know -- is it a flavor of markdown?) and the help page for it points to http://www.textism.com/tools/textile/ which in turns redirect to the quite unrelated page http://www.booked.net/textism.html
Would you please fix the dead link? Great job board otherwise, I was about to post a job (I work at SUSE, almost everything we do is FOSS).
Would you please fix the dead link? Great job board otherwise, I was about to post a job (I work at SUSE, almost everything we do is FOSS).
That’s not an unrelated page; it describes Textile’s syntax in a column on the right and lets you try it interactively.
(No, it’s not a flavour of Markdown.)
(No, it’s not a flavour of Markdown.)
Textile is a syntax invented for the Textpattern blogging system.
When they say 'full time' in the job description, how many hours do they expect us to spend time on those projects?
If you find a job that looks interesting, it's always a good idea to get in touch and find out the details and how much it is up for negotiations. Quite often there's details in the description, and if not, I would expect full time to mean something around 40 hours per week. It helps to look at the cultural background and where the organization is based. Especially benefits (vacation days, sick days, health insurance) vary quite much between different countries.
Wow, this is the coolest idea. I am going to find and collect all the resources to get prepared for a remote work Foss job.
Where did you get your initial feed of job offers? I can see offers that are 4 years old
It's simple, and you can help: I am adding jobs that I come across or that people submit. It's a collaborative action. Job listings from 2012 were added in 2012. It's not a new site. Of course we don't add old expired jobs.
[deleted]
This is such a great concept for a job-seeking site; kudos!
(from a job posting I saw)
"So where do you work?"
"Uhhh. Cockroach Labs"
"So where do you work?"
"Uhhh. Cockroach Labs"
I'll be using this for my next job, thanks!
Will FOSS jobs will post job openings in India?
Hi!
A lot of the jobs on fossjobs.net are remote work. In fact, you can directly see the job's location on the job listing. It's definitely worthwhile reaching out to the project to ask.
And of course we would list openings in India, as we would list foss jobs in any place. If you hear of any, please let us know! The easiest way to do that is to cc @fossjobs_net on Twitter.
A lot of the jobs on fossjobs.net are remote work. In fact, you can directly see the job's location on the job listing. It's definitely worthwhile reaching out to the project to ask.
And of course we would list openings in India, as we would list foss jobs in any place. If you hear of any, please let us know! The easiest way to do that is to cc @fossjobs_net on Twitter.
Thankyou, Thankyou so so much. Now i can work overtime without feeling bad about spending my time making some bad people rich.
would any of those be useful for someone who's relocated to somewhere with a lower cost of living?
Just posted an ad. Great page!
the link support under JOB CATEGORIES is too broad
Removed.
Patches welcome. This is a hobby side project, and it does its job. (pun intended)
Help us hack on Tramcar (https://github.com/wfhio/tramcar). It's still very early days, but we'd love to see others starting use and contribute to this software! :)
[1] https://www.fossjobs.net/jobs-in/United-Kingdom/
edit: The 2nd link I click on had jobs ranging from 2014 to 2012. I respect the effort you're putting into this curated list but displaying jobs that old is a little silly.