Google Web Toolkit Becomes an Open Source Project

When the Google Web Toolkit team asked me to mentor them as they opened their source code, I was honored not only because they're a fantastic group of engineers, but also because they wanted to make the Google Web Toolkit into an open source project. Last month I sent the entire team copies of Karl Fogel's book "Producing Open Source Software" to guide them in their decisions of how to best open their development to the world.

Of course, they started off on the right foot at their launch this past May by opening the user libraries under the Apache 2.0 license. They took another step in the right direction when they moved all their issues into Google Code's issue tracker.

But now they're taking a gigantic leap forward--not only by open-sourcing all of their code, but their entire development process. That includes development discussions, code reviews, future milestones, and the entire codebase.

So, needless to say, I'm really excited about the Google Web Toolkit's grand entrance into the open source world and hope that you'll join me in welcoming them.