The open-source canon is already rich and deep, originating from the works that gave voice to the free-software culture and philosophy. Here are the primary sources of open source.
"GNU Manifesto," by Richard Stallman
www.gnu.org/gnu/manifesto.html (1985)
The original rant on why software should be free, this unpolished but passionate screed still pops up whenever users of the popular Emacs text editor hit the wrong help keys.
Hackers by Steven Levy
Anchor Press/Doubleday (1984)
Following the bottom-up growth of hacking from '60s MIT phonephreaks to '80s teenage millionaires, Levy's profile of groundbreaking (and rule-breaking) programmers is recommended by Linus Torvalds.
Free Software Business Mailing List
fsb-subscribe@crynwr.com (launched 1993)
One of the Apache codevelopers, Brian Behlendorf, recommends this list for aspiring entrepreneurs.
Programming Perl, 2nd Edition, by Larry Wall, et al.
O'Reilly & Associates (1996)
To fully grok the value of O'Reilly's best-selling reference tome (nearly half a million copies sold), try borrowing it from your webmaster. This definitive guide to one of today's most popular languages is written in the foo- and bar-laden argot of engineers.
Running Linux, 2nd Edition, by Matt Welsh and Lar Kaufman
O'Reilly & Associates (1996)
Designed to get you over the hump of installation, configuration, and system management, this other O'Reilly bestseller feels the Linux newbie's pain.
"The Cathedral and the Bazaar," by Eric Raymond
www.tuxedo.org/~esr/writings/cathedral-bazaar/cathedral-bazaar.html (1998)
Thirteen years after Stallman's manifesto, Eric Raymond finally found the words to win nonbelievers over to what he called "open source." Netscape CEO Jim Barksdale allegedly decided to give away the source code for the company's browser after reading this.
"Homesteading the Noosphere," by Eric Raymond
www.tuxedo.org/~esr/writings/homesteading/homesteading.html (1998)
Skip to the end to get Raymond's pregnant point: Collaborative developments can succeed where tightly held proprietary ones fail, but it helps to have a benevolent dictator like Linus Torvalds.
The Halloween Documents, by Eric Raymond
www.opensource.org/halloween.html (1998)
An embarrassing set of internal memos, leaked to Raymond over the Halloween weekend last year, in which Microsoft engineers and managers discuss how they can undermine the open-source threat.
