Open Source SOM/DSOM?

Esther Schindler blogs about the possibility of Open Sourcing IBM's SOM/DSOM [System Object Model / Distributed System Object Model] ... I worked with this stuff back in the 1990's and it was marvellous. Object here is proxy for object there ... whee ...

A few years before Java got off the ground SOM/DSOM was a "parent class" so to speak of CORBA .

Problem was, those hi-end 350MHz IBM desktops weren't fast enough for this sort of distributed object thing. That situation has changed now, very much so. So there's this mature, debugged mountain of code with a very simple metaprogramming model that a child can comprehend. And it's locked in a drawer, more or less :)

In the 1990's I was urging IBM to Open Source the wonderful Object Rexx language, which they finally did a few years ago, bless 'em and their glacial speed leaving the very worthy and vibrantly developing Open Object Rexx teetering on the brink of relevance.

Ditto SOM/DSOM ... Open Source it now, Big Blue, and show us you understand that Open Source is not just a publicity ploy, but a model for decades of ongoing software collaboration. It may save SOM/DSOM's relevance for a programming generation.