At a time when banks are shedding IT roles by the dozen, it seems counter-intuitive that 83 per cent of the nation’s chief information officers should report they are confident about the future of their business to the extent that 45 per cent expect to hire IT staff in the first six months of the year. The question remains – is this a dead cat bounce?
"Grok" is a word that you may not know, but it has been in use since the 1960's. It is commonly taken to mean "understand" but it is so much more than that. Do you grok open source? The word is the key to understanding why talented developers give of their time.
The word “grok” was coined by popular science fiction author Robert A. Heinlein and was first used in his novel Stranger in a Strange Land. He wrote,
Grok means to understand so thoroughly that the observer becomes a part of the observed – to merge, blend, intermarry, lose identity in group experience. It means almost everything that we mean by religion, philosophy, and science—and it means as little to us (because of our Earthly assumptions) as color means to a blind man.
In Heinlein’s stories, the men from Mars exist. Not only do they exist, they’re pretty thirsty it turns out. When they drink water it is such an experience that the Martians become one with the water, the water becomes one with the Martian. They grok each other. Things which once had independent existences become forever intertwined with each other and form a new reality which is greater than the sum of its parts.
Lest you think grok to be purely a geeky term, it has been used so widely that the Oxford English Dictionary accepted it into their tome, and thus the legitimate English language. The dictionary defines it thus, “to understand intuitively or by empathy; to establish rapport with" and "to empathize or communicate sympathetically (with); also, to experience enjoyment."
The word enjoyed popularity in the 1960’s counter culture although it later became more concentrated in computer culture. The near-legendary Jargon File (otherwise known as the Hacker’s Dictionary) contained a definition for grok from the beginning. The current entry reads
To understand. Connotes intimate and exhaustive knowledge. When you claim to ‘grok’ some knowledge or technique, you are asserting that you have not merely learned it in a detached instrumental way but that it has become part of you, part of your identity. For example, to say that you “know” LISP is simply to assert that you can code in it if necessary — but to say you “grok” LISP is to claim that you have deeply entered the world-view and spirit of the language, with the implication that it has transformed your view of programming.
I’m sure a picture is forming in your mind; to grok something means not just to be aware of it or to mentally apprehend it. To grok it means you absolutely, really, completely just get it. It’s natural to you. It makes sense. The concept lives and breathes through you and you espouse it.
So, do you grok open source? The question has a much richer and clearer sense now.
There are a lot of people who don’t grok open source. They ask things like “How can you ever possibly make any money out of that?” or “Why would you give away all your code and secrets and intellectual property?” and “Don’t you get what you pay for?”
Michelle Thomas
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