BDFL

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English

Etymology

Originally applied to Guido van Rossum, creator of the Python programming language.

Noun

BDFL (plural BDFLs)

  1. (software, humorous) Initialism of benevolent dictator for life (leader of an open-source software project who retains the final say in disputes or arguments within the community)
    • 2023, John Mertic, Open Source Projects—Beyond Code: A blueprint for scalable and sustainable open source projects, Packt Publishing Ltd, →ISBN, page 69:
      BDFL can be a type of governance that is part of a project from the onset, or it can emerge from the do-acracy form described earlier. We most often see the former: Rasmus Lerdorf with PHP, Linus Torvalds with the Linux kernel, and Guido van Rossum with Python.

See also

Further reading

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