A dispute between a prominent open-source developer and the maker of software used to manage Linux kernel development has forced Linux creator Linus Torvalds to embark on a new software project of his own. The new effort, called "git," began last week after a licensing dispute forced Torvalds to abandon the proprietary BitKeeper software he had used since 2002 to manage Linux kernel development.

The conflict touches on the difference between open-source developers who view Linux's open, collaborative approach as a technically superior way to build software and advocates of free software who see the ability to access and change source code as fundamental freedom.

As a result of the dispute, Torvalds is now working with other Linux developers to create software that can quickly make changes to 17,000 files that make up the Linux kernel, the central component of the Linux operating system. "Git, to some degree, was designed on the principle that everything you ever do on a daily basis should take less than a second," Torvalds said in an e-mail interview.