Open-source software

“ When economists looked at open source software they saw not a single twenty- dollar bill lying implausibly on the sidewalk, but whole bushels of them. Why would anyone work on a project the fruits of which could be appropriated by anyone? Since copyright adheres on fixation—since the computer programmer already has the legal power to exclude others—why would he or she choose to take the extra step of adopting a license that undermined that exclusion? Why would anyone choose to allow others to use and modify the results of their hard work? ”

“ Open source is the concept and practice of enabling access by both users and developers, to the programme source code, enabling both developers and users to be able to modify or add features to the source code and redistribute it. [1] In this regard, collaboration and circulation are central tenets to the open source movement. Open source software offers an alternative to proprietary courseware, in education. Open source software is cost effective as it does not entail licence fees, has open standards that facilitate integration with other systems and can be easily customised. ”

“ We should pay attention to open source software because it shows us something about business methods in the digital world—indeed in the entire world of "information-based" products, which is coming to include biotechnology. The scale of your network matters. The larger the number of people who use your operating system, make programs for your type of computer, create new levels for your game, or use your device, the better off you are. A single fax machine is a paperweight. ”

“ The creators of free and open source software were able to use the fact that software is copyrighted, and that the right attaches automatically upon creation and fixation, to set up new, distributed methods of innovation. For example, free and open source software under the General Public License—such as Linux—is a "commons" to which all are granted access. Anyone may use the software without any restrictions. They are guaranteed access to the human-readable "source code," rather than just the inscrutable "machine code," so that they can understand, tinker, and modify. ”

“ One model for the open-ended and participatory process through which legislation might occur in a networked democracy can be found in the 'open source' software movement. Faced with the restrictive practices of the highly competitive software developers, and the pitifully complex and inefficient operating systems such as Microsoft Windows that this process produces, a global community of programmers decided to find a better development philosophy for themselves. ”

“ Author’s source code integrity. If the license allows patch file distribution along with the original source code, a user cannot modify the code and distribute it except by giving the new version a new name. No personal discrimination. No person or group shall be discriminated against during open source product distribution. No restriction on application. Open source software can be used in any field and for any purpose. ”

“ If you catch a newspaper or magazine abusing the work `hacker', write them and straighten them out (this appendix includes a model letter) .
• If you're a techie or computer hobbyist, get involved with one of the free Unixes. Toss out that lame Microsoft OS, or confine it to one disk partition and put Linux or FreeBSD or NetBSD on the other one. And the next time your friend or boss is thinking about some proprietary software `solution' that costs more than it's worth, be ready to blow the competition away with open-source software running over a Unix. ”

“ Few words in the English language pack as much ambiguity and sexiness as ‘open.’ And after O’Reilly’s bombastic ­interventions – ‘Open allows experimentation. Open encourages competition. Open wins,’ he once proclaimed in an e­ssay – ­its luster has only intensified. Profiting from the term’s ambiguity, O’Reilly and his collaborators ­likened the ‘openness’ of open source software to the ‘openness’ of the academic enterprise, markets, and free speech. ”

“ For example, most open-source software licenses include provisions about distributing the software’s source code—but the CC licenses do not address this important aspect of sharing software. The software-sharing ecosystem is well established, and there are many good open-source software licenses to choose from. An FAQ from Creative Commons’ website available at https://creativecommons.org/faq/#can-i-apply-a-creative-commons-license-to-software has more information about why we discourage the use of our licenses for software. ”

“ In a society modelled on open source ideals, 'think globally, act locally' becomes more than just a catch phrase. The relationship of an individual or local community's action to the whole system can be experienced quite readily. For example, an open source software developer who writes just a few useful lines of code, say the protocol for enabling infrared communications to work on the Linux operating system, will see his or her contribution interpolated into the kernel of the operating system and then spread to everyone who uses it. He has done more than distributed a line of computer code. ”

“ It would mean assessing the impact of rules on both proprietary and nonproprietary production. For example, if the introduction of a broad regime of software patents would render open source software development more difficult (because individual contributors cannot afford to do a patent search on every piece of code they contribute) , then this should be reflected as a cost of software patents, to be balanced against whatever benefits the system brought. A method for encouraging innovation might, in fact, inhibit one form of it. ”

“ From open universities we have the principles of open access and removal of barriers to education. This was restricted to a particular interpretation of open education, however, and closely allied with particular national policies. Open source software gives us principles of freedom of use, mutual benefit in sharing resources and the significance of licences. This didn’t spread much beyond the specialised community of software developers. Lastly, web 2.0 provides the cultural context within which the openness becomes widely recognised and expected. ”

“ Additionally, a bioinformatician should be able to incorporate components from open source software repositories into a software system. The ability to effectively utilize distributed and high-performance computing to analyze large data sets is essential, as is knowledge of networking technology and internet protocols. ”

“ Snub or no snub, both O'Reilly and Raymond say the term "open source" won over just enough summit-goers to qualify as a success. The attendees shared ideas and experiences and brainstormed on how to improve free software's image. Of key concern was how to point out the successes of free software, particularly in the realm of Internet infrastructure, as opposed to playing up the GNU/Linux challenge to Microsoft Windows. But like the earlier meeting at VA, the discussion soon turned to the problems associated with the term "free software." ”

“ In parallel, a notion emerged of 'Open Source' learning materials, facilitated by growing exploration by educators and educational content developers of the possibilities of developing digital materials that could be designed to allow easy reuse in a wide range of teaching and learning situations. Thus, the notion of OER has 'Open Source' parallels in several areas: OER and Open Source Software have many aspects in common, a connection first established in 1998 by David Wiley, who introduced the concept of open content by analogy with Open Source. ”

“ Many users don't even know that a series of arbitrary decisions have been made about the software they use. They don't know it can be changed. They simply adjust.
By publishing software along with its source code, open source developers encourage one another to correct each other's mistakes, and improve upon each other's work. Rather than competing they collaborate, and don't hide the way their programs work. As a result, everyone is invited to change the underlying code and the software can evolve with the benefit of a multiplicity of points of view. ”

“ An active open source user community participating in maintaining and improving the code base can free the original developer to concentrate on major enhancements or move on to other projects without sacrificing continued utility of the software. ”

“ Microsoft's Shared Source program recognizes that there are many benefits to the openness, community involvement, and innovation of the Open Source model. But the most important component of that model, the one that makes all of the others work, is freedom. By attacking the one license that is specifically designed to fend off their customer and developer lock-in strategy, they hope to get the benefits of Free Software without sharing those benefits with those who participate in creating them. ”

“ By making code open then, better software is developed.
The Free Software Foundation make a clear distinction between Free Software and Open Source, stating that:
[T] he two terms describe almost the same category of software, but they stand for views based on ­fundamentally ­different values. Open source is a development ­methodology; free software is a social movement. For the free software movement, free software is an ethical imperative, essential respect for the users’ freedom. ”

“ But Free Software is also directly in the user's interest, because it means that the users control the software they use. When they do business with Open Source vendors, the vendors do not dominate them. ”

“ ICT infrastructure: Reliable and scalable open source software systems exist for implementing the OER networked collaboration. Initiatives To facilitate planning and coordination across national boundaries, the project is sub-divided into a number of initiatives. Each initiative will include a number of activities (with corresponding inputs, outputs, milestones, key performance indicators and outcomes) ultimately contributing to the implementation of the OER for assessment and credit for students project. ”

“ But, like literacy, the open source ethos and process are hard if not impossible to control once they are unleashed. Once people are invited to participate in, say, the coding of a software program, they begin to question just how much of the rest of our world is open for discussion. They used to see software as an established and inviolable thing - something married to the computer. A given circumstance. With an open source awareness, they are free to discover that the codes of the software have been arranged by people, sometimes with agendas that hadn't formerly been apparent. ”

“ Large portions of the Mac OS X operating system are also open source, including WebKit, the core of Safari, the Mac OS X web browser.
The open source and free software movements have now built free alternatives for just about every major type of computer application, from word processing to video games. And for a time it seemed like Stallman’s dream had come true: one could truly continue to use computers without having laws restrict one’s freedom—it was possible “to get along without any software that is not free.” ”

“ The success of GNU/Linux has led to a larger free software movement as well as the “open source” movement, which releases software and its source code under copyright licenses that provide some of the software freedoms. ”

“ Our community has been self-selected for caring about other things—accomplishment, pride, artistic passion, and each other.9 Whether or not such comments allayed suspicions that Raymond and other open source proponents had simply been in it for the money, they drove home the open source community's ultimate message: all you needed to sell the free software concept is a friendly face and a sensible message. ”

“ The use of standard and open formats assures this free access, making possible the creation of compatible software.
To guarantee the perenniality of public data, it's undispensable that the use and maintainment of software do not depend on the good will of the providers, nor of monopolic conditions, imposed by those. Systems whose evolution can be guaranteed by the availableness of source code.
To guarantee national security it's vital to have systems that are devoid of elements that allow remote control or the transmission of non-desired information to third-parties. ”

“ The success of the Open Source model arises from copyright holders relaxing their control in exchange for more and better collaboration. Developers allow their software to be freely redistributed and modified, asking only for the same privileges in return. ”

“ An open source model for participatory, bottom-up and emergent policy will force us, or allow us, to confront the issues of our time more directly. Using the logic of a computer programmer, when we find we can't solve a problem by attacking one level of societal software, we proceed to the next level down. ”

“ Still, peer-to-peer software, if we could make it work, would seem to give the best of both worlds: the freedom to modify how a program functions on our local computers as well as the ability to share and collaborate with others across the Internet. ”

“ Microsoft deceptively compares Open Source to failed dot-com business models. Perhaps they misunderstand the term Free Software. Remember that Free refers to liberty, not price. The dot-coms gave away goods and services as loss-leaders, in unsuccessful efforts to build their market share. In contrast, the business model of Open Source is to reduce the cost of software development and maintenance by distributing it among many collaborators. ”

“ There is much software that is essential to a business, but which does not differentiate that business from its competitors. Even companies that have not fully embraced the Open Source model can justify collaboration on Free Software projects for this non-differentiating software, because of the money they will save. And such collaborations are often overwhelmingly successful: for example, the project that produces the market-leading Apache web server was started by a group of users who agreed to share the work of maintaining a piece of software that each of their businesses depended on. ”