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Open Source Software - Why is it Used
Open Source Software
(OSS) is software that is available under a special
license that allows everyone to access the program code
as well as the executable program. This means that anyone
is able to edit the program code and therefore customise
the software for their own needs.
This ability to access
the source code is protected by the license under which
the software is released. There is a great many Open
Source licenses, but they all have one thing in common,
they protect the right of the user of the software to
access and modify it in any way they desire.
This ability to modify
applications is in direct contrast to the Closed Source
Software model. In Closed Source only the creator of
the application has access to the source code, and therefore,
only the creator is able to modify the application.
Being able to change the way an Open
Source Software application operates is critical in
many business environments. No two businesses are identical
and therefore it is unlikely that any one piece of software
will satisfy the needs of all potential users. Without
the ability to modify their software a company is restricted
in its operations by that software.
While it is true that no two businesses
are identical, it is also true that there are a great
many common business practices that are repeated across
organisations. These common practices can be well served
by "standard" software. The remaining practices,
those that are different from competitors are, typically,
the ones that give a business an advantage in the marketplace.
Since these non-standard practices are
key to the organisations success it is critical that
any software solutions adopted by the company also support
these non-standard processes. It is in this need to
adapt software to a companies specific needs that makes
Open Source Software attractive. Since the company has
access to the source, the application can be freely
adapted to suit the unique requirements of each user.
Who Pays for Open Source Development?
The ability to customise software is
critical to allow an organisation to continue to improve
their business processes, but how does a company afford
to pay for such customisations?
One of the side effects of allowing
any user access to the source code is that the cost
of acquiring the software in the first instance is massively
reduced. In most cases the source code is available
for no cost. This enables the user to divert resources
normally allocated to pay software license fees into
enhancing the software.
A successful Open Source Software project
has a large community of software developers. Many of
these developers work as independent contractors and
can be employed to customise the software, alternatively,
if a company has internal developer resources, they
can leverage those skills to perform the customisations.
Does it Really Work?
This all sounds fantastic, but does
it really work? Are there Open Source Applications in
use in the real world?
Here are a few facts to convince you
that it most certainly does work:
- Around 70% of web sites are served
by the Open Source Apache HTTPD server.
- In a 2002 survey it was found over
31% of UK and nearly 42% of German companies were using
or planning to use OSS.
- In 2001, Debian (an Open Source Operating
System), contained over 55 million lines of code and
was estimated to have consumed over 14,000 person years
in development time. That is a development cost of around
1.89 Billion Dollars (US) yet it is still available
with no license fees.
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