Open Source

Not simply free software but simply...

The source code of Open Source software, usually C or C++, is public. Everybody has the freedom to use, copy, distribute, study, change and improve the software. Everybody has the freedom to commercially exploit the software within the terms of it's licence, usually the 'Gnu General Public Licence' or GPL. There are many variations on GPL to protect commercial exploitation within the concepts of Open Source and copyleft. The licence exists to protect the freedoms that are central to the philosophy of Open Source.

Do not confuse open source with free of charge.

"Free software is a matter of liberty, not price. To understand the concept you should think of 'free speech' not 'free beer'." - Richard Stallman

The internet emerged from the public development of open systems and open standards largely through the process of open debate in the form of Requests for Comment (RFC). The birthplace of the internet was the american Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) working with american academics in developing resilient wide area network technology (ARPANET). This project involved many organisations collaborating through an open exchange of RFC documents.

The resulted in packet switched networkoing with TCP/IP and over time the many protocols built on TCP/IP that we now see collectively as the the world wide web, notably DNS, SMTP, FTP, HTTP, etc.. The internet was not developed as a commercial enterprise but as an academic exercise. It is not surprising that Open Source software plays an important role in web technology.

"In fact, open source will be the only way that this technology can evolve with the kind of flexible, multidimensional coordinated changes that are necessary. You couldn't possibly get that with vendors having to compete." - Douglas Engelbart

FAQ

How does Open Source software compare with Microsoft?
The primary function of Microsoft is to make money, something that they are clearly very good at.
The primary function of the open source community is to make good software, something they are clearly better at than Microsoft.
Which is not to say that Microsoft do not make good software but...
If Open Source is so good why does it not have market dominance?
Two connected reasons:
1)  FUD - Fear, Uncertainty and Doubt - a term used pre Microsoft to explain the market dominance of IBM. In a fit of short sightedness IBM accidently handed market dominanance to Microsoft at the dawn of the PC era. As principal beneficiaries of FUD Microsoft went on to successfully exploit their monopoly position to the extent that they have been subjected to penalties from a US Senate Judiciary Committee anti-trust hearing and hit with a $613million fine from the EU. (see also EEE - Embrace, Extend, Eliminate).
2)  See question 1 - Microsoft are very good at selling software, they have a sizeable marketing budget. It is a common error in todays world to mistake a heavily advertised product for a quality product.
What about support?
Documentation for Open Source software is taken very seriously and invariably of high quality. Literature is plentiful, cf. O'Reilly Press. Community support through mailing lists and newsgroups compares most favourably with commercial products. Perhaps most significantly, Open Source software is remarkably bug free. New bugs are patched with astounding speed. (You can always roll up your sleeves and fix the code yourself :-)
A number of successful organizations have business models based on supporting Open Source products.
What is the future for Open Source?
As people become more technically aware the FUD factor diminishes. As endorsements of Open Source software become increasingly convincing, remaining pockets of FUD are migrating away from licence fees. This is especially so for the server (file, web and database) market sector.
So who endorses Open Source?
The big players; IBM, Sun, HP, Novell,etc., etc. (Microsoft??, Apple??)
The big customers; Military, Oracle, Amazon, MSC, ASCI, etc., etc.
What are the major Open Source products?
By no means a complete but highly credible list containing some of the most important software ever developed:
  • Operating Systems: Linux, OpenBSD, FreeBSD, Hurd
  • Networking: BIND, OpenSSH, PGP
  • Email:
    • Transfer agents: sendmail, exim, qmail, postfix
    • Filter agents: procmail
    • User agents: mutt, pine, elm, Mozilla Thunderbird
    • Client services: qpopper, uw imap
  • Web Servers: Apache, Tomcat, Jigsaw, Xitami
  • Web Browsers: Mozilla Firefox, Lynx, Amaya
  • Compilers and languages: gcc, g++, Perl, PHP, Python, Tcl/Tk, Ruby
  • Editors: vi, emacs, xemacs
  • Graphics: X11 (XFree86, Xorg), gnome, kde, gtk, png, gimp, GD, Mesa (OpenGL), GhostScript
  • Document Preparation and typesetting: Tex, LaTeX, GhostScript
  • Officeware: Open Office, Star Office
  • Databases: MySQL, PostgreSQL
  • IDEs: NetBeans, Eclipse
Where do I find out more?
Books: Websites:

Watch This Documentary

Gasp as our heroes, Stallman, Raymond, Torvalts, et. al. do battle with the dreaded suits. See for yourself just how bonkers these freedom fighters really are. Marvel at the greed of corporate industry. Shudder as you witness the horror of the dreaded Gates beast.

This is a 90 minute documentary made before the dotcom bust so slightly historic but crammed with good stuff.

There are several ways to get hold of this but downloads only, no streams.
(For reasons of copyright access is restricted to the University of Greenwich.)

  1. Recommended 701.4 MByte XviD
  2. 436.82 MBytes Real Media
  3. 191.7 MBytes of Windoze Media

The XviD offers the best video quality and the movie plus codec will burn onto a 700M CD in a few minutes in the lab (download the file to a local hard drive first - this takes about 10 minutes). You can try downloading the 700M XviD off-campus but this will take many hours. If you are downloading off-campus the Windoze Media is watchable but only on a small window. For successful full screen you need the Real Media or XviD versions. Whichever you choose it needs to be on a local drive to play successfully.

Listen to this Podcast

Radio 4 podcast of 'In Business' 11th January 2007 NEW WAVE COMPUTING.

Click on Peter's photograph to listen to the 11 MByte mp3 file. Right click the image if you want to save to disk for later consumption. (For reasons of copyright access is restricted to the University of Greenwich.)

photograph of Peter Day

"Peter Day talks to some of the rising stars of the new revolution and finds out how the computer industry is changing yet again.

The world's biggest computer companies are being threatened by a host of new start-ups powered by open-source software, strings of inexpensive computers,and 'mash-up' websites which combine information in innovative ways."

Poor old Aunty BEEB are slightly mistaken when they announce that Open Source is new. Stallman's Open Source manifesto came out back in 1985 and some of the Open Source businesses are now more than a decade old. Nevertheless this programme reinforces my assertions about the importance of Open Source both now and in the future. In business is an excellent programme that frequently contains material relevant to a sudent of computing, science, software and or engineering.

Follow this lecture

Open Standards, Open Source (ppt 957k)

Read This article

Samuelson, P. IBM's Pragmatic Embrace of Open Source Communications of the ACM, vol 49 no.10 October 2006

(For reasons of copyright access is restricted to the University of Greenwich.)

Open source has changed the intellectual property landscape of the software industry.

Twenty years ago, IBM Corp. was the most vigorous advocate of very strong intellectual property (IP) rights for computer programs. Without strong copyright protection, IBM contended, there would be insufficient incentives for firms to invest in software development. IBM's executives and lawyers asserted that: copyright law protected program code from copying and redistribution, as well as protecting the structure, sequence, and organization of programs; interface specifications were among the original elements of computer programs that copyright did and should protect; and reverse engineering of computer programs for purposes such as discerning interface information in order to develop interoperable programs infringed copyrights