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Free & Open Source Software Movement @ ideOS
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See also:
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Free Software Movement & Open Source
Introduction
While it is common to see the two terms – free software movement and open source movement – used interchangeably, the two movements have quite different philosophies and goals that guide them.
As any adherent to the free software movement would tell you, the free in “Free Software” is about freedom – the freedom to put to use the software to any purpose the user wishes to, freedom to make changes in the source code of the software, freedom to distribute the changes one has made in the source code to another user and so on. The free does not stand for cost or price, though you will find that most free software indeed come at no price. In order to emphasise the freedom perspective of “free”, free software is also called the libre software movement, where libre stands for liberty/freedom. Hence, one will come across the term Free/Libre Software Movement as much as Free Software Movement. (see also: Free Software Definition from Free Software Foundation)
The Open Source movement, on the other hand, is more concerned with developing software in a collaborative method such that the resulting product is superior to closed products that had been developed with fewer brains with lesser diversity among them. This movement is more focused on developing robust products than on providing freedom. (see also: Open Source Initiative)
That said, however, there are overlaps in the two movements. Many Open Source software products indeed are used under the terms set by the Free Software Movement (GNU/Linux is a famous example, in which the Linux kernel ( see: www.linux.org ) is developed under the open source banner but is used under the GNU GPL free source licensing mechanism – see GNU GPL). And of course, most development that happen under the Free Software Movement banner are collaborative, with open standards that are geared to producing robust products.
In current usage, one finds that in many cases free/libre software and open source software are used together to represent a particular type of software development. This has given rise to yet another term – Free/Libre Open Source Software. For those who have the teeth for acronyms, that would be F/LOSS.
In this section, the distinction between the two – Free Software & Open Source – is maintained by and large. You will however come across references where the distinction is not as clear as you would like it to be. We’d have liked to put the blame on the chaps who authored the respective content, but we are told that modesty ( if modesty is a new term to you, see this Wiki article on modesty) is the flavour of the season, so wherever you find that things are not clear, you may blame it on us.
You will find little – if any - original content in the rest of this section. There are two reasons for this: (1) The main purpose of this section is to provide comprehensive web references for free & open source software, and (2) You will realize that any content provided would be adding little or no value when compared with the rich content available in the web references and resources.
Any feedback on errors/mistakes, as well as suggestions for improvements, is welcome. The chappie you will need to send these to would be Narsi – narsi@esource.in .
The section is divided into the following topics:
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