Table of Contents Link to heading
- Open Source Philosophy
- Open Source Licensing
- The Free Software Foundation
- The Open Source Initiative
- Creative Commons
- Open Source Business Models
Open Source Philosophy Link to heading
Philosophy that users have the right to obtain the software source code and modify it for their own use.
- Software projects use source code; a human-readable set of computer instructions.
- Unix source code language preceded Linux. Unix was created at AT&T Bell Labs in 1969.
- Standards organisations like IEEE and POSIX ensure that code has the ability to be compatible with other programs and operating systems for collaboration.
- GNU Project built tools that are compatible with UNIX, which were used to create Linux and now make Linux a more complete package.
Open Source Licensing Link to heading
- Purchasing Software:
- Ownership - Who owns the intellectual property
- Money Transfer - Does it cost anything? How do you pay?
- Licensing - What do you get? What can you do with the software? How many computers? Can you share it?
- End User Licence Agreement (EULA) is a legal document you must accept before installing software.
- GNU General Public Licence version 2 (GPLv2) is a licence that states the source code must be made available to anyone and that anyone can make changes. Changes must be under the same licence.
- Free and Open Source Software is software where anyone can view source code, modify it, and redistribute it.
“Two groups can be considered the most influential forces in the world of open source: The Free Software Foundation and the Open Source Initiative.”
The Free Software Foundation Link to heading
- Founded in 1985 with goal of promoting free software. Advocates for freedom to share, study, and modify the underlying source code.
- Enforces copyleft, the philosophy that if someone modifies free software, they are required to share those changes when they share the modified software.
- Developed their own licences which are free and are based on GNU General Public Licence (GPL). Also GPLv2, GPLv3, LGPLv2, and LGPLv3.
The Open Source Initiative Link to heading
- Licences without copyleft are called permissive.
- Free and Open Source Software (FOSS) is an term used to refer to the open source community, which consists of Free Software and Open Source as a collective (a catch-all term).
- Free/Libre/Open Source Software (FLOSS) uses the term libre to define the difference between free from restrictions (Libre) and free from cost (Free)
Creative Commons Link to heading
- Attribution – Must acknowledge the author
- ShareAlike – Copyleft
- No-Derivs – You may not change the content
- NonCommercial – No commercial use
- Combinations are allowed, such as Attribution-No-Derivs-NonCommercial
| Licence | Description |
|---|---|
| Attribution (CC-BY) | You can use CC BY content for any use but must credit the copyright holder |
| Attribution ShareAlike (CC-BY-SA) | Copyleft version of the Attribution licence |
| Attribution No-Derivs (CC-BY-ND) | You may redistribute the content under the same conditions as CC-BY but may not change it |
| Attribution-NonCommercial (CC-BY-NC) | Like CC BY, but you may not use it for commercial purposes |
| Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike (CC-BY-NC-SA) | Requires that your changes be shared under the same licence |
| Attribution-NonCommercial-No-Derivs (CC-BY-NC-ND) | Allows sharing the content to be used for non-commercial purposes, but people may not change the content |
| No Rights Reserved (CC0) | Public domain |
Open Source Business Models Link to heading
If the software is free, how can a company monetise it?
- Offer products and services: Red Hat and Ubuntu
- Create tools: Wireshark
- Package hardware and open source software: Tivo, appliances