The open-source-software movement is a movement that supports the use of open-source licenses for some or all software, a part of the broader notion of open collaboration. The open-source movement was started to spread the concept/idea of open-source software. Programmers who support the open-source-movement philosophy contribute to the open-source community by voluntarily writing and exchanging programming code for software development. The term "open source" requires that no one can discriminate against a group in not sharing the edited code or hinder others from editing their already-edited work. This approach to software development allows anyone to obtain and modify open-source code. These modifications are distributed back to the developers within the open-source community of people who are working with the software. In this way, the identities of all individuals participating in code modification are disclosed and the transformation of the code is documented over time. This method makes it difficult to establish ownership of a particular bit of code but is in keeping with the open-source-movement philosophy. These goals promote the production of high-quality programs as well as working cooperatively with other similarly-minded people to improve open-source technology. This led to software such as MediaWiki, the software with which the Wikipedia website is built.
Brief history
The label "open source" was created and adopted by a group of people in the free-software movement at a strategy session held at Palo Alto, California, in reaction to Netscape's January 1998 announcement of a source-code release for Navigator.
One of the reasons behind using the term was that "the [advantage] of
using the term open source [is] that the business world usually tries to
keep free technologies from being installed."
Those people who adopted the term used the opportunity before the
release of Navigator's source code to free themselves of the ideological
and confrontational connotations of the term "free software". Later in
February 1998, Bruce Perens and Eric S. Raymond founded an organization called Open Source Initiative (OSI) "as an educational, advocacy, and stewardship organization at a cusp moment in the history of that culture."
Evolution
In
the beginning, a difference between hardware and software did not exist.
The user and programmer of a computer were one and the same. When the
first commercial electronic computer was introduced by IBM
in 1952, the machine was hard to maintain and expensive. Putting the
price of the machine aside, it was the software that caused the problem
when owning one of these computers. Then in 1952, a collaboration of all
the owners of the computer got together and created a set of tools. The
collaboration of people were in a group called PACT (The Project for
the Advancement of Coding techniques). After passing this hurdle, in
1956, the Eisenhower administration decided to put restrictions on the
types of sales AT&T
could make. This did not stop the inventors from developing new ideas
of how to bring the computer to the mass population. The next step was
making the computer more affordable which slowly developed through
different companies. Then they had to develop software that would host
multiple users. MIT
computation center developed one of the first systems, CTSS (Compatible
Time-Sharing System). This laid the foundation for many more systems,
and what we now call the open-source software movement.
The open-source movement is branched from the free-software movement which began in the late 80s with the launching of the GNU project by Richard Stallman.
Stallman is regarded within the open-source community as sharing a key
role in the conceptualization of freely-shared source code for software
development. The term "free software"
in the free software movement is meant to imply freedom of software
exchange and modification. The term does not refer to any monetary
freedom. Both the free-software movement and the open-source movement share this view of free exchange of programming code, and this is often why both of the movements are sometimes referenced in literature as part of the FOSS or "Free and Open Software" or FLOSS "Free/Libre Open-Source" communities.
These movements share fundamental differences in the view on open
software. The main, factionalizing difference between the groups is the
relationship between open-source and proprietary software. Often,
makers of proprietary software, such as Microsoft, may make efforts to support open-source software to remain competitive. Members of the open-source community are willing to coexist with the makers of proprietary software and feel that the issue of whether software is open source is a matter of practicality.
In contrast, members of the free-software community maintain the vision that all software is a part of freedom of speech and that proprietary software is unethical and unjust.
The free-software movement openly champions this belief through talks
that denounce proprietary software. As a whole, the community refuses to
support proprietary software. Further there are external motivations
for these developers. One motivation is that, when a programmer fixes a
bug or makes a program it benefits others in an open-source environment.
Another motivation is that a programmer can work on multiple projects
that they find interesting and enjoyable. Programming in the open-source
world can also lead to commercial job offers or entrance into the
venture capital community. These are just a few reasons why open-source
programmers continue to create and advance software.
While cognizant of the fact that both, the free-software movement
and the open-source movement, share similarities in practical
recommendations regarding open source, the free-software movement
fervently continues to distinguish themselves from the open-source
movement entirely.
The free-software movement maintains that it has fundamentally
different attitudes towards the relationship between open-source and
proprietary software. The free-software community does not view the
open-source community as their target grievance, however. Their target
grievance is proprietary software itself.
Legal issues
The
open-source movement has faced a number of legal challenges. Companies
that manage open-source products have some difficulty securing their
trademarks.
For example, the scope of "implied license"
conjecture remains unclear and can compromise an enterprise's ability
to patent productions made with open-source software. Another example is
the case of companies offering add-ons for purchase; licensees who make
additions to the open-source code that are similar to those for
purchase may have immunity from patent suits.
In the court case "Jacobsen v. Katzer",
the plaintiff sued the defendant for failing to put the required
attribution notices in his modified version of the software, thereby
violating license. The defendant claimed Artistic License in not
adhering to the conditions of the software's use, but the wording of the
attribution notice decided that this was not the case. "Jacobsen v
Katzer" established open-source software's equality to proprietary
software in the eyes of the law.
In a court case accusing Microsoft of being a monopoly, Linux and
open-source software was introduced in court to prove that Microsoft
had valid competitors and was grouped in with Apple.
There are resources available for those involved open-source projects in need of legal advice. The Software Freedom Law Center
features a primer on open-source legal issues. International Free and
Open Source Software Law Review offers peer-reviewed information for
lawyers on free-software issues.
Formalization
The Open Source Initiative
(OSI) was instrumental in the formalization of the open-source
movement. The OSI was founded by Eric Raymond and Bruce Perens in
February 1998 with the purpose of providing general education and
advocacy of the open-source label through the creation of the Open
Source Definition that was based on the Debian Free Software Guidelines.
The OSI has become one of the main supporters and advocators of the
open-source movement.
In February 1998, the open-source movement was adopted,
formalized, and spearheaded by the Open Source Initiative (OSI), an
organization formed to market software "as something more amenable to
commercial business use" The OSI owns the trademark "Open Source".
The main tool they adopted for this was The Open Source Definition.
The open-source label was conceived at a strategy session that
was held on February 3, 1998 in Palo Alto, California and on April 8 of
the same year, the attendees of Tim O’Reilly's Free Software Summit
voted to promote the use of the term "open source".
Overall, the software developments that have come out of the
open-source movement have not been unique to the computer-science field,
but they have been successful in developing alternatives to propriety
software. Members of the open-source community improve upon code and
write programs that can rival much of the propriety software that is
already available.
The rhetorical discourse used in open-source movements is now
being broadened to include a larger group of non-expert users as well as
advocacy organizations. Several organized groups such as the Creative
Commons and global development agencies have also adopted the
open-source concepts according to their own aims and for their own
purposes.
The factors affecting the open-source movement's legal
formalization are primarily based on recent political discussion over
copyright, appropriation, and intellectual property.
Strengths
- The collaborative nature of the open-source community creates software that can offer customizability and, as a result, promotes the adoption of its products.
- The open-source community promotes the creation of software that is not proprietary, resulting in lower costs.
- Individuals who have intrinsic interest in code writing and software creation motivate the development of open-source software within the community. This differs from proprietary software, the development of which is often motivated through potential monetary gains.
- An open-source tool puts the system administrator in control of the level of risk assumed in deploying the tool.
- Open source provides flexibility not available in closed products. The hope is that individuals make improvements to an open tool and will offer those improvements to the original developer and community at large. The give-and-take of the gift economy benefits the entire community.
- Open-source licenses and software can be combined with proprietary software. While open source was initially seen as a threat to corporations, some companies found ways to strengthen their proprietary code with open-source code, re-releasing it as an improvement.
- In the event of market failure, programmers and innovators work together to make sure that the software still works
- Globalization of Market
The open-source movement has allowed smaller businesses to
participate in the global economy. Before, smaller businesses did not
have access to the software needed to participate or compete in the
global market. It was the larger corporations, the producers of the
networks and software who had the power. "That is, individuals who have
access to the software needed to create, organize, or distribute content
can plug into and participate in the global community".
The creation of the open-source movement has created "a degree of
global computing access that might have been unthinkable in a world
where proprietary was the only option."
Individuals or organizations with access to an open source had the
means needed to develop technical material for a variety of consumers.
The open-source movement created equal opportunities for people all over
the world to participate in the global economy.
Members of the open-source movement stress the importance of
differentiating between open-source software and free software.
Although the two issues are related, they are quite different. The
open-source movement and the free-software movement are different, but
they work together. Both movements strive for freedom of the Internet
and dislike the idea of ownership over a website.
For both open-source and free software, one can find the source code
and executable component easily and for free online. The largest
difference is that free software requires any changes to be submitted to
the original maker for redistribution, and any derivative software must
also be distributed as free software. This is mainly to keep companies
from making minor changes to free software and redistributing it as
their own, for a price.
A major advantage to open-source code is the ability for a
variety of different people to edit and fix problems and errors that
have occurred. Naturally, because there are more people who can edit the
material, there are more people who can help make the information more
credible and reliable.
The open-source mission statement promises better quality, higher
reliability, more flexibility, lower cost, and an end to predatory vendor lock-in.
They stress the importance of maintaining the Open Source Definition.
This trademark creates a trusted group that connects all users and
developers together.
To fully understand the Open Source Definition, one must understand
certain terms: Free redistribution means that there is no restriction on
any party to sell or give away the software to third parties. Source
Code means that the program must efficiently publicize the means of
obtaining the source code. Derived works means that the program must
allow certain works to be distributed under the same terms. There must
be a promise of no discriminating against any certain persons or groups.
All of these factors allow for the open-source movement to become
available to all and easy to access, which is their overall mission.
The latest updates from the Open Source Institution took place on
January 19, 2011: The OSI collaborated with the Free Software Foundation
and together they updated a version of the request that they have sent
to the US Department of Justice.
Drawbacks
- The structure of the open-source community requires that individuals have programming expertise in order to engage in open-code modification and exchange. Individuals interested in supporting the open-source movement may lack this skill set.
- Programmers and developers make up a large percentage of the open-source community and sought-out technical support and/or documentation may not be useful or clear to open-source software lay-users.
- The structure of the open-source community is one that involves contributions of multiple developers and programmers; software produced in this fashion may lack standardization and compatibility with various computer applications and capabilities.
- Production can be very limited. Programmers that create open-source software often can turn their attention elsewhere very quickly. This opens the door for many bug-filled programs and applications out there. Because no one is paid to create it, many projects are never completed.
- In the open-source industry, the user decides the quality of the software. A user must learn the skills of software creation independently and then make the appropriate determinations for quality and capabilities.
- Librarians may not be equipped to take on this new responsibility of technologies.
- There is no guarantee that development will happen. It is unknown if an open-source project will become usable, especially when a project is started without significant support from one or more organizations. Even if the project does reach a usable stage, it is possible the project can die if there is not enough funding or interest toward it.
- It is sometimes difficult to know that a project exists, and its current status. Especially for open-source projects without significant support, there is not much advertising involved in open-source software.
- The amount of support for an open-source project varies highly. The available support for open-source software is predominantly self-motivated discussions found on the Internet, sometimes moderated by a core group of contributors. The amount of documentation or guides for an open-source project also varies highly. More popular or company-backed projects often have more detailed and maintained documentation. However, as open-source projects are regularly changing, documentation can easily fall out of date.
- There is no guarantee of updates. Although open-source software is available to anyone for free, regular updates are not assured since users do not pay for its use.
- Beyond the obvious detriments towards the theoretical success of open-source software, there are several factors that contribute to the lack of long-term success in open-source projects. One of the most obvious drawback is that without pay or royalty licensing, there is little financial incentive for a programmer to become involved with a project in the first place, or to continue development and support once the initial product is released. This leads to innumerable examples of well-anticipated software being forever condemned to beta versions and unsupported early model products. With donations as the only source of income for a truly open-source (and GPL-licensed) project, there is almost no certainty in the future of the project simply because of developer abandonment, making it a poor choice for any sort of application in which future versions, support and a long-term plan would be essential, as is the case for most business software.
- Organizations with enterprise agreements still pay licensing agreements even if they choose to run alternative open-source software. Therefore, many organizations are unlikely to consider using alternative products. As a cost-saving method of using Microsoft products, many large corporations use enterprise agreements and therefore pay a single company wide IT licensing fee, at lower cost per product. "Organizations with EAs that are interested in alternative products can benefit from the gap-filler scenario, but only after they drop Microsoft Office from their EA at the next renewal and final true-up."
Social structure of open source contribution teams
Historically, researchers have characterized open source contributors as a centralized, onion-shaped group.
The center of the onion consists of the core contributors who drive the
project forward through large amounts of code and software design
choices. The second-most layer are contributors who respond to pull
requests and bug reports. The third-most layer out are contributors who
mainly submit bug reports. The farthest out layer are those who watch
the repository and users of the software that's generated. This model
has been used in research to understand the lifecycle of open source
software, understand contributors to open source software projects, how
tools such as GitHub can help contributors at the various levels of
involvement in the project, and further understand how the distributed
nature of open source software may affect the productivity of
developers.
Some researchers have disagreed with this model. Crowston et
al.'s work has found that some teams are much less centralized and
follow a more distributed workflow pattern.
The authors report that there's a weak correlation between project size
and centralization, with smaller projects being more centralized and
larger projects showing less centralization. However, the authors only
looked at bug reporting and fixing, so it remains unclear whether this
pattern is only associated with bug finding and fixing or if
centralization does become more distributed with size for every aspect
of the open source paradigm.
An understanding of a team's centralization versus distributed
nature is important as it may inform tool design and aid new developers
in understanding a team's dynamic. One concern with open source
development is the high turnover rate of developers, even among core
contributors (those at the center of the "onion").
In order to continue an open source project, new developers must
continually join but must also have the necessary skill-set to
contribute quality code to the project. Through a study of GitHub
contribution on open source projects, Middleton et al. found that the
largest predictor of contributors becoming full-fledged members of an
open source team (moving to the "core" of the "onion") was whether they
submitted and commented on pull requests. The authors then suggest that
GitHub, as a tool, can aid in this process by supporting "checkbox"
features on a team's open source project that urge contributors to take
part in these activities.
Motivations of programmers
With the growth and attention on the open-source movement, the
reasons and motivations of programmers for creating code for free has
been under investigation. In a paper from the 15th Annual Congress of
the European Economic Association on the open-source movement, the
incentives of programmers on an individual level as well as on a company
or network level were analyzed. What is essentially the intellectual
gift giving of talented programmers challenges the
"self-interested-economic-agent paradigm", and has made both the public and economists search for an understanding of what the benefits are for programmers.
- Altruism: The argument for altruism is limited as an explanation because though some exists, the programmers do not focus their kindness on more charitable causes If the generosity of working for free was a viable motivation for such a prevalent movement, it is curious why such a trend has not been seen in industries such as biotechnology that would have a much bigger impact on the public good.
- Community sharing and improvement: The online community is an environment that promotes continual improvements, modifications, and contributions to each other's work. A programmer can easily benefit from open-source software because by making it public, other testers and subprograms can remove bugs, tailor code to other purposes, and find problems. This kind of peer-editing feature of open-source software promotes better programs and a higher standard of code.
- Recognition: Though a project may not be associated with a specific individual, the contributors are often recognized and marked on a project's server or awarded social reputation. This allows for programmers to receive public recognition for their skills, promoting career opportunities and exposure. In fact, the founders of Sun Microsystems and Netscape began as open-source programmers.
- Ego: "If they are somehow assigned to a trivial problem and that is their only possible task, they may spend six months coming up with a bewildering architecture...merely to show their friends and colleagues what a tough nut they are trying to crack." Ego-gratification has been cited as a relevant motivation of programmers because of their competitive community. An OSS (open-source software) community has no clear distinction between developers and users, because all users are potential developers. There is a large community of programmers trying to essentially outshine or impress their colleagues. They enjoy having other programmers admire their works and accomplishments, contributing to why OSS projects have a recruiting advantage for unknown talent than a closed-source company.
- Creative expression: Personal satisfaction also comes from the act of writing software as an equivalent to creative self-expression – it is almost equivalent to creating a work of art. The rediscovery of creativity, which has been lost through the mass production of commercial software products can be a relevant motivation.
Gender diversity of programmers
The
vast majority of programmers in open-source communities are male. In a
study for the European Union on free and open-source software
communities, researchers found that only 1.5% of all contributors are
female.
Although women are generally underrepresented in computing, the
percentage of women in tech professions is actually much higher, close
to 25%.
This discrepancy suggests that female programmers are overall less
likely than male programmers to participate in open-source projects.
Some research and interviews with members of open-source projects
have described a male-dominated culture within open-source communities
that can be unwelcoming or hostile towards females. There are an initiatives such as Outreachy
that aim to support more women and other underrepresented gender
identities to participate in open-source software. However, within the
discussion forums of open-source projects the topic of gender diversity
can be highly controversial and even inflammatory.
A central vision in open-source software is that because the software
is built and maintained on the merit of individual code contributions,
open-source communities should act as a meritocracy.
In a meritocracy, the importance of an individual in the community
depends on the quality of their individual contributions and not
demographic factors such as age, race, religion, or gender. Thus
proposing changes to the community based on gender, for example, to make
the community more inviting towards females, go against the ideal of a
meritocracy by targeting certain programmers by gender and not based on
their skill alone.
There is evidence that gender does impact a programmer's
perceived merit in the community. A 2016 study identified the gender of
over one million programmers on GitHub, by linking the programmer's GitHub account to their other social media accounts. Between male and female programmers, the researchers found that female programmers were actually more likely
to have their pull requests accepted into the project than male
programmers, however only when the female had a gender-neutral profile.
When females had profiles with a name or image that identified them as
female, they were less likely than male programmers to have their pull
requests accepted. Another study in 2015 found that of open-source
projects on GitHub, gender diversity was a significant positive
predictor of a team's productivity, meaning that open-source teams with a
more even mix of different genders tended to be more highly productive.
Evidence of open-source adoption
Libraries are using open-source software to develop information as
well as library services. The purpose of open source is to provide a
software that is cheaper, reliable and has better quality. The one
feature that makes this software so sought after is that it is free.
Libraries in particular benefit from this movement because of the
resources it provides. They also promote the same ideas of learning and
understanding new information through the resources of other people.
Open source allows a sense of community. It is an invitation for anyone
to provide information about various topics. The open-source tools even
allow libraries to create web-based catalogs. According to the IT source
there are various library programs that benefit from this.
Government agencies and infrastructure software —
Government Agencies are utilizing open-source infrastructure software,
like the Linux operating system and the Apache Web-server into software,
to manage information.
In 2005, a new government lobby was launched under the name National
Center for Open Source Policy and Research (NCOSPR) "a non-profit
organization promoting the use of open source software solutions within
government IT enterprises."
Open-source movement in the military — Open-source
movement has potential to help in the military. The open-source software
allows anyone to make changes that will improve it. This is a form of
invitation for people to put their minds together to grow a software in a
cost efficient manner. The reason the military is so interested is
because it is possible that this software can increase speed and
flexibility. Although there are security setbacks to this idea due to
the fact that anyone has access to change the software, the advantages
can outweigh the disadvantages. The fact that the open-source programs
can be modified quickly is crucial.
A support group was formed to test these theories. The Military Open Source Software Working Group
was organized in 2009 and held over 120 military members. Their purpose
was to bring together software developers and contractors from the
military to discover new ideas for reuse and collaboration. Overall,
open-source software in the military is an intriguing idea that has
potential drawbacks but they are not enough to offset the advantages.
Open source in education — Colleges and organizations use
software predominantly online to educate their students. Open-source
technology is being adopted by many institutions because it can save
these institutions from paying companies to provide them with these
administrative software systems. One of the first major colleges to
adopt an open-source system was Colorado State University in 2009 with
many others following after that. Colorado State Universities system was
produced by the Kuali
Foundation who has become a major player in open-source administrative
systems. The Kuali Foundation defines itself as a group of organizations
that aims to "build and sustain open-source software for higher
education, by higher education." There are many other examples of
open-source instruments being used in education other than the Kuali
Foundation as well.
"For educators, The Open Source Movement allowed access to software that could be used in teaching students how to apply the theories they were learning". With open networks and software, teachers are able to share lessons, lectures, and other course materials within a community. OpenTechComm is a program that is dedicated to "open access, open use, and open edits- text book or pedagogical resource that teachers of technical and professional communication courses at every level can rely on to craft free offerings to their students." As stated earlier, access to programs like this would be much more cost efficient for educational departments.
Open source in healthcare — Created in June 2009 by the
nonprofit eHealthNigeria, the open-source software OpenMRS is used to
document health care in Nigeria. The use of this software began in
Kaduna, Nigeria to serve the purpose of public health. OpenMRS manages
features such as alerting health care workers when patients show warning
signs for conditions and records births and deaths daily, among other
features. The success of this software is caused by its ease of use for
those first being introduced to the technology, compared to more complex
proprietary healthcare software available in first world countries.
This software is community-developed and can be used freely by anyone,
characteristic of open-source applications. So far, OpenMRS is being
used in Rwanda, Mozambique, Haiti, India, China, and the Philippines.
The impact of open source in healthcare is also observed by Apelon Inc,
the "leading provider of terminology and data interoperability
solutions". Recently, its Distributed Terminology System (Open DTS)
began supporting the open-source MySQL database system. This essentially
allows for open-source software to be used in healthcare, lessening the
dependence on expensive proprietary healthcare software. Due to
open-source software, the healthcare industry has available a free
open-source solution to implement healthcare standards. Not only does
open source benefit healthcare economically, but the lesser dependence
on proprietary software allows for easier integration of various
systems, regardless of the developer.
Companies
Microsoft — Before summer of 2008, Microsoft has generally been known as an enemy of the open-source community. The company's anti-open-source sentiment was enforced by former CEO Steve Ballmer,
who referred to Linux, a widely used open-source software, as a
"malignant cancer". Microsoft also threatened Linux that they would
charge royalties for violating 235 of their patents.
In 2004, Microsoft lost a European Union court case, and lost the appeal in 2007, and their further appeal in 2012:
being convicted of abusing its dominant position. Specifically they
had withheld inter-operability information with the open source Samba (software)
project, which can be run on many platforms and aims to "removing
barriers to interoperability".
In 2008, however, Sam Ramji, the then head of open-source-software
strategy in Microsoft, began working closely with Bill Gates to develop a
pro-open-source attitude within the software industry as well as
Microsoft itself. Ramji, before leaving the company in 2009, built
Microsoft's familiarity and involvement with open source, which is
evident in Microsoft's contributions of open-source code to Windows
Azure, "its new-age web service for building and hosting applications on
the net", among other projects. These contributions would have been
previously unimaginable by Microsoft.
Microsoft's change in attitude about open source and efforts to build a
stronger open-source community is evidence of the growing adoption and
adaption of open source.
