[Sussex] A Brief Guide to Open-Source

[Geoffrey Teale]

On Tuesday 20 December 2005 22:27, Mark Harrison (Groups) wrote:
--- %< -----
> And this would be one of the reasons why I use the term "OpenSource"
> rather than "Free". For a much fuller argument as to why, see "The
> Cathedral and that Bazaar" - for the opposing viewpoint, see Geoff
> Teale :-)
--- %< -----

So I guess I'll take hold of the bait.  I haven't posted in an age so here 
goes.

I stress "free" because I believe that what is important about the software is 
the freedom.  I discourage the term "Open Source" only because I believe it 
detracts from the message about freedom.  

To some this may seem silly, or counter productive - after all if you want 
someone to use something you have to tell them that it's a good match for 
their needs; that it's good value for money; and in both regards it exceeds 
the competition.  That may be so, but I believe that the freedoms implied by 
the term "Free Software" carry with them strong indicators that the software 
will meet those criteria, or can be made to.  As a brand "Free Software" 
carries more weight than the majority of software houses can deliver. 

The unfortunate thing about "Open Source" as a term is that it was developed 
as a marketing tool.  The assumption that drove this was that free software 
wasn't making it into commercial environments because the decision makers in 
the business community were too stupid to understand the distinction between 
a set of rights granted by license and the monetary price paid to acquire 
such a license.  

It strikes me that Eric Raymond, et al got this wrong.  I don't think we saw a 
great change in the adoption pattern of free software simply because a group 
of people decided to start referring to it as "open source".  People who 
would evalute the software simply in terms of the name "open source" are not 
the sort of people who would adopt these kinds of solutions generally.   That 
thought process is the mark of the software consumer would typically buy 
Microsoft products because they came with the PC's.  Indeed the only chance 
that such a consumer would end up with a free software solution is because 
the saw the word "free" in financial terms.  The words "open" and "source" 
mean nothing to such a decision maker.

So whay has adoption of free software expanded so much in recent years?  I 
think it is a result of the ever increasing quality and quantity of the 
software and of the snowball effect.  

Inertia is the standard state of corporate I.T.  It takes a lot of weight to 
move companies in a new direction.  It took guts to recommend GNU/Linux on 
servers in the mid 1990s.  Every magazine and marketing campaign told you 
that Windows NT was the server platform of the hour.  By contrast the number 
of companies world wide actually saying "we use linux" could be counted on 
the fingers of one hand.    

Today GNU/Linux is a major player in the server market.  To paraphrase Paul 
Graham, if you're building your servers on something other than GNU/Linux 
then you've got to be asking yourself what it is you think you know about 
servers that Google, Yahoo and Amazon don't know.  In this environment is it 
hard to propose GNU/Linux as a server solution?  Sometimes it still is, yes, 
but for the average I.T. director this is at least an idea that deserves some 
thought.  

By contrast, now think about GNU/Linux  on the desktop.  What is it that stops 
adoption?  

Here's an excercise to help you think through it all.  Try ranking the 
following factors for 1 to 10 (with one being the most important and 10 being 
the least):

  * Concerns about the availability of software and support
  * Interoperability with other companies using proprietary solutions
  * Migration or continuation of legacy systems 
  * Retraining, support and migration costs
  * Lack of mature solutions for niche users
  * Variety / Lack of standard or "obvious choice" tools 
  * Lack of obvious success stories from other companies
  * Strong marketing from competing systems
  * Details of software license unappealing to business
  * Generic name of software licensing scheme implies "free of charge" but 
neither guarantees this nor explicity counterracts the "you get what you pay 
for" arguement

Hmmm, that's a toughy. :-)

-- 
Geoff Teale
tealeg at member.fsf.org