The Benefits of Open Source
Jan 28th, 2007 by abbot
“Knowledge is of two kinds. We know a subject ourselves, or we know where we can find information upon it.” — Samuel Johnson
When I was in college, some fundamental preachers came to campus to let us all know how terrible we were. They even preached against the Mennonite women whose hemlines fell above their ankles. One of the campus Christian groups were so upset with themselves because they froze up when trying to argue via an exchange of Bible verses. The statements the preachers were coming out with were so over the top, the only thing that tends to come to one’s mind is “Are they for real?” You can’t really get past that, rendering you a stammering idiot. In the end, it did not matter. It was not about an exchange of ideas.
I run into some folks who will preach against open source. A classic sound bite argument is, “Is freeware really free?” I remember working for government when government was very anti open source. Nowadays, attitudes have changed. Still, I come across some die hards from the old days. When I encounter such a person, I end up thinking about the news stories of those time capsules recently opened. Were these people somehow trapped in one of those time capsules? I am not an open source zealot. You use the right tool for the right job. I would argue one needs to be aware of the tools at their disposal. In the rapidly changing IT world, OSS can be a valuable tool adding agility to an enterprise solution toolbox. There are so many reports on the business impact of OSS, that one could write several books on the topic. I will spare you that, but still I wanted to post a few links. It is my way of countering the closed source preacher with what is equivalent to quoting open source Bible verses.
A good place to start is discussing the advantages, risk, culture change, and strategies involved with adapting OSS. Ibrahim Haddad has written a Enterprise OpenSource Magazine article titled, “Adapting an Open Source Approach to Software Development, Distribution, and Licensing.” He does a good job of discussing the unique characteristics, development model, the advantages, the risks, cultural changes, and strategies involved with developing and deploying OSS. There is more to open source than just not paying for the software
For a fun 48 page presentation, head over to the Free Electrons site. They have posted the presentation “Advantages of Free Software and Open Source in Embedded Systems.” A newly released European Commission study on the impact of Free, Libre, and Open Source Software (FLOSS) on the European IT sector is summarized by Thomas Claburn of InformationWeek in the article, “Study Finds Open Source Benefits Business.” The Europeans have been major developers of open source projects. Over on the English GBdirect site they have put together an area discussing the benefits of using open source software.
How does OSS fit into American markets? Darryl K. Taft did an article for eWeek on “CIOs: Open-Source Software Offers Cost, Quality Benefits.” Major American companies are also posting information on the benefits of open source. Red Hat, Inc. has posted, “Understanding the Financial Benefits of Open Source.” Sun has posted, “Open Source Is About Participation.” Of course, the US government has been looking into using OSS. Joab Jackson writing for GCN did a report, “Report Advocates Open-Source Approach for Software Acquisition.” It discusses the Office of the Deputy Undersecretary of Defense for Advanced Systems and Concepts commissioning the Open Technology Development road map. That is a fascinating report, which I highly recommend everyone interested in this topic read. A summary of the report can be found in Computer Business article title, “Open Source in the National Interest.”
Additional information on how OSS is being used within DoD can be read in the GCN article, “Open-Source Software Gets Nod from DoD” by Patricia Daukantas. Joris Evers writes for CNET how “Homeland Security Helps Secure Open-Source Code.”
Those articles and reports are just a sampling. They should help folks see the benefits of OSS and danger when implemented in the wrong environments. There are other benefits in terms of the agility open source brings to an organization. Plus, there are ties in to other areas of IT that are gaining major attention in 2007. I’ll write more on those later.
