Knowlegde Through Fun Welcome To Mady's Site.

The Linux operating system kernel is a very successful example of a
large software system in widespread use that has been developed using
an "open source" development (OSD) model. If a conclusion has to be
compiled, then freedom, ownership of the source, no license fees,
availability of skills and resource to fix problems or to develop
enhancements are all readily available. The distribution of software
to smaller companies or acquisitions of the main business is freely
available. Desires of a company dictate, freedom, cost effectiveness,
availability of resources, a reliable and flexible solution that works
well and retain any office tools and integration with popular market
products, services or communication methods are key to the
consideration of a business solution.
So why is it not a perfect model for the commercial world? Habit and
poor understanding is the cause of all issues related to acceptance of
the Open Source Model. It is also ignorance and laziness that prevents
the research and investigation into such technologies for many
businesses. Ironically, it is far simpler to replace a system using
Open Source model with numerous organizations that will guide any
organization through the process, than it is to retain the large
supplier that creates the locked in Psyche. The Open Source model will
be freely accepted commercially and one day there will be no preferred
alternative, the time line for globalization of such methods is
certainly within the next five years, so hold on to your hats and do
not get left behind, it is your choice and a free one.

The mantra of the open source community is that OSS increases the
reliability of software because it is peer-reviewed by many
developers, all performing their own tests, making bug corrections,
and tweaking the software until it is complete. Proponents claim this
process creates mature, stable code more quickly than conventional
software development, lowers overhead, and, through operating system
porting, broadens the market for the software. The nature of open
source development also increases the interaction between the
developers of software and the customers who will ultimately use it.
As an ideal, OSS sounds wonderful—a utopia for software development.
Unfortunately, it's not as perfect as it seems. All of the claims made
by the Open Source Initiative are true, but only if the community of
engineers and developers is actually interested in the success of a
piece of software. If the open source community is not motivated to
work on a certain software project, it will languish in obscurity.
This seems to be the scenario that has plagued Netscape and its
Mozilla project. Netscape had hoped its willingness to reveal design
secrets would attract outside programmers and yield new features,
better code, and faster development. However, very few programmers
jumped on the bandwagon. The Mozilla project was to be the loss leader
that would open the market for Netscape's enterprise software;
instead, the effort has been a commercial flop.
The major problem with OSS is the lack of objective information on how
open source works in an enterprise and on how much it actually costs.
Open source software is not a new concept, but its application in an
enterprise environment is a recent phenomenon. Until open source
software development moves out of the "philosophical" into the
"practical," management decisions on its viability will be suspect and
ill-advised.
There is no doubt that open source standards have benefits for
enterprise computing needs, but the technology is not quite ready for
prime time. Infrastructure and standards of practice are being
developed and true cost analysis will be implemented. Only then will
it be possible to say with any certainty that open source is the
future.

This paper provides quantitative data that, in many cases, using open
source software / free software is a reasonable or even superior
approach to using their proprietary competition according to various
measures. This paper's goal is to show that you should consider using
OSS/FS when acquiring software. There are many good reasons to use
OSS/FS, and there's actually quantitative data justifying some of its
claims (such as higher reliability).

7.1 Major Projects
A List of important OSS/FS programs that are generally recognized as mature.
Major OSS/FS Projects include:
1. Linux kernel,
2. Apache (web server),
3. Samba (supports interoperability with Windows clients by acting as
a Windows file and print server),
4. GNOME (a desktop environment),
5. KDE (also a desktop environment),
6. The GIMP (bitmapped image editor),
7. MySQL (database emphasizing speed),
8. PostgreSQL (database emphasizing functionality),
9. PHP (hypertext preprocessor used for web development),
10. Mailman (mailing list manager),
11. XFree86 (graphics infrastructure which implements the X window system),
12. bind (domain naming service, a critical Internet infrastructure service),
13. GNU Compiler Collection (GCC, a suite of compilation tools for C,
C++, and several other languages),
14. Perl (programming/scripting language),
15. Python (another programming/scripting language),
16. Mozilla (web browser and email client),
17. OpenOffice.org (office suite, including word processor,
spreadsheet, and presentation software),
The open source BSD Operating systems
FreeBSD (general purpose),
OpenBSD (security-focused),
NetBSD (portability-focused)).
A great deal of documentation is available at the Linux Documentation
Project (LDP).
A number of up and coming projects are at an alpha or beta level. Some
projects that have the potential to be very important, have running
code, and are working toward more functionality or stability include
the following: Wine (a program to allow Windows programs to run on
Unix-like systems, AbiWord (a word processor), Gnumeric (spreadsheet),
KOffice (office suite), and GnuCash (money management).
Web projects around the world often use LAMP, an abbreviation for
Linux, Apache, MySQL (sometimes replaced with PostgreSQL), and
PHP/Perl/Python. More complex web projects may use major libraries or
frameworks, such as PHP-Nuke (based on PHP) and Zope (based on
Python).

The open source development process differs sharply from the
traditional commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) model. Eric Raymond likens
the corporate or traditional COTS model, whereby a corporation
produces and sells proprietary software, to a cathedral and the open
source model to a bazaar. In the corporate model, individuals or small
groups of individuals quietly and reverently develop software in
isolation, without releasing a beta version before it is deemed ready.
In contrast, the open source model relies on a network of "volunteer"
programmers, with differing styles and agendas, who develop and debug
the code in parallel. From the submitted modifications, the delegated
leader chooses whether or not to accept one of the modifications. If
the leader thinks the modification will benefit many users, he will
choose the best code from all of the submittals and incorporate it
into the OSS updates. The software is released early and often.