Fosss
- 1. (FOSS) Presenter: Saleema A. Gulzar MScN, BScN, BA, RN Assistant Professor AKU-SONAM Acknowledgement: Dodo Khan Abdul Muqeet (eHealth)
- 2. Objectives At the end of the presentation participants will be able to: Define FOSS List type of soft ware development Illustrate the background of FOSS Discuss the benefits and strengths of FOSS
- 3. Software Software , is a collection of computer program and related data that provide the instructions to a computer what to do and how to do it. Computer instructions or data. Anything that can be stored electronically is software
- 4. Type of Software Development Free and Open Source Software Proprietary Software In-house Software
- 5. Proprietary Software Proprietary software is computer software licensed under exclusive legal right of its owner. The purchaser, or licensee, is given the right to use the software under certain conditions, but restricted from other uses, such as modification, further distribution, or reverse engineering. MS Office Internet Explorer Skype
- 6. In-House Software Development In-House development means that a company has programmers on its staff and develops software internally.
- 7. Freedom to run the program for any purpose Freedom to study and modify the program Freedom to copy the program so you can help your neighbor Freedom to improve the program, and release your improvements to the public, so that the whole community benefits What Does ‘Free’ Mean?
- 8. Free and Open Source Software (FOSS) Software which is liberally licensed to grant the right of users to study, change, and improve its design through the availability of its source code.
- 9. Brief Background of FOSS 1986 – Free Software Foundation was born. To promote 'free software'. 1991 – Linus Torvalds distributed a Unix-like kernel and encouraged everyone to help improve it. The kernel was later named “Linux” and then integrated with GNU into an operating system called “GNU/Linux”. 1994 – Apache, the now popular web server system, was born.
- 10. Brief Background of FOSS 1995 – Red Hat was born. 1998 – Netscape released Netscape Navigator code base under open source. This paved the way for development of Mozilla Firefox.
- 11. FOSS? Software that can be accessible freely Source code is available Software can be altered to suit users needs Software can be re-distributed freely without violating copyrights “ SOFTWARE INCAPABLE OF CREATING MONOPOLIES” “ SOFTWARE THAT PROMOTES SHARING” “ SOFTWARE THAT MAINTAINS YOUR FREEDOM”
- 12. FOSS defined F ree and O pen S ource S oftware Free Software Open Source Software Software considered to be alternative to a proprietary one For example: Mozilla Firefox as alternative to Internet Explorer; OpenOffice to Microsoft Office; GIMP to Photoshop. “ Proprietary” denotes a software user's lack of freedom to study, modify and redistribute the software
- 13. Benefits of FOSS Software that will induce growth of Local Software industries No need to rely on other company Software that will induce economic development tapping on local talent and human resources Encourage use of local Software at National Levels Not war on Microsoft or any other proprietary vendor Not war on copyrights Translatable into local languages Business Not As Usual
- 14. Make or Buy? You always have the option of building your own software This should only be considered when you cannot find adequate software or the software is too expensive or would require extensive modifications
- 15. Modify You always have the option of building your own software All software will require some modification. Always look at how easy it is to modify the software and who will do the modifications.
- 16. Make vs. Buy… Or Modify Buy Software May not be an exact fit to your needs Build Software Long expensive process not guaranteed to succeed. Modify Start with open source software that you can modify This may meet only part of your needs but can be modified to meet your exact requirements Everyone benefits from your investment in the software
- 17. Modification and Support Alternative support options (open source can provide the option of multiple vendors for support) Customization and software modification capabilities
- 18. Open Source Criteria… Distribution of License The rights attached to the program must apply to all to whom the program is redistributed without the need for execution of an additional license by those parties. License Must Not Be Specific to a Product The rights attached to the program must not depend on the program's being part of a particular software distribution. License Must Not Restrict Other Software The license must not place restrictions on other software that is distributed along with the licensed software. For example, the license must not insist that all other programs distributed on the same medium must be open-source software. License Must Be Technology-Neutral No provision of the license may be predicated on any individual technology or style of interface
- 19. Some FOSS Equivalents to Proprietary Softwares Category Proprietary FOSS Office Microsoft Office, iWork OpenOffice, KOffice, Abiword, Gnumeric, Lotus Symphony Desktop Publishing Adobe PageMaker Scribus Image Manipulation/Graphics Production Adobe Photoshop GIMP, Inkscape Email Microsoft Outlook, Outlook Express Thunderbird Web Browser Internet Explorer Firefox Voice Over IP Skype Ekiga Database Microsoft Access, SQL Server OpenOffice Base, PostgreSQL, MySQL Media Player Microsoft Media Player, Power DVD Totem, VLC, Mplayer Chat Yahoo Messenger Pidgin, Empathy Video Editing Adobe Premier, Final Cut Cinelerra, Kino
- 20. FOSS Strengths Ability to fit local needs Availability of the source code means that you can modify and enhance the software to more closely fit your own needs. No restrictions on use No restrictions on how the software is used and no invoices for each user license. Low cost No charge for the software itself. If other libraries share their efforts, each user’s cost is reduced. Pay only for needed support or any additional products & services if required. Even then huge savings than commercial SW. Innovation With open source code, users keep-up innovating, improving which means often much faster development cycle when compared to proprietary software.
- 21. FOSS Strengths.. User-driven Traditional vendors focus on providing functionality meeting needs of the majority of their customers. In contrast, OSS features emerge from the community of users. This makes OSS development user-driven: you decide what features are important and deserve attention rather than a vendor. Collaboration Vibrant local, national and global user groups collaborate in creativity, development and trouble shooting. Transfer of Technical Know-How Being active member and part of OSS community, your team members will learn the minimum required know-how of SW & technologies in use.
- 22. FOSS Strengths... Reliability OSS is peer-reviewed software, exposed to extreme scrutiny, with problems being found and fixed instead of being kept secret until the wrong person discovers. So the code base is more reliable than closed, proprietary software. Mature open-source code is as bulletproof as software ever gets. People improve it, people adapt it, people fix bugs. Security and Stability Proprietary software, with 'closed' source code, support and future development rely solely on the resources of a single vendor. If the vendor goes down, so does your product support. In contrast, OSS rely on stable code bases developed and supported by many providers worldwide.
- 23. Some FOSS Health EMR: OpenMRS, Care2x, OpenVista and OpenEHR Telehealth: iPath and telemedmail PACS: KPACS and ClearCanvas Enterprise Document Management System: Information Exchange : MIRTH Enterprise Document Management System: alfresco
- 24. Thank You
- 25. Contact Details Saleema gulzar Assistant professor, MScN, BScN, BA, RN email: [email protected]
Editor's Notes
- #14: FOSS has changed the economics of the Information Technology (IT) industry in that it encouraged greater competition in the sector and helped develop a software industry that produced or serviced code and programmes. The open nature of the code is particularly beneficial for use in scholastics institutions and higher education as it allowed future programmers to learn from existing code. This will become part of a policy prerogative for bridging the digital divide. This is a particularly important feature for developing countries in that it moved them away from the threat of technological dependency. The open and collaborative development process that produced FOSS is generally efficient, and produced good programmes. In addition it provided an often-requested level of transparency: something governments needed and often requested from their technology suppliers
- #17: Often the decision on software is presented as a "build vs. buy" decision where you look for software that meets your needs and then buy it or you don't find software that meets your needs and then you have to build it from scratch. There is another option that is increasingly attractive. This is the "modify" option. You can start with software that meets some of your needs or which has a useful basic architecture and then modify it to meet all of your needs. This option is difficult with commercial proprietary software which requires that the vendor be agreeable to make the changes. (Often local vendors are not skilled or not permitted to make changes.) However, with open source software, you have access to the underlying instructions "source code" to the software so it becomes a much more feasible project to make the changes yourself or to hire someone to make the changes. Another advantage of this option is that the investment you make in changes to the software accrue to the benefit of you and others who use the software, rather than being locked up in a proprietary system