About Open Source

[kiko_novaera]

What do you think about 'The Open Source world?

Today we can see that Open Source is spreading itself as the time in my country began to have more support, more disclosure, but we are people closed for the sake of tradition, and some fear the new.
But the Linux, Open Source initiatives are growing increasingly.
So I ask again What do you think about 'The World Open Souce'?

Oh! You think Open Source sucks, watch Revolution SO film, and learn more about Open Source.

[Jewels]

I can't imagine why anyone would think open source sucks!

[fraggle]

yes, my acknowledgment, revolution os is a good movie to understand how the open source world works.
i love open source, why? because  i have not to pay for software, its free available. it is also a great advantage
to be able to take a look at the programms sourcecode ( but there are also people who say the same about
taking a look at the sourcecode but aren't making use of this advantage - that's pointless  : ).
i think the biggest problem is the finance. there are a lot of well known and succesfull open source projects, like
openBSD for example. there source of money is for sure there offer for selling t-shirts, posters, releasing openbsd
on cds & little donations. but they have their community which support them, open source is in this point also
"cyberteamwork/internationalteamwork" *imo*
if you want that an open source project should be affiliated, then you need also an idea, an awesome idea,
an idea accepted from everyone cause its userfriendly, plain, platformindependent & so on. this and some
another reasons build up my main reason, why i love open source so much : its a kind of creative act,
combine all tasks together which have to be done, and you will notice, you will need a lot of weird thoughts
to reach your goal, thats fun, and thats also what i understand under the term hacking. the open source
world is also a part of the hacking world.

[seem]

Open Source has good and bad projects. One of the best OS projects is Linux, independent under which License. Also this two points are the baddest in the OS communtiys. There are too much Licenses, which nobody really understand aside from he´s (or she´s ) an jurist. Also Linux, with all of it different derivates, different packaging systems which are not compatible togehter, different subsystems,...

imo this is the only reason, why i haven´t seen any running Linux in Enterprise Environments on production critical servers. And when they use them, the linux is built-in and running from an ROM (For examplesome SAN Storages use it) or the Linux is a boxed Version with contracts and support options and then the servers only are working as firewall or router. It´s also the meaning of a lot of colleagues from my side.
On real Business critical systems, they use Windows (Yes, it´s running in Enterprise, you wouldn´t belive it) or Real UNIX Systems like SUN Solaris, HP-UX, AIX or as the only running Linux with a real function, the Oracle Linux, based on Red Hat, only with a few changes in update systems and the GUI, on it running an Oracle DB.

At home or in Small-Midsize Business Linux is a real alternative, if they have an local admin who can use and manage it or they have an good IT Supporter, which is able to do that. Also a problem of Linux is the unregular update cycle, you have to update your system every day to up-to-date, and when something runs wrong (like by myself) and the system wouldn´t come up, then you have to look and change a lot of parameters on the shell. And this is not really user friendly. If there would be an GUI and a few commands, it would be nicer and more accepted. Based on this difference the change to Linux and away from windows will have a long way. Windows is the same GUI and mostly the same commands, on Client as on Server, in Linux it depends on which OS i´m using.

On the other side, there are a lot of powerful other OS projects for web (CMS, CRM,...) and for local machines and also for servers. The support of a lot of these projects is better then the commercial support, faster and the supporter are the developers, so they know exactly where the problem could be, so this is real great.

Both needs to be existing, the commercial, closed source Projects and the Open Source, both of them has positive and negative points, and for the right choice of an tool, an OS,... you need to balance your needs and the features. If you´re a programmer and know your goal, then OS is better, if you´re only want to install it and start to work with the tool, then mostly closed source is the better choice, and for the rest look on the features .

I would be happy, if more Open Source would be used, no difference between the peoples who look into the source and understand it or those who didn´t look, because they didn´t understand. It´s always based on your needs and on your effort.

[fraggle]

for the interested, revolution os is available @ video.google : http://video.google.de/videosearch?q=revolution+os&sitesearch=

[swytch]

Awesome link, thanks Fraggle!


The open source world is a slice of the tech world which we all can benefit from.  From Sys Admins to home users, there is something for everyone.  More than an end product, the open source world (much like she-geeks) creates a place to share ideas and collaborate.  This spirit is what makes technology "tick".   

[justy]

wow...i just watched that video fraggle. so intriguing!   the words "open source"....says it all for me :p  a galaxy in itself.

[cadean21]

open source is cool, i have used suse....pretty nice. its deffo not for the average home user tho lol. if u know what ur doing it can be fun to play with. i just dont really have time for things like that nemore. i used it to run a ut2k4 server, closed the server and gave the pc to a friend. like i said in another post, i have vista now...i like it. thats all i really need. it is nice to have open source available to you tho. think about all the freeware programs we use lol. the net can be friendly and it can be ur enemy lmao