The open source software movement has been growing rapidly, and for good reason. First off, it doesn't cost any money; second is the fact that you can share it with friends; third, since the code is available, you can change it to suit your needs or fix bugs that pop up - and you won't have to wait for a patch or an update.
There is a downside and strings attached. For those of us that are not technically-savy enough to edit code, we will have to wait for someone else to create updates, so it really isn't free. It often isn't easy to install and searching forums for answers takes a lot of sifting, reading, trying, and sometimes failing. And if it's free, you can't really complain, right? However, if you are a paying customer you have a right to call an 800 number, wait on hold for twenty minutes, and demand your questions be answered! (and hopefully you will).
This is not to say that all open source software is unsuccessful as it is quite the opposite. There are extremely successful programs that shine a spotlight on the open source movement such as OpenOffice, Wordpress and Firefox. I, too, have had great success with Gimp and Linux operating systems. I was even excited to see that some netbooks came with Linux installed versus Windows.
I see a trend in the use of open source software as budgets are being slashed and minds are being opened to the wonderful world of Open Source.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
As a web developer, we've worked quite a bit with Open Source technologies. In the end of the day, it doesn't really save all that money and time to use it since it still needs to be heavily customized for nearly all of our projects. So the foundation is there but still, it's not as helpful as one would think.
ReplyDeleteAlso, another upside to using it for projects that we do is that our clients can have the option of using any other developer as well. For example, if we're integrating a Drupal CMS into a website and the client wants to add additional modules in 5 years they can call or us their buddy that does Drupal development.
A downside is that since the open source code is free and public for all it can often times be more vulnerable. While the coding structure is being worked on the keep hackers out, hackers know which vulnerabilities exist and can target those specific works that are built on the framework. Goes both ways...
Leesa,
ReplyDeleteI'm with you your point about technical competence for open source software. I can't do much with code. But I've benefited from open source professionally being helped by those who do understand code.
I don't feel badly about getting help with the code because I can help with other aspects of the applications developed from the code. Usability, interface design for example.
Glad that the open source initiative exists. It's save me time and budget with several work projects.
Steve Hoard