Open Source: an introduction

by Stuart Yeates on 28 April 2006

Introduction

Key messages…

These are the points to take away from this talk:

  • open source is a copyright licensing paradigm
  • open source is about freedom
  • open source is a software development methodology
  • open source is about community
  • open source is a business model
  • good policy needs to be discussed, understood, and embedded into current practice
  • JISC’s open source software policy is good policy
  • You can reap the benefits

In this talk

  • OSS Watch
  • The open source landscape
  • The policy framework in the UK
  • Deployment

OSS Watch: the UK open source software advisory service

OSS Watch provides unbiased advice and guidance on free and open source software for UK higher and further education.

  • strategic IT decision-makers
  • IT managers and technical staff
  • software developers
  • academic end-users

OSS Watch is funded by the Joint Information Systems Committee (JISC) and based within the Research Technologies Service at the University of Oxford.

OSS Watch website

Promoting awareness and understanding

OSS Watch is not an advocacy group. There are many other groups across the world who fulfil the advocacy function, e.g.:

  • Free Software Foundation
  • Open Forum Europe
  • SchoolForgeUK
  • and many more OSS Watch’s role is to promote awareness and understanding of the legal, social, technical and economic issues that arise when educational institutions engage with free and open source software.

OSS Watch activities

  • Website http://www.oss-watch.ac.uk/
  • Wiki http://wiki.oss-watch.ac.uk/
  • Briefing notes and guidance materials
  • Conferences and workshops
  • Consultation

  • Research

    • national survey on open source software use in HE and FE
    • JISC study on models for sustainability in open source projects

Open source software licences

Open source is not a self-certification scheme.

Either your software is released under an Open Source Initiative (OSI) certified licence or it is not open source software.

There are, at present, 58 OSI certified licences.

The first question you should ask of any software claiming to be open source is, what licence is this software released under?

All certified licences meet the 10 criteria of the Open Source Definition http://www.opensource.org/docs/definition.php

OSD criteria

  • free redistribution
  • source code
  • derived works
  • integrity of the author’s source code
  • no discrimination against persons or groups
  • no discrimation against fields of endeavour
  • distribution of licence
  • licence must not be specific to a product
  • licence must not restrict other software
  • licence must be technology-neutral

Open source is about freedom

  • The freedom to run the program, for any purpose
  • The freedom to study how the program works, and adapt it to your needs
  • The freedom to redistribute copies so you can help your neighbour
  • The freedom to improve the program, and release your improvements to the public, so that the whole community benefits

The Free Software Definition http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.html

Free vs Free

In many languages we distinguish between two very different senses of free.

In French, we have libre and gratuit.

In English, we sometimes mark this distinction be pointing out the difference between free speech and free beer.

Free and open source software is not about free beer!

Open source is a development methodology

Key features of open source development may include:

  • Programmer commitment, because the programmer is also the user
  • Rapid change, because programmers want to see results
  • Unconstrained specifications, because there is no external client
  • Collective maintainance of the code
  • Response to change, dictated by (perhaps unexpected) users Eric Raymond famously characterised this apparent new development paradigm in his monograph The Cathedral and the Bazaar.

Open source is about community

Those who merely deploy open source software are also part of the open source community.

It’s the community, not the code, that’s important.

Open source is a business model

Any business whose business model depends upon the use or development of open source software is an open source business.

This leaves plenty of room for many different types of businesses:

  • consultation
  • business process analysis
  • implementation support
  • bespoke module development
  • ongoing support contractor
  • training
  • hosting
  • and more!

Policy framework in the UK

  • Government Open Source Software Trials: final report http://www.cabinetoffice.gov.uk/e-government/policy_guidance/index.asp
  • Open Source Software: Use within UK Government http://www.govtalk.gov.uk/policydocs/
  • Becta report - Open Source Software In Schools http://www.becta.org.uk/corporate/press_out.cfm?id=4681M
  • BBC use of open source http://www.bbc.co.uk/opensource/
  • OSS Watch http://www.oss-watch.ac.uk/

UK government initiatives

Office of Government Commerce software trials: Sept 2003 - October 2004. Key conclusions:

  • Open Source software is a viable and credible alternative to proprietary software for infrastructure implementations, and for meeting the requirements of the majority of desktop users; no significant obstacles were noted for the adoption of Open Source in infrastructure developments
  • Adoption of Open Source software can generate significant savings in hardware and software costs for infrastructure implementation, and reduce the licensing costs and hardware refresh requirements for desktop implementation

UK Government open source policy(1)

The second and current version of the UK government policy was issued on 28 October 2004:

  • UK Government will consider OSS solutions alongside proprietary ones in IT procurements. Contracts will be awarded on a value for money basis.
  • UK Government will only use products for interoperability that support open standards and specifications in all future IT developments.
  • UK Government will seek to avoid lock-in to proprietary IT products and services.

UK Government open source policy(2)

  • UK Government will consider obtaining full rights to bespoke software code or customisations of COTS(Commercial Off The Shelf) software it procures wherever this achieves best value for money.
  • Publicly funded Research and Development projects which aim to produce software outputs shall specify a proposed software exploitation route at the start of the project. At the completion of the project, the software shall be exploited either commercially or within an academic community or as OSS.

Becta study: Open Source Software In Schools

Becta study conducted in 2004-5, published immediately after the May election on 13 May 2005:

  • Our study indicates that OSS can be implemented successfully as a networking solution within the technical infrastructure and with obvious cost benefits. It is important to adopt a strategic approach to financial planning in which any savings are then allocated to best meet the wider educational aims of the school.
  • The use of office-based OSS such as StarOffice and OpenOffice offers a cost-effective alternative to proprietary office software.

BBC use and development of open source

JISC open source policy

The JISC Policy on Open Source Software for JISC Projects and Services was initially drafted by Sebastian Rahtz and Stuart Yeates of OSS Watch. It is based on

  • UK government open source policy
  • well-established best-practice in software engineering and management of intellectual property rights (IPR)
  • current IT best-practice within JISC and higher and further education more broadly It was confirmed by the principal JISC committee in February 2005, but not published on the JISC website until September 2005.

http://www.jisc.ac.uk/index.cfm?name=about_policy

Getting some of the Goodness: Deployment

Open source is widely deployed in educational setting.

  • Hidden systems: routers, switches and firewalls running Linux or FreeBSD.
  • ``Backend’’ systems: web servers, email infrastructure, web proxies, DNS, backup systems, etc.
  • ``Specialist’’ systems: Moodle, SAKAI, eprints, etc.
  • Desktop: Audacity, zip, firefox, thunderbird, PDFCreator, Blender, OpenOffice, etc.

Moodle

Moodle is a VLE (Virtual Learning Environment) built in accordance with a social constructivist pedagogy.

Moodle compares favourably to other offerings because:

  • Licencing model is suited to small-scale, ad-hoc, incremental roll-outs
  • Installable by most technologically literate teachers
  • Supports interoperability in deed
  • Easily translatable (languages, institutions, cultures, etc)
  • Large and growing community
  • Testbed for third party tools

PDFCreator

PDFCreator is a windows print driver that creates vanilla PDFs from any document that you can print in windows.

PDF compares favourably to other offerings because:

  • Free
  • Unbranded
  • Small
  • Doesn’t do all of the fancy PDF that requires users to upgrade their PDF readers

PDFCreator is perhaps the best example of an open source model. A small that does a single job, with as little fuss as possible and effectively commoditise something.

Key message

These are the points to take away from this talk:

  • open source is a copyright licensing paradigm
  • open source is about freedom
  • open source is a software development methodology
  • open source is about community
  • open source is a business model
  • good policy needs to be discussed, understood, and embedded into current practice
  • JISC’s open source software policy is good policy
  • You can reap the benefits

Further Information

For more information on open source software development and deployment, visit http://www.oss-watch.ac.uk/ or write to info@oss-watch.ac.uk