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Free software and Open Source software (Discussion)

jza said – Thu, 22 May 2008 18:40:36 -0000 ( Link )

Commonly Free software is referenced as opensource. Really open source is a more general view than what free software is. Is like saying a born citizen of New York is a newyorker but is also an American but not all americans are newyorkers.

Free software is bound to the licenses that are provided by the Free software foundation. Open Source software however have many different providers of licenses. For example Mozilla Public license (MPL) is not considered free software but it is open source.

The most common license in the Free software world is the GPL. Linux is GPL as well as other components within the operating system.

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  1. wmoxam said – Thu, 22 May 2008 19:05:38 -0000 ( Link )

    The BSD license is another popular one, and is used by much of the software that powers the internet. The difference between BSD and GPL software is that you can redistribute modified BSD software without including the source code to those changes. The GPL stipulates that you must distribute the source code for any enhancements you make as well.

    Some people get confused and believe that you always must make changes to GPL software publicly available, but that’s only true if you’re distributing software. For example Google does not have to make its changes to Linux available because their custom version of Linux only runs on their servers.

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  2. jza said – Thu, 22 May 2008 19:54:19 -0000 ( Link )

    That is true, there is also a topic on selling free software on the work ;)

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