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The State of Open Source Software

Posted by samzenpus on from the line-them-up dept.

snydeq writes "InfoWorld's Peter Wayner provides an in-depth look at the state of open source software and an overview of the best open source software of the year. 'It's easy to find hundreds of other positive signs of open source domination. If the mere existence of a tar file filled with code from the nether regions of a beeping device that's buried deep inside someone's pocket is all you need to feel warm and fuzzy about "open source," you might conclude that open source development is the most dominant form in the increasingly dominant platform of the future,' Wayner writes. 'But anyone who digs a bit deeper will find it's not so simple. Although the open source label is more and more ubiquitous, society is still a long way from Richard Stallman's vision of a world where anyone could reprogram anything at any time. Patents, copyrights, and corporate intrigue are bigger issues than ever for the community, and more and more people are finding that the words "open source" are no guarantee of the freedom to tinker and improve. Some cynics even suggest that the bright, open future is receding as Linux and other open source tools grow more dominant.' Included in the writeup are the best open source applications, best open source desktop and mobile offerings, best open source development tools, and best open source software for datacenters and the cloud."

3 of 76 comments (clear)

  1. InfoWorld and Slashdot by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    InfoWorld promotion has been going on for a long time in slashdot, but seriously now. Milking for link juice and keywords like "best open source applications" and "best open source development tools" straight in the summary? Hooray, SEO spam.

  2. Google's idea of open source isn't right by jmcbain · · Score: 4, Interesting

    As J. Gruber of Daring Fireball points out, Google doesn't do open source as we would expect. An internal Google memo on Android development clearly states their policy:

    • Do not develop in the open. Instead, make source code available after innovation is complete
    • Lead device concept: Give early access to the software to partners who build and distribute devices to our specification (ie [sic], Motorola and Verizon). They get a non-contractual time to market advantage and in return they align to our standard.

    This is not how open source is supposed to work. Open source doesn't mean "closed until we decide to make it open". Open source doesn't mean "closed until we and our partners can profit."

  3. Re:Fifty-one pages by UnknownSoldier · · Score: 4, Informative

    Agreed. Here's all the one page summary ...
    [ not karma whoring since I've been maxed for _years_ ... ]

    = Applications =
    * Apache Lucene and Solr
    * Drupal
    * Openbravo ERP
    * Pentaho BI Suite
    * SugarCRM
    * WordPress

    = Desktop and mobile =
    * 7-Zip
    * Google Android
    * CamStudio
    * Google Chrome
    * LibreOffice
    * Oracle VM VirtualBox
    * PDFCreator
    * Pidgin
    * PortableApps.com
    * TrueCrypt
    * VLC

    = Application Development =
    * CakePHP
    * CoffeeScript
    * Git
    * Apache Hadoop
    * Hudson and Jenkins
    * jQuery Mobile and Sencha Touch
    * MongoDB
    * Node.js
    * Web2py

    = Data Center & Cloud =
    * Eucalyptus and OpenStack
    * Gluster
    * Talend Open Studio
    * Vyatta
    * Xen
    * WSO2

    --
    Can I get my 10 mins back, please.