Free software

Free software, as defined by the Free Software Foundation, is software which can be used, copied, studied, modified and redistributed without restriction. Freedom from such restrictions is central to the concept, with the opposite of free software being proprietary software and not software which is sold for profit, commercial software. The usual way for software to be distributed as free software is for the software to be accompanied by a free software license (or be in the public domain), and the source code of the software to be made available (for a compiled language).

Usage

To help distinguish libre (freedom) software from gratis (zero price) software, Richard Stallman, founder of the free software movement, developed the following explanation: "Free software is a matter of liberty not price. To understand the concept, you should think of 'free' as in 'free speech', not as in 'free beer'". More specifically, free software means that computer users have the freedom to cooperate with whom they choose, and to control the software they use. The GNU Manifesto contains language that gives evidence of Stallman's initial confusion with the usage.

Most free software is distributed online without charge, or off-line at the marginal cost of distribution, but this is not required, and people may sell copies for any price. The capitalized term "Open source" is attached to a definition originally created in 1998 from Debian's free software guidelines. While most open source software is also free software and vice-versa, this is not always the case.

The free BSD-based operating systems, such as FreeBSD, OpenBSD, and NetBSD, use a similar definition of free software, but they differ in interpretation about copyleft. Users of these systems often see copyleft as being over-restrictive to the point of being an encroachment on their freedom.

"Freeware" is software made available free of charge, but is generally proprietary, as users do not necessarily have the freedom to use, copy, study, modify or redistribute it. Source code for freeware may or may not be published, and permission to distribute modified versions may or may not be granted, so freeware is gratis, and not libre software.

FSF's official definition for free software was first published in January 1989. ^* This was later reworded by Bruce Perens to make the Debian Free Software Guidelines (DFSG). When Open Source Initiative was founded, its board used the DFSG but with the words "free software" replaced with "open-source software". These three definitions (from FSF, Debian, and OSI) are the only generally accepted definitions associated with free software (by whichever name one calls it).

History

A brief history of free software:

1960s and 1970s : Software was seen as an add-on supplied by mainframe vendors to make computers useful. Thus, programmers and developers frequently shared their software freely. This was especially common in large users groups, such as DECUS, the DEC (Digital Equipment Corporation) Users Group.
Late 1970s and early 1980s : Companies began routinely imposing restrictions on programmers with software license agreements. Sometimes this was because companies were now making money from proprietary software or they were trying to keep hardware characteristics secret by hiding the source code. Other times it was because of the increasingly corporatised attitude in the growing and previously eclectic industry saw protecting source code and trade secrets as a norm even if it didn't provide any benefit to business. Bill Gates signalled the change of the times when he wrote an open letter urging hackers to stop stealing by breaking license agreements.
1983 : Richard Stallman launched the GNU project after becoming frustrated with the effects of the change in culture of the computer industry and users. One incident was when a printer wouldn't work but he couldn't hack the source code to fix the problem because it was withheld. Software development for the GNU operating system began in January 1984, and Free Software Foundation (FSF) was founded in October 1985. He introduced a free software definition and "copyleft", designed to ensure software freedom for all. ^* Some reacted strongly against Stallman's position as idealistic nonsense and he was strongly mocked and criticised.
Present day : Free software is a huge international effort, producing software used by individuals, large organisations, and even entire countries. The economic advantages of the free software model, and, to a lesser extent, the ethical principles that it was founded upon are beginning to be recognised, even by mainstream media. Also, some other industries — that is, non-software industries — are beginning to recognise the value of free software's message too: scientists, for example, are looking towards more open development processes, and hardware such as microchips is beginning to be developed under Copyleft licenses (see the OpenCores project, for instance). The Creative Commons and Open Content movements have also been largely influenced by free software.

Free software licenses

According to Stallman and the FSF, software licenses must have the following freedoms to qualify as being "Free":

Freedom 0: The freedom to run the program for any purpose.
Freedom 1: The freedom to study and modify the program.
Freedom 2: The freedom to copy the program so you can help your neighbor.
Freedom 3: The freedom to improve the program, and release your improvements to the public, so that the whole community benefits.

Freedom 1 and 3 require source code access, because studying and modifying software without its source code is extremely difficult, highly inefficient, and sometimes impossible in practice. Access to annotated source code relieves these problems.

Free Software Foundation and Open Source Initiative both publish lists of licenses that they find to comply with their definition of free software and open-source software respectively.^* The lists are necessarily incomplete, because a license need not be known by either organisation in order to provide these freedoms. Apart from these two organisations, the Debian project is seen by some to provide useful advice on whether particular licenses comply with their Debian Free Software Guidelines. Debian doesn't publish a list of approved licenses, so its judgements have to be tracked by checking what software they have allowed into their archives. However, it is rare that a license is announced as being in-compliance by FSF or OSI and not the other (the Netscape Public License used for early versions of Mozilla being an exception), so exact definitions of the terms have not become hot issues.

The terms Libre software, FLOSS, FOSS, and OSS/FS do not have formal meanings or defacto arbitrators.

Most free software uses a small set of licenses. The most popular of these are the GNU General Public License, the GNU Lesser General Public License, the BSD License, the Mozilla Public License, the MIT License, and the Apache License.

Software that is not free software is known as proprietary software. It may come with some or none of the above freedoms, and almost always comes with an EULA which purports to use contract law to restrict users' ability to run the software in certain ways.

The FSF free software definition disregards price. CDs containing free software such as GNU/Linux distributions are commonly for sale. If the CD buyer retains the free software freedoms the purchased software is still free software. Freeware includes restrictions that conflict with the free software definition are considered proprietary, since source code may be unavailable, or redistributors may be prohibited charging fees.

Some people use "libre" to avoid the ambiguity of the word "free". However, these terms are mostly used within the free software movement.

Variations on free software as defined by the FSF:

Copyleft licenses, the GNU General Public License being the most prominent. The author retains copyright and permits redistribution and modification under terms to ensure that all modified versions remain free.
Public domain software - the author has abandoned the copyright. Since public-domain software lacks copyright protection, it may be freely incorporated into any work, whether proprietary or free.
BSD-style licenses, so called because they are applied to much of the software distributed with the BSD operating systems. The author retains copyright protection solely to disclaim warranty and require proper attribution of modified works, but permits redistribution and modification in any work, even proprietary ones.

A copyright owner of copyleft-licensed software can produce and sell a version under any license, in addition to distributing the original version as free software. Many free software companies do this; this does not restrict any rights granted to the users of the copyleft version.

All free software licenses must grant people all the freedoms discussed above. However, unless the applications' licenses are compatible, combining programs by mixing source code or directly linking binaries is problematic, because of license technicalities. Programs indirectly connected together may avoid this problem.

Examples of free software

Notable free software:

Operating systems: GNU/Linux, BSD, Darwin, and the Windows clone ReactOS.
GCC compilers, GDB debugger and C libraries.
Servers: BIND name server, Sendmail mail transport, Apache web server, and Samba file server.
Relational database systems: MySQL and PostgreSQL.
Programming languages: Perl, PHP, Python, Ruby and Tcl.
GUI related: X Window System, GNOME, KDE, and xfce desktop environments.
OpenOffice.org office suite, Mozilla and Firefox web browsers and the GIMP graphics editor.
Typesetting and document preparation systems TeX and LaTeX.
MediaWiki, the software which runs Wikipedia.

The Free Software Directory is a free software project that maintains a large database of free software packages.

The most accessible and comprehensive collections of free software are currently distributed as LiveDistros, entire operating systems stored and made ready to boot on CDs, USB sticks, DVDs, and other bootable media. By inserting a LiveDistro into your CD drive and booting the computer you arrive to a desktop with hundreds of free software packages ready to run and use.

Some free software like OpenOffice.org work on the non-free Microsoft Windows and non-free Unix platforms. Non-free software can work on free platforms, although purists prefer using platforms composed entirely of free software such as GNU/Linux.

Free software packages constitute a software "ecosystem" where software provides services, resulting in mutual benefit: for instance, the Apache web server handling the HTTP protocol, using mod_python to provide dynamic content.

Social significance

Positive Social Outcomes

Free software is generally available at little to no cost. Thus, free software is a pure public good rather than a private good.
May result in a permanently lower cost compared to proprietary software, due to the fact that free software is becoming popular in third world countries.
The ability to view and modify the software provides a practical defence against Spyware.
Businesses have the freedom to make the free software they use fit their specific needs by hiring programmers to modify it for them. As opposed to being at the mercy of a vendor as they are with proprietary software.
Free software gives users the ability to cooperate with each other in enhancing and refining the programs they use.
Open source allows anyone, not just the employees of a business, to fix bugs and security issues in far less time.

Negative Social Outcomes

Possible loss of incentives to produce software for the entertainment industry.
Possible loss of incentives to pay people to write software in the "cathedral" style of development of proprietary software (see Eric S. Raymond's The Cathedral and the Bazaar).
Possible loss of incentives for commercial innovation, due to lack of a capitalist competitive business environment.

Political Characterisation

Computer software is inanimate and therefore not political. However, its effects on society, like speech, are political.

Free software as a communist movement

SCO CEO Darl McBride and others have tended to characterise free software as communist. The accusation leverages the influential legacy of anti-communism in United States to generate an effect in the market or in legal matters.[http://news.com.com/2010-7344-5083904.html Communism opposes the free market and rejects private property. Free software gives users the same freedoms as the copyright holder, while the owners of proprietary software make restrictions to generate profit. The free software community is also critical of software patents, and other protection technologies. Models for collective ownership in free software is at odds with capitalistic/individualist ownership and production. However, free software licenses allow one to charge a price for distributing the software. Further, copyright holders have copyright law to enforce the license of their free software package if the need arises.

Free software as a libertarian movement

The libertarian ideal can be characterised as being in favour of social liberty (including free speech, a free press and privacy) as well as economic liberty (including property rights and individual control over property) and in favour of a capitalist free market. There is some evidence that free software is congruent with libertarian ideals of economic liberty, intellectual property ^* and freedom from invasions of privacy.

Free software license terms guarantee that anybody coming into possession of the software has the source code and the right to modify, reproduce and distribute it. Consequently anybody with the required knowledge is able to perform modifications and provide support for the product. Modifications are enabled directly by access to the source code and other services can be provided by those who have examined and learned about the product as users and maintainers. The result is a marketplace open to competition from a wide range of participants. There is little or no barrier to entry to the market since all the necessary permissions are granted by the license. The creation of this competition for services is appealing to the libertarian ideal of the free market and facilitates the creation of businesses.

The right to modify their software also enables users to exercise complete control over the computing devices that they own. Though users are generally free to choose which software products they run, the ability to modify the software products themselves means that assets can be exploited more efficiently. This reinforces the benefits of existing property and creating a situation of complete control. This control precipitates many of the positive social outcomes described above, including enhanced computer security, electronic privacy and consumer choice.

Individual motivations

It is often wondered why individuals would make the effort to participate and contribute to free software, as such contributions can be very costly in terms of effort or time.

Individuals within a team typically have a wide variety of motivations. Often, there are stances on the relationship between free software and the existing capitalist economic system. Some contributors dislike the capitalist economic system, and perceive that free software and capitalism are incompatible, so more free software results in less capitalism. They may also believe in inter-market competition, and that free software is a form of competition within capitalism. They may also perceive that copyright systems and other intellectual property regimes government-enforced monopolies - market restrictions. Other motivations may consist of gift economics, where status depends effectively on "gifts" from the contributor. Or more prosaically, a contributor may just want to altruistically do what he perceives as a good deed, in the spirit of volunteerism.

Relative security

There is controversy over the security of free software versus proprietary software, with a major issue being security through obscurity. A popular relative security measurement is counting known unpatched security flaws. Generally, users of this method advise avoiding products which lack fixes for known security flaws, at least until a fix is available. Some claim that method counts more vulnerabilities for the free software, as free software is more open about what their problems are^*.

Free software controversies

The BitKeeper controversy in the free software movement illustrates the movement's major issues and points of view.

Larry McVoy invited high-profile free software projects to use BitKeeper to attract paying users. In 2002 a controversial decision was made to use BitKeeper, a proprietary software product, to develop the Linux kernel, a free software project. The following excerpt from a Newsforge article illustrates why this proved to be a major source of controversy.

"McVoy made the program available gratis to free software developers. This did not mean it was free software for them: they were privileged not to part with their money, but they still had to part with their freedom. They gave up the fundamental freedoms that define free software: freedom to run the program as you wish for any purpose, freedom to study and change the source code as you wish, freedom to make and redistribute copies, and freedom to publish modified versions.

The free software movement has said "Think of free speech, not free beer" for 15 years. McVoy said the opposite; he invited developers to focus on the lack of monetary price, instead of on freedom. A free software activist would dismiss this suggestion, but those in our community who value technical advantage above freedom and community were susceptible to it. ...

A free kernel, even a whole free operating system, is not sufficient to use your computer in freedom; we need free software for everything else, too. Free applications, free drivers, free BIOS: some of those projects face large obstacles -- the need to reverse engineer formats or protocols or pressure companies to document them, or to work around or face down patent threats, or to compete with a network effect. Success will require firmness and determination. A better kernel is desirable, to be sure, but not at the expense of weakening the impetus to liberate the rest of the software world." ^*

McVoy withdrew permission for gratis use by free software projects. Many in the free software movement see the whole affair as a vindication of Richard Stallman's principled position over the more utilitarian approach of Linus Torvalds.

External links

The Free Software Definition - published by FSF
Foundation for a Free Information Infrastructure (FFII).
Free Software and Open Source software (Where to find) - from Wikisolutions
FSF's list of free software licenses, including clarifications on often confused non-free licenses
FSF/UNESCO directory of free software packages
The GNU philosophy pages
FSF's comparison of "Open Source" and "Free Software"
Why Open Source Software / Free Software (OSS/FS)? Look at the Numbers! — David Wheeler's analysis of the advantages of OSS/FS.
Free software transcripts by Ciaran O'Riordan

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