Open source, what is it?

Open source, what is it? We see and hear that phrase everywhere in online media these days. Some would have you believe that it is a Pandora's box, others would have you believe it is the fountain of youth. In reality, it is a simple idea, the idea that collectively, many people can contribute their own free time to work on a piece of software. An even simpler example is to relate this idea to the following phrase in the English language: to volunteer.

Imagine what the several thousands of people all driven to a single intent could create? Its not hard, we can see manifestations of this behavior in all aspects of the global society. It is a very powerful notion that people who are committed to something can create almost anything they desire, whether it be social change, software, a pyramid, or even a website.

You might be surprised to find out that most of the world's technical infrastructure is actually built on the resultant software produced by open source software projects. Here is a quick break-down of how open source and collectively built software probably touches you:

• The operating system on the server which hosts your site is probably Linux.
• The web server software which host your site is probably Apache.
• The programming language with which your site was created is probably PHP.
• The database which contains all your data for your website is probably MySQL.
• The mail software which receives and sends your email.
• The list goes on....

Does any of this sound familiar? Governments use it, schools use it, maybe even the birds and bees use it. It doesn't have to cost us in currency, though of course, nothing is free mind you, “cost” is a moving target specific to every situation in which it is calculated.

There are several projects which provide software for absolutely free. We are not talking spyware here, we're talking everything from an alternative to MS Office to the operating system that the NSA uses on its internal networks. Open source sofware is every around us!

If you are curious and would like to find out more about software, you can start your journey here at: http://www.opensource.org.

- John Ensign, CTO