Techie Vocab Lesson #1: Open Source

So what the heck does “open source” mean? And why should you care?

Open source is a term used to describe software that is developed by a community of individuals and offered free for download off the internet. It’s the opposite of propriatary software that’s developed by a company and liscensed to its users. Perhaps the best example of proprietary software is Microsoft’s office. The only way to use their software is to liscense it. And if you find a bug, you must submit it to Microsoft. It will be addressed by their internal programmers.

Open source developers often make their money by consulting or customizing open source applications for their cleints. So while downloading a piece of software is free, it may need to be tweaked for your particular needs.

The most common open source application we implement for our clients are “content management systems.” (CMS) These allow an organization to self edit their website without staff needing to know HTML. Through a password-protected administrative dashboard, staff can add, edit, and delete pages of content. They system is dynamic, meaning if you have multiple areas on your site where the same content displays (like news headlines in a press section and on the homepage), they system will follow an established set of rules and populate your content in all the right places. In other words, you only have to make one change and the website makes the rest.

There’s no one CMS option that’s right for every organization. Some will want to hire a proprietary company. But it can cost $30,000 or more to sign up with one of these groups. If this budget is too large, an open source solution might be the way to go.

See other web definitions on Google and visit the Open Source Initiative (OSI) for more information.

–Susan