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63-472: The .NET platform (pronounced as " dot net" ) is a free and open-source , managed computer software framework for Windows , Linux , and macOS operating systems . The project is mainly developed by Microsoft employees by way of the .NET Foundation and is released under an MIT License . New versions of the .NET platform are released annually, typically in November. The most recent version of .NET
126-475: A hardened toolchain and position-independent executables to minimize the potential for stack-based attacks , but is now based on the standard long term stable distribution of the Linux kernel. Alpine's primary feature is its small size, which enables it to start quickly and run in environments very low in memory and storage, such as containers or embedded devices . Alpine Linux can optionally be installed as
189-413: A run-from-RAM operating system. This allows Alpine to work reliably in demanding embedded environments or to (temporarily) survive partial disk failures as sometimes experienced in public cloud environments. By default, Alpine running in this mode will only load a few key packages, but a tool called LBU (Alpine Local Backup) is made available that allow changes in this boot configuration to be written to
252-571: A webserver -based tool known as the Alpine Configuration Framework, which allows users less familiar with Alpine or the command line to configure the operating system in a way similar to that allowed by Debian's debconf utility. Alpine's configuration scripts are written entirely as UNIX shell scripts , which call a small ISO image parsing utility written in C and distributed in Alpine. The Alpine Configuration Framework
315-407: A community-developed open source project because it did not meet the criteria of an Open Source Initiative (OSI) approved license. .NET Core 1.0 was released on June 27, 2016, along with Microsoft Visual Studio 2015 Update 3, which enables .NET Core development. .NET Core 1.0.4 and .NET Core 1.1.1 were released along with .NET Core Tools 1.0 and Visual Studio 2017 on March 7, 2017. .NET Core 2.0
378-606: A niche role outside of the mainstream of private software development. However the success of FOSS Operating Systems such as Linux, BSD and the companies based on FOSS such as Red Hat , has changed the software industry's attitude and there has been a dramatic shift in the corporate philosophy concerning its development. Users of FOSS benefit from the Four Essential Freedoms to make unrestricted use of, and to study, copy, modify, and redistribute such software with or without modification. If they would like to change
441-581: A single unified term that could refer to both concepts, although Richard Stallman argues that it fails to be neutral unlike the similar term; "Free/Libre and Open Source Software" (FLOSS). Richard Stallman 's Free Software Definition , adopted by the FSF, defines free software as a matter of liberty, not price, and that which upholds the Four Essential Freedoms. The earliest known publication of this definition of his free software definition
504-438: A special file called an APK overlay file (usually shortened to apkovl ), a tar.gz file that by default stores a copy of all files in /etc that have been changed from the default configuration, with the option to track more directories as needed. Alpine offers a number of preinstalled configuration scripts which guide the user through initial configuration of the system for common computing tasks. In addition, Alpine also offers
567-515: A standardization effort through ECMA for what it dubbed the Common Language Infrastructure . The company continued development and support of its own implementation as proprietary, closed source software in the meantime. On November 12, 2014, Microsoft introduced .NET Core —an open-source, cross-platform successor to .NET Framework —and released source code for the .NET Core CoreCLR implementation, source for
630-653: A variety of FOSS projects, including both free software and open-source. Alpine Linux Alpine Linux is a Linux distribution designed to be small, simple, and secure. It uses musl , BusyBox , and OpenRC instead of the more commonly used glibc , GNU Core Utilities , and systemd . This makes Alpine one of few Linux distributions not to be based on the GNU Core Utilities. For security, Alpine compiles all user-space binaries as position-independent executables with stack-smashing protection . Because of its small size and rapid startup, it
693-425: Is .NET 9, released in November 2024, while the current long-term support (LTS) version is .NET 8, released in November 2023 and scheduled to receive updates until November 2026. In the late 1990s, Microsoft began developing a managed code runtime and programming language ( C# ) which it billed together as part of the ".NET platform", with the core runtime and software libraries comprising the .NET Framework . At
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#1732801477165756-429: Is a cross-platform framework for creating native mobile and desktop apps with C# and Extensible Application Markup Language (XAML), which also supports Android and iOS . The official community mascot of .NET is the .NET Bot (stylized as "dotnet bot" or "dotnet-bot"). The dotnet bot served as the placeholder developer for the initial check-in of the .NET source code when it was open-sourced. It has since been used as
819-544: Is commonly used in containers providing quick boot-up times, on virtual machines as well as on real hardware in embedded devices , such as routers , servers and NAS . Originally, Alpine Linux began as an embedded-first distribution for devices such as wireless routers , based on Gentoo Linux , inspired by GNAP and the Bering-uClibc branch of the LEAF Project . Founder Natanael Copa has said that
882-809: Is in contrast to proprietary software , where the software is under restrictive copyright or licensing and the source code is hidden from the users. FOSS maintains the software user's civil liberty rights via the " Four Essential Freedoms " of free software. Other benefits of using FOSS include decreased software costs, increased security against malware , stability, privacy , opportunities for educational usage, and giving users more control over their own hardware. Free and open-source operating systems such as Linux distributions and descendants of BSD are widely used today, powering millions of servers , desktops , smartphones , and other devices. Free-software licenses and open-source licenses are used by many software packages today. The free software movement and
945-536: Is supported since .NET Core 2.1. Windows Arm64 is natively supported since .NET 5. Previously, .NET on ARM meant applications compiled for the x86 architecture and run through the ARM emulation layer. .NET fully supports C# and F# (and C++/CLI as of 3.1; only enabled on Windows) and supports Visual Basic .NET (for version 15.5 in .NET Core 5.0.100-preview.4, and some old versions supported in old .NET Core). VB.NET compiles and runs on .NET, but as of .NET Core 3.1,
1008-534: Is today better known as Mozilla Firefox and Thunderbird . Netscape's act prompted Raymond and others to look into how to bring the FSF's Free software ideas and perceived benefits to the commercial software industry. They concluded that FSF's social activism was not appealing to companies like Netscape, and looked for a way to rebrand the Free software movement to emphasize the business potential of sharing and collaborating on software source code. The new name they chose
1071-663: Is used by the Open Source Initiative (OSI) to determine whether a software license qualifies for the organization's insignia for open-source software . The definition was based on the Debian Free Software Guidelines , written and adapted primarily by Bruce Perens . Perens did not base his writing on the Four Essential Freedoms of free software from the Free Software Foundation , which were only later available on
1134-554: The Common Language Runtime (CLR) and the Framework Class Library (FCL) of the .NET Framework 's Common Language Infrastructure (CLI) implementation. As an implementation of CLI's Virtual Execution System (VES), CoreCLR is a complete runtime and virtual machine for managed execution of CLI programs and includes a just-in-time compiler called RyuJIT. .NET Core also contains CoreRT,
1197-738: The United Space Alliance , which manages the computer systems for the International Space Station (ISS), regarding why they chose to switch from Windows to Linux on the ISS. In 2017, the European Commission stated that "EU institutions should become open source software users themselves, even more than they already are" and listed open source software as one of the nine key drivers of innovation, together with big data , mobility, cloud computing and
1260-665: The hacker community at the MIT Artificial Intelligence Laboratory , announced the GNU project , saying that he had become frustrated with the effects of the change in culture of the computer industry and its users. Software development for the GNU operating system began in January 1984, and the Free Software Foundation (FSF) was founded in October 1985. An article outlining the project and its goals
1323-494: The internet of things . In 2020, the European Commission adopted its Open Source Strategy 2020-2023 , including encouraging sharing and reuse of software and publishing Commission's source code as key objectives. Among concrete actions there is also to set up an Open Source Programme Office in 2020 and in 2022 it launched its own FOSS repository https://code.europa.eu/ . In 2021, the Commission Decision on
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#17328014771651386-609: The open-source software movement are online social movements behind widespread production, adoption and promotion of FOSS, with the former preferring to use the terms FLOSS , free or libre. "Free and open-source software" (FOSS) is an umbrella term for software that is simultaneously considered both free software and open-source software . The precise definition of the terms "free software" and "open-source software" applies them to any software distributed under terms that allow users to use, modify, and redistribute said software in any manner they see fit, without requiring that they pay
1449-441: The "entire [...] library stack" for .NET Core, and announced the adoption of a conventional ( "bazaar"-like ) open-source development model under the stewardship of the .NET Foundation . Miguel de Icaza describes .NET Core as a "redesigned version of .NET that is based on the simplified version of the class libraries", and Microsoft's Immo Landwerth explained that .NET Core would be "the foundation of all future .NET platforms". At
1512-557: The .NET Native runtime optimized to be integrated into AOT compiled native binaries . As an implementation of CLI's Standard Libraries , CoreFX shares a subset of .NET Framework APIs, however, it also comes with its own APIs that are not part of the .NET Framework. A variant of the .NET library is used for UWP . The .NET command-line interface offers an execution entry point for operating systems and provides developer services like compilation and package management. .NET Multi-platform App UI ( .NET MAUI , introduced with .NET 6)
1575-638: The EU. These recommendations are to be taken into account later in the same year in Commission's proposal of the "Interoperable Europe Act" . While copyright is the primary legal mechanism that FOSS authors use to ensure license compliance for their software, other mechanisms such as legislation, patents, and trademarks have implications as well. In response to legal issues with patents and the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA),
1638-706: The FOSS ecosystem, several projects decided against upgrading to GPLv3. For instance the Linux kernel , the BusyBox project, AdvFS , Blender , and the VLC media player decided against adopting the GPLv3. Apple , a user of GCC and a heavy user of both DRM and patents, switched the compiler in its Xcode IDE from GCC to Clang , which is another FOSS compiler but is under a permissive license . LWN speculated that Apple
1701-653: The Free Software Foundation released version 3 of its GNU General Public License (GNU GPLv3) in 2007 that explicitly addressed the DMCA and patent rights. After the development of the GNU GPLv3 in 2007, the FSF (as the copyright holder of many pieces of the GNU system) updated many of the GNU programs' licenses from GPLv2 to GPLv3. On the other hand, the adoption of the new GPL version was heavily discussed in
1764-402: The actual causes of the many issues with Linux on notebooks such as the unnecessary power consumption. Mergers have affected major open-source software. Sun Microsystems (Sun) acquired MySQL AB , owner of the popular open-source MySQL database, in 2008. Oracle in turn purchased Sun in January 2010, acquiring their copyrights, patents, and trademarks. Thus, Oracle became the owner of both
1827-470: The author(s) of the software a royalty or fee for engaging in the listed activities. Although there is an almost complete overlap between free-software licenses and open-source-software licenses, there is a strong philosophical disagreement between the advocates of these two positions. The terminology of FOSS was created to be a neutral on these philosophical disagreements between the Free Software Foundation (FSF) and Open Source Initiative (OSI) and have
1890-434: The concept of freely distributed software and universal access to an application's source code . A Microsoft executive publicly stated in 2001 that "Open-source is an intellectual property destroyer. I can't imagine something that could be worse than this for the software business and the intellectual-property business." Companies have indeed faced copyright infringement issues when embracing FOSS. For many years FOSS played
1953-502: The copyright law was extended to computer programs in the United States —previously, computer programs could be considered ideas, procedures, methods, systems, and processes, which are not copyrightable. Early on, closed-source software was uncommon until the mid-1970s to the 1980s, when IBM implemented in 1983 an "object code only" policy, no longer distributing source code. In 1983, Richard Stallman , longtime member of
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2016-562: The functionality of software they can bring about changes to the code and, if they wish, distribute such modified versions of the software or often − depending on the software's decision making model and its other users − even push or request such changes to be made via updates to the original software. Manufacturers of proprietary, closed-source software are sometimes pressured to building in backdoors or other covert, undesired features into their software. Instead of having to trust software vendors, users of FOSS can inspect and verify
2079-416: The goal of developing the most efficient software for its users or use-cases while proprietary software is typically meant to generate profits . Furthermore, in many cases more organizations and individuals contribute to such projects than to proprietary software. It has been shown that technical superiority is typically the primary reason why companies choose open source software. According to Linus's law
2142-567: The government charged that bundled software was anticompetitive. While some software was still being provided without monetary cost and license restriction, there was a growing amount of software that was only at a monetary cost with restricted licensing. In the 1970s and early 1980s, some parts of the software industry began using technical measures (such as distributing only binary copies of computer programs ) to prevent computer users from being able to use reverse engineering techniques to study and customize software they had paid for. In 1980,
2205-538: The heart of the .NET Platform is the .NET Framework, a high-productivity, multilanguage development and execution environment for building and running Web services with important features such as cross-language inheritance and debugging. Soon after the announcement of the C# language at the Professional Developers Conference in 2000 and previews of its software became available, Microsoft began
2268-491: The historical potential of an " economy of abundance " for the new digital world , FOSS may lay down a plan for political resistance or show the way towards a potential transformation of capitalism . According to Yochai Benkler , Jack N. and Lillian R. Berkman Professor for Entrepreneurial Legal Studies at Harvard Law School , free software is the most visible part of a new economy of commons-based peer production of information, knowledge, and culture. As examples, he cites
2331-485: The level of interest in a particular project. However, unlike close-sourced software, improvements can be made by anyone who has the motivation, time and skill to do so. A common obstacle in FOSS development is the lack of access to some common official standards, due to costly royalties or required non-disclosure agreements (e.g., for the DVD-Video format). There is often less certainty of FOSS projects gaining
2394-545: The more people who can see and test a set of code, the more likely any flaws will be caught and fixed quickly. However, this does not guarantee a high level of participation. Having a grouping of full-time professionals behind a commercial product can in some cases be superior to FOSS. Furthermore, publicized source code might make it easier for hackers to find vulnerabilities in it and write exploits. This however assumes that such malicious hackers are more effective than white hat hackers which responsibly disclose or help fix
2457-477: The most popular proprietary database and the most popular open-source database. Oracle's attempts to commercialize the open-source MySQL database have raised concerns in the FOSS community. Partly in response to uncertainty about the future of MySQL, the FOSS community forked the project into new database systems outside of Oracle's control. These include MariaDB , Percona , and Drizzle . All of these have distinct names; they are distinct projects and cannot use
2520-511: The name was chosen as a backronym for "A Linux-Powered Network Engine" or some such similar phrase, but that the exact phrase has since been forgotten. Alpine's package management system, the Alpine Package Keeper, was originally a collection of shell scripts but was later rewritten in C . The aim of this package manager is to achieve a high install and update speed, which it does by writing new data directly in-place into
2583-444: The official mascot. Free and open-source Free and open-source software ( FOSS ) is software that is available under a license that grants the right to use, modify, and distribute the software, modified or not, to everyone free of charge. The public availability of the source code is, therefore, a necessary but not sufficient condition. FOSS is an inclusive umbrella term for free software and open-source software . FOSS
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2646-640: The open source licensing and reuse of Commission software (2021/C 495 I/01) was adopted, under which, as a general principle, the European Commission may release software under EUPL or another FOSS license, if more appropriate. There are exceptions though. In May 2022, the Expert group on the Interoperability of European Public Services came published 27 recommendations to strengthen the interoperability of public administrations across
2709-495: The operating system's file system , rather than employing caching or compression . In 2014, Alpine Linux switched from uClibc to musl as its C standard library . A PaX hardened kernel was included in the default distribution to aid in reducing the impact of exploits and vulnerabilities, but Alpine's maintainers chose to discontinue this support due to the PaX patch no longer being made publicly available. Alpine still uses
2772-544: The parties stipulated that Google would pay no damages. Oracle appealed to the Federal Circuit , and Google filed a cross-appeal on the literal copying claim. By defying ownership regulations in the construction and use of information—a key area of contemporary growth —the Free/Open Source Software (FOSS) movement counters neoliberalism and privatization in general. By realizing
2835-418: The required resources and participation for continued development than commercial software backed by companies. However, companies also often abolish projects for being unprofitable, yet large companies may rely on, and hence co-develop, open source software. On the other hand, if the vendor of proprietary software ceases development, there are no alternatives; whereas with FOSS, any user who needs it still has
2898-484: The right, and the source-code, to continue to develop it themself, or pay a 3rd party to do so. As the FOSS operating system distributions of Linux has a lower market share of end users there are also fewer applications available. "We migrated key functions from Windows to Linux because we needed an operating system that was stable and reliable -- one that would give us in-house control. So if we needed to patch, adjust, or adapt, we could." Official statement of
2961-564: The separate Visual Basic Runtime is not implemented. Microsoft initially announced that .NET Core 3 would include the Visual Basic Runtime, but after two years the timeline for such support was updated to .NET 5. .NET supports the following cross-platform scenarios: ASP.NET Core web apps , command-line/console apps, libraries and Universal Windows Platform apps . Prior to .NET Core 3.0, it did not implement Windows Forms or Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF), which render
3024-521: The source code themselves and can put trust on a community of volunteers and users. As proprietary code is typically hidden from public view, only the vendors themselves and hackers may be aware of any vulnerabilities in them while FOSS involves as many people as possible for exposing bugs quickly. FOSS is often free of charge although donations are often encouraged. This also allows users to better test and compare software. FOSS allows for better collaboration among various parties and individuals with
3087-742: The standard GUI for desktop software on Windows. However, from .NET Core 3 on, it started implementing them along with Universal Windows Platform (UWP). It is also possible to write cross-platform graphical applications using .NET with the GTK# language-binding for the GTK widget toolkit. .NET supports use of NuGet packages. Unlike .NET Framework , which is serviced using Windows Update , .NET used to rely on its package manager to receive updates. Since December 2020, however, .NET updates started being delivered via Windows Update as well. The two main components of .NET are CoreCLR and CoreFX, which are comparable to
3150-453: The time of the announcement, the initial release of the .NET Core project had been seeded with a subset of the libraries' source code and coincided with the relicensing of Microsoft's existing .NET reference source away from the restrictions of the Ms-RSL . Landwerth acknowledged the disadvantages of the formerly selected shared license, explaining that it made codename Rotor "a non-starter" as
3213-518: The trademarked name MySQL. In August 2010, Oracle sued Google , claiming that its use of Java in Android infringed on Oracle's copyrights and patents. In May 2012, the trial judge determined that Google did not infringe on Oracle's patents and ruled that the structure of the Java APIs used by Google was not copyrightable. The jury found that Google infringed a small number of copied files, but
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#17328014771653276-837: The vulnerabilities, that no code leaks or exfiltrations occur and that reverse engineering of proprietary code is a hindrance of significance for malicious hackers. Sometimes, FOSS is not compatible with proprietary hardware or specific software. This is often due to manufacturers obstructing FOSS such as by not disclosing the interfaces or other specifications needed for members of the FOSS movement to write drivers for their hardware - for instance as they wish customers to run only their own proprietary software or as they might benefit from partnerships. While FOSS can be superior to proprietary equivalents in terms of software features and stability, in many cases it has more unfixed bugs and missing features when compared to similar commercial software. This varies per case, and usually depends on
3339-485: The web. Perens subsequently stated that he felt Eric Raymond 's promotion of open-source unfairly overshadowed the Free Software Foundation's efforts and reaffirmed his support for free software. In the following 2000s, he spoke about open source again. From the 1950s and on through the 1980s, it was common for computer users to have the source code for all programs they used, and the permission and ability to modify it for their own use. Software , including source code,
3402-590: Was "Open-source", and quickly Bruce Perens , publisher Tim O'Reilly , Linus Torvalds, and others signed on to the rebranding. The Open Source Initiative was founded in February 1998 to encourage the use of the new term and evangelize open-source principles. While the Open Source Initiative sought to encourage the use of the new term and evangelize the principles it adhered to, commercial software vendors found themselves increasingly threatened by
3465-488: Was abandoned and version 4.0 was skipped to avoid conflation with .NET Framework, of which the latest releases had all used 4.x versioning for all significant (non-bugfix) releases since 2010. It addresses the patent concerns related to the .NET Framework . In November 2021, Microsoft released .NET 6.0, in November 2022 released .NET 7.0, in November 2023 released .NET 8.0, and in November 2024 released .NET 9.0. Alpine Linux , which primarily supports and uses musl libc,
3528-447: Was commonly shared by individuals who used computers, often as public-domain software (FOSS is not the same as public domain software, as public domain software does not contain copyrights ). Most companies had a business model based on hardware sales, and provided or bundled software with hardware, free of charge. By the late 1960s, the prevailing business model around software was changing. A growing and evolving software industry
3591-462: Was competing with the hardware manufacturer's bundled software products; rather than funding software development from hardware revenue, these new companies were selling software directly. Leased machines required software support while providing no revenue for software, and some customers who were able to better meet their own needs did not want the costs of software bundled with hardware product costs. In United States vs. IBM , filed January 17, 1969,
3654-534: Was in the February 1986 edition of the FSF's now-discontinued GNU's Bulletin publication. The canonical source for the document is in the philosophy section of the GNU Project website. As of August 2017 , it is published in 40 languages. To meet the definition of "free software", the FSF requires the software's licensing respect the civil liberties / human rights of what the FSF calls the software user's " Four Essential Freedoms ". The Open Source Definition
3717-572: Was motivated partly by a desire to avoid GPLv3. The Samba project also switched to GPLv3, so Apple replaced Samba in their software suite by a closed-source, proprietary software alternative. Leemhuis criticizes the prioritization of skilled developers who − instead of fixing issues in already popular open-source applications and desktop environments − create new, mostly redundant software to gain fame and fortune. He also criticizes notebook manufacturers for optimizing their own products only privately or creating workarounds instead of helping fix
3780-528: Was published in March 1985 titled the GNU Manifesto . The manifesto included significant explanation of the GNU philosophy, Free Software Definition and " copyleft " ideas. The FSF takes the position that the fundamental issue Free software addresses is an ethical one—to ensure software users can exercise what it calls " The Four Essential Freedoms ". The Linux kernel , created by Linus Torvalds ,
3843-657: Was released as freely modifiable source code in 1991. Initially, Linux was not released under either a Free software or an Open-source software license. However, with version 0.12 in February 1992, he relicensed the project under the GNU General Public License . FreeBSD and NetBSD (both derived from 386BSD ) were released as Free software when the USL v. BSDi lawsuit was settled out of court in 1993. OpenBSD forked from NetBSD in 1995. Also in 1995, The Apache HTTP Server , commonly referred to as Apache,
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#17328014771653906-467: Was released on August 14, 2017, along with Visual Studio 2017 15.3, ASP.NET Core 2.0, and Entity Framework Core 2.0. .NET Core 2.1 was released on May 30, 2018. NET Core 2.2 was released on December 4, 2018. .NET Core 3 was released on September 23, 2019. NET Core 3 adds support for Windows desktop application development and significant performance improvements throughout the base library. In November 2020, Microsoft released .NET 5.0. The "Core" branding
3969-527: Was released under the Apache License 1.0 . In 1997, Eric Raymond published The Cathedral and the Bazaar , a reflective analysis of the hacker community and Free software principles. The paper received significant attention in early 1998, and was one factor in motivating Netscape Communications Corporation to release their popular Netscape Communicator Internet suite as Free software . This code
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