This is an accepted version of this page
86-411: Waterfox is a free and open-source web browser and fork of Firefox . It claims to be ethical and user-centric, emphasizing performance and privacy. There are official Waterfox releases for Windows , macOS , Linux and Android . It was initially created to provide official 64-bit support, back when Firefox was only available for 32-bit systems. Waterfox shares core features and technologies like
172-618: A copyleft license and another license is often only a one-way compatibility. This "one-way compatibility" characteristic is, for instanced, criticized by the Apache Foundation , who provides the more permissive Apache license which doesn't have this characteristic. Non-copyleft licenses, such as the FOSS permissive licenses , have a less complicated license interaction and normally exhibit better license compatibility. For example, if one license says "modified versions must mention
258-651: A dual-license setup, along with the GNU General Public License . The vast majority of free software uses undisputed free-software licenses; however, there have been many debates over whether or not certain other licenses qualify for the definition. Examples of licenses that provoked debate were the 1.x series of the Apple Public Source License , which were accepted by the Open Source Initiative but not by
344-580: A different position on licensing. The main difference is the belief that the copyleft licenses, particularly the GNU General Public License (GPL), are undesirably complicated and/or restrictive. The GPL requires any derivative work to also be released according to the GPL while the BSD license does not. Essentially, the BSD license's only requirement is to acknowledge the original authors, and poses no restrictions on how
430-606: 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
516-566: A piece of software can remove these restrictions by accompanying the software with a software license which grants the recipient these rights. Software using such a license is free software (or free and open-source software ) as conferred by the copyright holder. Free-software licenses are applied to software in source code and also binary object-code form, as the copyright law recognizes both forms. Free-software licenses provide risk mitigation against different legal threats or behaviors that are seen as potentially harmful by developers: In
602-576: A position which faced opposition by Daniel J. Bernstein and others. In 2012 the dispute was finally resolved when Rosen accepted the CC0 as open source license , while admitting that contrary to his previous claims copyright can be waived away, backed by Ninth circuit decisions. In 2007, after years of draft discussion, the GPLv3 as major update of the GPLv2 was released. The release was controversial due to
688-600: A problem which had not previously existed. This new threat was one of the reasons for writing version 3 of the GNU GPL in 2006. In recent years, a term coined tivoization describes a process where hardware restrictions are used to prevent users from running modified versions of the software on that hardware, in which the TiVo device is an example. It is viewed by the FSF as a way to turn free software to effectively non-free, and
774-532: 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
860-783: A user's rights if said user embarks on litigation proceedings against them due to patent litigation. Patent retaliation emerged in response to proliferation and abuse of software patents . The majority of free-software licenses require that modified software not claim to be unmodified. Some licenses also require that copyright holders be credited. One such example is version 2 of the GNU GPL, which requires that interactive programs that print warranty or license information, may not have these notices removed from modified versions intended for distribution. Licenses of software packages containing contradictory requirements render it impossible to combine source code from such packages in order to create new software packages. License compatibility between
946-407: A variety of FOSS projects, including both free software and open-source. Free-software license Higher categories: Software , freedom A free-software license is a notice that grants the recipient of a piece of software extensive rights to modify and redistribute that software. These actions are usually prohibited by copyright law, but the rights-holder (usually the author) of
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#17327729711821032-893: Is an inclusive umbrella term for free software and open-source software . FOSS 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
1118-410: Is generally believed that such agendas should not be served through software licenses; among other things because of practical aspects such as resulting legal uncertainties and problems with enforceability of vague, broad and/or subjective criteria or because tool makers are generally not held responsible for other people's use of their tools. Nevertheless some projects include legally non-binding pleas to
1204-694: Is qualitatively different from software and is subject to different requirements. Debian accepted, in a later resolution, that the GNU FDL complied with the Debian Free Software Guidelines when the controversial " invariant section " is removed, but considers it "still not free of trouble". Notwithstanding, most GNU documentation includes "invariant sections". Similarly, the FLOSS Manuals foundation, an organization devoted to creating manuals for free software, decided to eschew
1290-453: Is still partially maintained with fixes and patches from Waterfox and Firefox ESR releases. However, its development has been separated due to several changes from Waterfox that are otherwise unapplicable. Waterfox Classic has multiple unpatched security advisories. The developer states that "changes between versions so numerous between ESRs making merging difficult if not impossible". Exodus Privacy Analysis demonstrates that Waterfox uses
1376-534: 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
1462-577: 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
1548-485: Is why they have chosen to prohibit it in GPLv3 . Most newly written free-software licenses since the late 1990s include some form of patent retaliation clauses. These measures stipulate that one's rights under the license (such as to redistribution), may be terminated if one attempts to enforce patents relating to the licensed software, under certain circumstances. As an example, the Apple Public Source License may terminate
1634-611: The Gecko browser engine and support for Firefox Add-ons with Firefox. It is also compatible with Google Chrome and Opera extensions. It disables telemetry and Pocket by default, which are present in Firefox builds. However, it collects technical information about the user's device to update properly. Waterfox Classic is a version of the browser based on an older version of the Gecko engine that supports legacy XUL and XPCOM add-on capabilities that Firefox removed in version 57. It
1720-800: The Open Source Definition rather than the Free Software Definition . It considers Free Software Permissive license group to be a reference implementation of a Free Software license. Thus its requirements for approving licenses are different. The Free Software Foundation , the group that maintains the Free Software Definition , maintains a non-exhaustive list of free-software licences. The Free Software Foundation prefers copyleft ( share-alike ) free-software licensing rather than permissive free-software licensing for most purposes. Its list distinguishes between free-software licenses that are compatible or incompatible with
1806-738: 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
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#17327729711821892-665: 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
1978-494: 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
2064-609: 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
2150-401: The source code available to anyone when they share or sell the object code . In this case, the source code must also contain any changes the developers may have made. If GPL code is used but not shared or sold, the code is not required to be made available and any changes may remain private. This permits developers and organizations to use and modify GPL code for private purposes (that is, when
2236-467: The source code may be used. As a result, BSD code can be used in proprietary software that only acknowledges the authors. For instance, Microsoft Windows NT 3.1 and macOS have proprietary IP stacks which are derived from BSD-licensed software. In extreme cases, the sub- or re-licensing possibilities with BSD or other permissive licenses might prevent further use in the open-source ecosystem. For instance, MathWorks ' FileExchange repository offers
2322-469: The " permissive " kind. In the mid-1980s, the GNU project produced copyleft free-software licenses for each of its software packages. An early such license (the "GNU Emacs Copying Permission Notice") was used for GNU Emacs in 1985, which was revised into the "GNU Emacs General Public License" in late 1985, and clarified in March 1987 and February 1988. Likewise, the similar GCC General Public License
2408-536: The BSD license for user contributions but prevents with additional terms of use any usage beside their own proprietary MATLAB software, for instance with the FOSS GNU Octave software. Supporters of the BSD license argue that it is more free than the GPL because it grants the right to do anything with the source code, provided that the attribution is preserved. The approach has led to BSD code being used in widely used proprietary software. Proponents of
2494-668: The Department of Computer Science at the University of Victoria in Canada, presented a talk in 2013 about the methodological challenges in determining which are the most widely used free-software licenses, and showed how he could not replicate the result from Black Duck Software. A GitHub study in 2015 on their statistical data found that the MIT license was the most prominent FOSS license on that platform. In June 2016 an analysis of
2580-638: 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),
2666-603: 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
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2752-537: The FSF's copyleft GNU General Public License . There exists an ongoing debate within the free-software community regarding the fine line between what restrictions can be applied and still be called "free". Only " public-domain software " and software under a public-domain-like license is restriction-free. Examples of public-domain-like licenses are, for instance, the WTFPL and the CC0 license. Permissive licenses might carry small obligations like attribution of
2838-636: The Free Software Foundation or Debian and the RealNetworks Public Source License , which was accepted by Open Source Initiative and Free Software Foundation but not by Debian . Also, the FSF recommended GNU Free Documentation License , which is incompatible with the GPL, was considered "non-free" by the Debian project around 2006, Nathanael Nerode, and Bruce Perens . The FSF argues that documentation
2924-576: 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
3010-603: The Free Software Foundation says it is not free because it infringes the so-called "zero freedom" of the GPL, that is, the freedom to use the software for any purpose. While historically the most widely used FOSS license has been the GPLv2, in 2015, according to Black Duck Software the permissive MIT license dethroned the GPLv2 to the second place while the permissive Apache License follows at third place. A study from 2012, which used publicly available data, criticized Black Duck Software for not publishing their methodology used in collecting statistics. Daniel German, professor in
3096-575: The GFDL in favor of the GPL for its texts in 2007, citing the incompatibility between the two, difficulties in implementing the GFDL, and the fact that the GFDL "does not allow for easy duplication and modification", especially for digital documentation. SLUC is a software license published in Spain in December 2006 to allow all but military use. The writers of the license maintain it is free software, but
3182-605: The GPL for the distributed computing software GPU in 2005, as well as several software projects trying to exclude use by big cloud providers. As there are several defining organizations and groups who publish definitions and guidelines about FOSS licenses, notably the FSF, the OSI, the Debian project, and the BSDs, there are sometimes conflicting opinions and interpretations. Many users and developers of BSD -based operating systems have
3268-443: The GPL point out that once code becomes proprietary, users are denied the freedoms that define free software. As a result, they consider the BSD license less free than the GPL, and that freedom is more than a lack of restriction. Since the BSD license restricts the right of developers to have changes recontributed to the community, neither it nor the GPL is "free" in the sense of "lacking any restrictions." The Debian project uses
3354-631: The GPLv2 is, by itself, not compatible with the GPLv3. Restrictions on use of a software ("use restrictions") are generally unacceptable according to the FSF, OSI , Debian , or the BSD-based distributions. Examples include prohibiting that the software be used for non-private applications, for military purposes, for comparison or benchmarking, for good use, for ethically questionable means, or in commercial organizations. While some restrictions on user freedom, e.g. concerning nuclear war, seem to enjoy moral support among most free software developers, it
3440-512: The US. In the German case the judge did not explicitly discuss the validity of the GPL's clauses but accepted that the GPL had to be adhered to: "If the GPL were not agreed upon by the parties, defendant would notwithstanding lack the necessary rights to copy, distribute, and make the software 'netfilter/iptables' publicly available." Because the defendant did not comply with the GPL, it had to cease use of
3526-402: 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
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3612-540: The author but allow practically all code use cases. Certain licenses, namely the copyleft licenses , include intentionally stronger restrictions (especially on the distribution/distributor) in order to force derived projects to guarantee specific rights which can't be taken away. The free-software share-alike licenses written by Richard Stallman in the mid-1980s pioneered a concept known as "copyleft". Ensuing copyleft provisions stated that when modified versions of free software are distributed, they must be distributed under
3698-470: 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
3784-548: The browser was made available via the Google Play Store in November 2023. Free and open-source software 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
3870-497: The code or the project is not sold or otherwise shared) without being required to make their changes available to the public. Supporters of GPL claim that by mandating that derivative works remain under the GPL, it fosters the growth of free software and requires equal participation by all users. Opponents of GPL claim that "no license can guarantee future software availability" and that the disadvantages of GPL outweigh its advantages. Some also argue that restricting distribution makes
3956-434: 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
4042-502: 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
4128-631: The criteria laid out in its Debian Free Software Guidelines (DFSG). The only notable cases where Debian and Free Software Foundation disagree are over the Artistic License and the GNU Free Documentation License (GFDL). Debian accepts the original Artistic License as being a free software license, but FSF disagrees. This has very little impact however since the Artistic License is almost always used in
4214-560: The developers in any advertising materials", and another license says "modified versions cannot contain additional attribution requirements", then, if someone combined a software package which uses one license with a software package which uses the other, it would be impossible to distribute the combination because these contradictory requirements cannot be fulfilled simultaneously. Thus, these two packages would be license-incompatible. When it comes to copyleft software licenses, they are not inherently compatible with other copyleft licenses, even
4300-516: The early times of software, sharing of software and source code was common in certain communities, for instance academic institutions. Before the US Commission on New Technological Uses of Copyrighted Works (CONTU) decided in 1974 that "computer programs, to the extent that they embody an author's original creation, are proper subject matter of copyright", software was not considered copyrightable. Therefore, software had no licenses attached and
4386-508: The following trackers: According to Exodus, these are the same as the trackers used by Firefox, with the notable exclusion of the Adjust marketing platform that only Firefox uses. Waterfox was first released by Alex Kontos on 27 March 2011 for 64-bit Windows . The macOS build was introduced on 14 May 2015 with the release of version 38.0, the Linux build was introduced on 20 December 2016 with
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#17327729711824472-562: 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
4558-416: 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
4644-567: 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,
4730-491: 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
4816-485: 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
4902-492: The license less free. Whereas proponents would argue that not preserving freedom during distribution would make it less free. For example, a non-copyleft license does not grant the author the freedom to see modified versions of his or her work if it gets publicly published, whereas a copyleft license does grant that freedom. During the 1990s, free-software licenses began including clauses, such as patent retaliation , in order to protect against software patent litigation cases –
4988-570: The mid-2000s, the open-source movement pushed and focused the free-software idea forward in the wider public and business perception. In the Dot-com bubble time, Netscape Communications ' step to release its webbrowser under a FOSS license in 1998, inspired many other companies to adapt to the FOSS ecosystem. In this trend companies and new projects ( Mozilla , Apache foundation , and Sun , see also this list ) wrote their own FOSS licenses, or adapted existing licenses. This License proliferation
5074-545: 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
5160-477: 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
5246-640: 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
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#17327729711825332-544: 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
5418-572: The permissive MIT license dethroned the GPLv2 as most popular free-software license to the second place while the permissive Apache license follows already at third place. In June 2016 an analysis of Fedora Project 's packages revealed as most used licenses the GPL, MIT, BSD, and the LGPL . The group Open Source Initiative (OSI) defines and maintains a list of approved open-source licenses . OSI agrees with FSF on all widely used free-software licenses, but differ from FSF's list, as it approves against
5504-581: The release of version 50.0, and an Android build was first introduced on 10 October 2017 in version 55.2.2. From 22 July 2015 to 12 November 2015, Waterfox had its own search-engine called "Storm" that would raise funds for charity and Waterfox. Storm was developed with over £2 million of investor funding and powered by Yahoo! Search . In December 2019, System1 , an advertising company which portrays itself as privacy-focused, acquired Waterfox. In July 2023, Alex Kontos announced that Waterfox had been turned into an independent project again. An Android release of
5590-418: 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
5676-484: 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
5762-452: The same terms as the original software. Hence they are referred to as "share and share alike " or " quid pro quo ". This results in the new software being open source as well. Since copyleft ensures that later generations of the software grant the freedom to modify the code, this is "free software". Non-copyleft licenses do not ensure that later generations of the software will remain free. Developers who use GPL code in their product must make
5848-459: The significant extended scope of the license, which made it incompatible with the GPLv2. Several major FOSS projects ( Linux kernel , MySQL , BusyBox , Blender , VLC media player ) decided against adopting the GPLv3. On the other hand, in 2009, two years after the release of the GPLv3, Google open-source programs office manager Chris DiBona reported that the number of open-source projects licensed software that had moved to GPLv3 from GPLv2
5934-398: The software. The US case ( MySQL vs Progress) was settled before a verdict was arrived at, but at an initial hearing, Judge Saris "saw no reason" that the GPL would not be enforceable. Around 2004 lawyer Lawrence Rosen argued in the essay Why the public domain isn't a license software could not truly be waived into public domain and can't be interpreted as very permissive FOSS license,
6020-521: 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
6106-518: 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
6192-472: The user, prominently SQLite . Among the repeated attempts by developers to regulate user behavior through the license that sparked wider debate are Douglas Crockford 's (joking) “no evil” clause, which affected the release process of the Debian distribution in 2012 and got the JSMin-PHP project expelled from Google Code , the addition of a pacifist condition based on Asimov's First Law of Robotics to
6278-837: 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
6364-485: 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,
6450-515: 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
6536-501: Was 50%, counting the projects hosted at Google Code . In 2011, four years after the release of the GPLv3, 6.5% of all open-source licensed projects were GPLv3 while 42.5% were still GPLv2 according to Black Duck Software data. Following in 2011 451 Group analyst Matthew Aslett argued in a blog post that copyleft licenses went into decline and permissive licenses increased, based on statistics from Black Duck Software. In 2015 according to Black Duck Software and GitHub statistics,
6622-486: Was applied to the GNU Compiler Collection , which was initially published in 1987. The original BSD license is also one of the first free-software licenses, dating to 1988. In 1989, version 1 of the GNU General Public License (GPL) was published. Version 2 of the GPL, released in 1991, went on to become the most widely used free-software license. Starting in the mid-1990s and until
6708-447: 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
6794-462: 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,
6880-534: 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
6966-559: Was later recognized as problem for the Free and open-source ecosystem due to the increased complexity of license compatibility considerations. While the creation of new licenses slowed down later, license proliferation and its impact are considered an ongoing serious challenge for the free and open-source ecosystem. From the free-software licenses, the GNU GPL version 2 has been tested in to court, first in Germany in 2004 and later in
7052-572: 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
7138-476: 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 ,
7224-578: 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,
7310-527: 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
7396-481: Was shared as public-domain software . The CONTU decision plus court decisions such as Apple v. Franklin in 1983 for object code , clarified that the Copyright Act gave computer programs the copyright status of literary works and started the licensing of software . Free-software licenses before the late 1980s were generally informal notices written by the developers themselves. These early licenses were of
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