Open source software is computer software released with a license that grants the use, study, and/or modification of ts source code. The source code is free to publicly access, modify, and share. One example of open source would be Mozilla Firefox web browser.

Authors of the open source software make is source code available to others who would like to view that code, copy it, learn from it, change it, and/or share it. The open source software is often licensed with stipulating terms of use the user must adhere to while they use the open source software, which vastly differ from proprietary licenses, such as Adobe Photoshop or Microsoft Office.

Learning Objectives

Differences of Open Source & Proprietary Software Benefits of Open Source Getting involved with Open Source What is the Difference between Open Source and Proprietary Software?

Proprietary software can only be modified by the original authors, and other users must agree to not alter the code unless they have permission from the owners to do so.

Open Source Licenses

While Open Source Software allows for open access to the source code, there can be restrictions. Here is a list of the most common open source licenses that details what the user is permitted to do with the source code:

Apache License 2.0 MIT license BSD 2-Clause "Simplified" or "FreeBSD" license GNU General Public License (GPL) Mozilla Public License 2.0 What are the benefits of Open Source Software?

Open source software is often seen as more secure than proprietary software since the code is freely available, developers can find issues, collaborate, make updates and have a quicker turn around on debugging the source code.

Control, security, stability and community are some of the facets that open source software can afford it's users. Users have the ability to examine the code to ensure what the code is actually doing, and modify it. Open Source Software is often considered more secure with all of the viewers that look over the code which extends a more stable nature than proprietary software. This openness affords the opportunities to quickly fix, update, and upgrade without asking for permission. Open source software often spurs a community of users and developers to collaborate

How to Get Involved With Open Source Software?

If you are looking to learn a little more about GitHub and practice your git commands try following this README.md on GitHub . There are countless sites that serve as valuable resources for contributing to open source, here are a couple to check out Good First Issue or at CodeTriage.

You can find ways to look at Open Source projects at a well-known site GitHub and follow the guidelines: GitHub Guide .