Free and open-source software/Intro

Free and open-source software also known simply as Free software or Open source software is a development model involving loose networks of people connected by the internet who collaborate to create and evolve software that is also made freely available for anyone to use. Not only is the end product available to all but the source code used to create it is can be freely viewed and modified as well. This is the code that commercial software firms normally keep secret. Free software is not the same as freeware or shareware which although might be free to download, it is not usually distributed with source code and is likely have a restrictive copyright license.

Making source code available means anyone with the programming ability can customise the software for their own ends or contribute to the development project directly. Others can help by reporting bugs and helping with documentation or translation efforts. So this encouragement of interaction between users and developers, and user becoming developers, creates a positive feedback loop in the software's evolution. Open source is becoming a very prominent method of software production and poses a serious challenge to commercial products - as the quality of open-source software approaches and supercedes commercial software, how will software companies compete with free?

The word 'free' in the title isn't referring to the cost of the software, although it is usually that too, it means users have the freedom to use the software as they wish, modify it and redistribute it.