An edited version of this article of mine appeared in the April 2010 edition of IT Next magazine in India, in their "Moneywise" column. Please feel free to translate, rewrite and publish it in your local geo to promote the message of open source. If this gets published elsewhere, kindly send me a copy/the link.
Open Source offers more to CIOs
“Quality. Price. Service. Pick any two,” said a very succinct placard in Damodar's tailor shop. Back in the days when clothes were tailored, Damodar was one of the best in the business and he definitely knew what he was talking about.
However, in the software industry, the emergence of open source software (OSS) has turned this dynamic on its head. It is no longer about, “Pick any two,” but “Pick ALL three.”
Take quality for a start. Studies by Coverity, have found that the number of defects per thousand lines of code is lower with OSS than with proprietary software. One of the most famous sayings in the OSS community is that “Many eyes make bugs shallow.” The open, transparent, community driven development model of open source has lead to the creation of some of the most robust software systems ever built. Those who have migrated from proprietary server operating systems to open source systems will happily testify to this fact. Is it any surprise that 446 out of the top 500 supercomputers in the world run on Linux? Or that mission critical applications like telecom billing solutions, stock exchanges and others are increasingly moving to Linux and other OSS systems?
On the price front, the industry has had to deal with the forced upgrade cycles, vendor lock-in and hugely bloated software licenses imposed by proprietary software vendors. While the development model of OSS is community driven, many commercial vendors have built business models around service and support for OSS deployments. Many top-notch system integrators around the world routinely incorporate OSS in the solutions they offer to their clients. Unlike their proprietary competitors, OSS vendors do not have to incur huge development costs and this enables them to offer high quality software implementations at prices lower than proprietary software vendors. The good news for CIOs is that OSS is no longer restricted to infrastructure software categories like operating systems and middleware, but has expanded to encompass application areas like CRM, ERP, Business Intelligence, Enterprise Portals, Content Management Systems and many others.
On the service front, everything boils down to how well the software is implemented and supported. In OSS, commercial vendors usually sell their services in the form of annual subscriptions that have to be renewed. The quality of services rendered to the client determine whether subscriptions are renewed or not. This gives OSS vendors an inherent incentive to offer good quality services. Therefore, CIOs should actively consider OSS while procuring software, especially where the OSS option is mature and meets their functional requirements.
Given the recent downturn in the economy, cost has been one of the reasons for more and more CIOs to turn to OSS. However, to be moneywise, CIOs should focus on all three aspects--quality, price and service. It may be tempting to go with OSS vendors who are the cheapest, but CIOs should evaluate the quality of skills available within the vendor organization before taking a final call. As I sum up, I cannot resist quoting from another placard in Damodar's tailor shop. “I have no quarrel with competitors who charge less. They know the value of their goods and services.”
Showing posts with label open source. Show all posts
Showing posts with label open source. Show all posts
Tuesday, May 04, 2010
Friday, December 11, 2009
Assam government includes FOSS in state IT policy
Yet another Indian state government made open source an integral part of its state IT policy. The policy is because it mandates open standards and ODF, in particular, which has been advocated open source supporters the open standard for office documents (instead of Microsoft's proprietary .doc, OOXML and other data formats). It also extends beyond software and says that all generic hardware purchased by the government should have support for open source software. The section mandating that source code developed for any State Government body shall be duly archived in a repository, indicates that the policy makers also understand the power of the open source development model. Overall, it is a good policy and worth forwarding to all the government policy makers that we are in touch with.
The full text of Section 3.12 of the Assam Government's state IT Policy says:
(a) The Government would promote use of Free and Open Source Software (FOSS) in all the departments and State agencies, bodies and authorities.
(b) The State Government would promote manpower development and training in use of FOSS, especially in day to day office works.
(c) The State Government would promote imparting training on FOSS in schools and colleges.
(d)Entrepreneurs/ companies using FOSS for application/website development would be given preference over those using third party packaged applications.
(e)All source codes customized/developed for any State Government body shall be duly archived in a repository, and shall be made available freely to other Government departments.
(f) The Government departments and bodies would ensure that Open Document Format (ODF) is adhered to in creating and storing editable documents, data and information and all applications developed by the respective departments adhere to ODF and other Open Standards and are largely independent of Operating Systems (OS) and web browsers.
(g)The Government departments and bodies would ensure that any generic hardware procured has support for multiple Operating Systems(OS) such as Unix, Linux, Opensolaris and other open source platforms.
To download the full text of Assam's IT Policy, click here.
The full text of Section 3.12 of the Assam Government's state IT Policy says:
(a) The Government would promote use of Free and Open Source Software (FOSS) in all the departments and State agencies, bodies and authorities.
(b) The State Government would promote manpower development and training in use of FOSS, especially in day to day office works.
(c) The State Government would promote imparting training on FOSS in schools and colleges.
(d)Entrepreneurs/ companies using FOSS for application/website development would be given preference over those using third party packaged applications.
(e)All source codes customized/developed for any State Government body shall be duly archived in a repository, and shall be made available freely to other Government departments.
(f) The Government departments and bodies would ensure that Open Document Format (ODF) is adhered to in creating and storing editable documents, data and information and all applications developed by the respective departments adhere to ODF and other Open Standards and are largely independent of Operating Systems (OS) and web browsers.
(g)The Government departments and bodies would ensure that any generic hardware procured has support for multiple Operating Systems(OS) such as Unix, Linux, Opensolaris and other open source platforms.
To download the full text of Assam's IT Policy, click here.
Sunday, May 31, 2009
My own little post on Rahul Gandhi
Last week, the papers were full of Rahul Gandhi, and talked about how India's heir-apparent has infused fresh life into the Congress party. When Red Hat chairman, Matthew Szulik was in India in 2005, we had faxed across a meeting request to Rahul's office. The very next day, we got a call confirming the meeting. Javed Tapia, who then headed Red Hat India, Szulik and myself met with Rahul. As an aside, Szulik is a passionate speaker on open source in education and it was one such speech that made me join Red Hat. Szulik updated Rahul on what is happening with open source around the world and tabled a request that the Indian syllabus should stop mandating proprietary software and endorsing brand names.
We spent around 30 minutes with Rahul. During the meeting he spoke very little but listened intently. He agreed with our point that the syllabus should stop endorsing brand names. While he did not speak much, it was clear that he had oodles of charisma, helped along by that famous dimpled smile. The lasting impression was that of someone who is a very pleasant human being, very understated and with absolutely no desire to show off. For that reason alone, I wish him and the new UPA government great success.
PS: In complete contrast was our effort to secure a meeting with the then IT Minister, Dayanidhi Maran. His secretary said that he would grant a meeting only if we promised to invest crores of rupees to set up a development center in Chennai. I conned the secretary into granting us an appointment but the meeting did not add up to anything.
We spent around 30 minutes with Rahul. During the meeting he spoke very little but listened intently. He agreed with our point that the syllabus should stop endorsing brand names. While he did not speak much, it was clear that he had oodles of charisma, helped along by that famous dimpled smile. The lasting impression was that of someone who is a very pleasant human being, very understated and with absolutely no desire to show off. For that reason alone, I wish him and the new UPA government great success.
PS: In complete contrast was our effort to secure a meeting with the then IT Minister, Dayanidhi Maran. His secretary said that he would grant a meeting only if we promised to invest crores of rupees to set up a development center in Chennai. I conned the secretary into granting us an appointment but the meeting did not add up to anything.
Wednesday, April 22, 2009
Reaping the benefits of open source
This article written by me appeared in Network Computing's India edition. Please feel free to translate this and get it published in other geographies. There is no need to credit me as the author, but do use this to spread the message of open source and drop me a line of acknowledgment when it is sent to a publication or gets published in print/online. And if you prefer the term "free software" that's also OK with me.
Venky
=====
Reaping the Benefits of Open Source
Open Source Software is moving from the edge of the enterprise into its very heart. CIOs can benefit from this development
Recently, in a Gartner report, 'The State of Open Source 2008', it was mentioned that, "By 2012, more than 90 percent of enterprises will use Open Source in direct or embedded forms." The report goes on to add that, "Open Source is a phenomenon with a broad impact. Chances are, if you do not think you use it, then you use it; and if you think you do use it, then you use lots more of it than you know.”
Why is Open Source becoming so pervasive? The reason is that we are now entering an era of Collaborative Innovation. Open Source Software (OSS) is the leading example of this trend, but the Open Source development model based on collaboration, community and the shared ownership of knowledge is rapidly expanding to other areas like content (Wikipedia), medicine (Open Source Drug Discovery), scientific publishing (Public Library of Science) and other areas of society. With 1.2 billion people on-line, the Internet, which is the largest collaborative platform that mankind has ever seen, has enabled OSS like Linux, Apache, Mozilla Firefox, Open Office and others to flourish. In the next couple of years another 600 million people will join the Internet. Thus the trend towards increasing collaboration is only set to grow and this is reflected in the explosive growth of Open Source projects across the world.
A few years back, OSS could be found on the edge of enterprise, running workloads like mail servers and web servers. However, the growing maturity of the OSS ecosystem means that it is now moving into the very heart of the enterprise, running mission critical servers, desktop computers and even application areas like CRM, ERP, Document Management, collaborative wikis, Content Management Systems and many others.
In these recessionary times, OSS also offers a major advantage in that users can often freely download and try out the software and pay only for value-added services like support. The growing interest in OSS has thrown up a number of software startups that specialize in supporting OSS. For CIOs, this development provides an alternative because the cost of buying support for OSS is usually far less than the cost of purchasing licenses for proprietary software.
For instance, download and check out OpenOffice.org, the full-fledged, Open Source office productivity suite. Many organizations have made OpenOffice.org, the default choice on their desktops and have generated significant cost savings when compared to proprietary office suites. A leading bank, known for its technological savvyness, has almost 70 percent of its staff working on OpenOffice.org. A few years ago, they looked at the increasing cost and hardware requirements of proprietary software and decided to switch to OpenOffice.org. Initially, users had to adjust to the new software, but a four-member helpdesk enabled them quickly become comfortable with OpenOffice.org. The cost of the help desk was far lower than the licensing fees and the increased hardware costs that would have been incurred on proprietary software, which has been restricted to a small group of financial analysts within the company.
Similarly, a study done by IIM Ahmedabad found that the Government of Delhi has saved almost 80 percent by switching to OpenOffice.org. One important reason for switching to OpenOffice.org was its support for the Open Document Format, an open standard for office documents, that ensured that needless upgrades of office suites and its underlying hardware would not be forced upon them. The usage of open standards also helped the Government of Delhi avoid vendor lock-in, which invariably reduces negotiation capabilities of the customer and increases cost.
In many ways, Open Source is becoming the baseline for software development. Within the past couple of years, venture capitalists have started investing several billion dollars in Open Source startups and have reaped handsome returns. The open and inclusive development model; and the freedom to modify the source code and improve the software attracts the best minds from across the world. When compared to the closed development models of proprietary software, which depends on internal skills, the open source model proves to be superior. Eric Raymond, author of the landmark book on OSS, “The Cathedral and the Bazaar” expresses it succinctly by saying that, “Many eyes make bugs shallow.” The reliability, robustness and low number of defects per thousand lines of code in open source software like Linux and Apache bear this aphorism out.
Of course, CIOs of enterprises need enterprise-class support. The growing adoption of Open Source in enterprises like LIC, Axis Bank, Central Bank of India, Bharti (Airtel), mission critical portals like Naukri.com, Yatra.com etc. point to the growing support infrastructure for OSS. As users test and deploy OSS, the demand for support is growing immensely.
Finally, while Open Source is not a panacea for every recessionary ill, in these tough times, it makes sense to evaluate OSS instead of spending precious money on expensive proprietary software. Open Source is a long-term trend that is here to stay and those CIOs who judiciously adopt this new paradigm of software development and deployment will benefit from it.
Venky
=====
Reaping the Benefits of Open Source
Open Source Software is moving from the edge of the enterprise into its very heart. CIOs can benefit from this development
Recently, in a Gartner report, 'The State of Open Source 2008', it was mentioned that, "By 2012, more than 90 percent of enterprises will use Open Source in direct or embedded forms." The report goes on to add that, "Open Source is a phenomenon with a broad impact. Chances are, if you do not think you use it, then you use it; and if you think you do use it, then you use lots more of it than you know.”
Why is Open Source becoming so pervasive? The reason is that we are now entering an era of Collaborative Innovation. Open Source Software (OSS) is the leading example of this trend, but the Open Source development model based on collaboration, community and the shared ownership of knowledge is rapidly expanding to other areas like content (Wikipedia), medicine (Open Source Drug Discovery), scientific publishing (Public Library of Science) and other areas of society. With 1.2 billion people on-line, the Internet, which is the largest collaborative platform that mankind has ever seen, has enabled OSS like Linux, Apache, Mozilla Firefox, Open Office and others to flourish. In the next couple of years another 600 million people will join the Internet. Thus the trend towards increasing collaboration is only set to grow and this is reflected in the explosive growth of Open Source projects across the world.
A few years back, OSS could be found on the edge of enterprise, running workloads like mail servers and web servers. However, the growing maturity of the OSS ecosystem means that it is now moving into the very heart of the enterprise, running mission critical servers, desktop computers and even application areas like CRM, ERP, Document Management, collaborative wikis, Content Management Systems and many others.
In these recessionary times, OSS also offers a major advantage in that users can often freely download and try out the software and pay only for value-added services like support. The growing interest in OSS has thrown up a number of software startups that specialize in supporting OSS. For CIOs, this development provides an alternative because the cost of buying support for OSS is usually far less than the cost of purchasing licenses for proprietary software.
For instance, download and check out OpenOffice.org, the full-fledged, Open Source office productivity suite. Many organizations have made OpenOffice.org, the default choice on their desktops and have generated significant cost savings when compared to proprietary office suites. A leading bank, known for its technological savvyness, has almost 70 percent of its staff working on OpenOffice.org. A few years ago, they looked at the increasing cost and hardware requirements of proprietary software and decided to switch to OpenOffice.org. Initially, users had to adjust to the new software, but a four-member helpdesk enabled them quickly become comfortable with OpenOffice.org. The cost of the help desk was far lower than the licensing fees and the increased hardware costs that would have been incurred on proprietary software, which has been restricted to a small group of financial analysts within the company.
Similarly, a study done by IIM Ahmedabad found that the Government of Delhi has saved almost 80 percent by switching to OpenOffice.org. One important reason for switching to OpenOffice.org was its support for the Open Document Format, an open standard for office documents, that ensured that needless upgrades of office suites and its underlying hardware would not be forced upon them. The usage of open standards also helped the Government of Delhi avoid vendor lock-in, which invariably reduces negotiation capabilities of the customer and increases cost.
In many ways, Open Source is becoming the baseline for software development. Within the past couple of years, venture capitalists have started investing several billion dollars in Open Source startups and have reaped handsome returns. The open and inclusive development model; and the freedom to modify the source code and improve the software attracts the best minds from across the world. When compared to the closed development models of proprietary software, which depends on internal skills, the open source model proves to be superior. Eric Raymond, author of the landmark book on OSS, “The Cathedral and the Bazaar” expresses it succinctly by saying that, “Many eyes make bugs shallow.” The reliability, robustness and low number of defects per thousand lines of code in open source software like Linux and Apache bear this aphorism out.
Of course, CIOs of enterprises need enterprise-class support. The growing adoption of Open Source in enterprises like LIC, Axis Bank, Central Bank of India, Bharti (Airtel), mission critical portals like Naukri.com, Yatra.com etc. point to the growing support infrastructure for OSS. As users test and deploy OSS, the demand for support is growing immensely.
Finally, while Open Source is not a panacea for every recessionary ill, in these tough times, it makes sense to evaluate OSS instead of spending precious money on expensive proprietary software. Open Source is a long-term trend that is here to stay and those CIOs who judiciously adopt this new paradigm of software development and deployment will benefit from it.
Monday, April 20, 2009
New Obama CTO, Aneesh Chopra, gets open source
After months of speculation, Obama has finally appointed Aneesh Chopra as Chief Technology Officer for USA. Tim O'Reilly has a ringing endorsement of Chopra. This CNet report indicates that Chopra "gets" what open source is all about.
The commonwealth of Virginia is undertaking a variety of initiatives to improve aspects of governance in areas like health care and education, said Aneesh Chopra, Virginia's secretary of technology.
On February 23, the commonwealth will debut the Virginia physics "flexbook," Chopra said--Web-based instructional materials that cover areas of physics in which Virginia's traditional curriculum is lacking.
The commonwealth partnered with the nonprofit CK-12 Foundation to provide an open-source platform on which new content can be quickly published. Virginia officials solicited contributions to the text from around the country. The contributions were subject to a series of academic reviews.
"Virginia will have its first physics flexbook for teachers to rip, mix, and burn and to incorporate into their educational coursework," Chopra said.
He said the process was faster than the traditional means of changing coursework, and it was one example of how a robust information technology infrastructure was helping the government better serve people.
"You can make information more accessible, collaborate more, and people can do more to hold their elected officials more accountable," Chopra said.
Monday, December 22, 2008
Make magazine has a great article on open source gift ideas for the season.
I had heard about the "gift economy" of open source but never realized that we have so many gift ideas! Way to go, open source!
There are hundreds of gift guides this holiday season filled with junk you can buy, but a lot of times you actually don't own it, you can't improve upon it, you can't share it or make it better, and you certainly can't post the plans, schematics, and source code either. We want to change that. We've put together our picks of interesting open source hardware projects, open source software, services, and things that have the maker spirit of open source. Some are kits, some are open software projects that you'll need to build hardware for before gifting, and some are just support for the projects/groups that do open source. Included in this guide are things you can get from the MAKE store too (we try and have as many open source goods as possible).
I had heard about the "gift economy" of open source but never realized that we have so many gift ideas! Way to go, open source!
Thursday, November 13, 2008
Proprietary software and "Lipstick on a pig"
Mark Taylor of Sirius Corporation has written a very interesting article that explains in economic terms why proprietary software is doomed.
Is proprietary software simply a pig skilfully dressed up to make the unwitting think it has intrinsic value?
The answer is 'yes', and here's why.
In any free market, the price of a commodity, over time, falls close to that of its marginal cost of production. A number of things can interfere with this process, the most damaging being the existence of a monopoly, but in the absence of market distortion this rule always holds true.
Wednesday, August 13, 2008
Patents are not neccessary for innovation
This article of mine appeared in Financial Express in the Face2Face secion where they carry debates. The rejoinder to my article was titled, "They offer valuable property protection", but like most rhetoric on this subject, the author paints broad brushstrokes while offering very little proof of the link between patents and innovation. Some statements are misleading and I have written a comment at the end of this article.
My article is reproduced in full below.
Patents are not neccessary for innovation
The objective of the patent system is to encourage innovation. Therefore, the question is whether patents are essential to promote innovation in the software industry? The fact is that most of the far-reaching innovations in the software industry happened well before software patents became common. Word processors, spreadsheets, databases, compilers, email, the world wide web, the fundamentals of modern operating systems, the graphical user interface were all developed before software became a patentable commodity in some countries.
Another example of innovation is the Linux operating system, which runs on almost everything, from the Mars Rover, to giant supercomputers to the tiniest embedded computers. This innovation has been powered by the open source model, based on collaboration, community and the shared ownership of knowledge. Thousands of volunteers and private enterprises like Red Hat, IBM and others have contributed source code to Linux under the general public license (GPL) that gives users the freedom to modify the source code and share the resulting improvements with others.
It is estimated that the Linux kernel now has around 10 million lines of source code (the instructions that make a software program work). The commercial value of the source code in an average Linux distribution is estimated at around $8 billion. This represents an enormous wealth of knowledge that is freely available to everyone. The success of open source is clear proof that patents are not necessary for innovation in the software industry and that profit motives are not the only spur for innovation.
Having established that, let us now look at the negative impact of software patents. To do that, we need to take a slight detour into the copyright law. Any person or organisation writing software automatically enjoys protection under the copyright law. If anybody steals source code, they are liable for prosecution under the copyright laws.
However, if anybody wrote source code that ends up being similar to another person's, they can defend themselves by proving that they wrote the code independently. If software patents are allowed, this 'independent invention' argument cannot be used as a legal defense. This is because the first person that obtains the patent then has exclusive rights over the idea. While copyright protects the expression of an idea, a patent is a state granted monopoly on the idea itself. We feel that copyrights are sufficient to protect software, while patents are a treacherous landmine that will increase litigation and hinder innovation in a rapidly growing industry.
It is estimated that around 2,00,000 software patents have been granted in the US and the task of sifting through these patents is so difficult that most companies don't even attempt this task. The language of software patents is so complex that only the most masochistic software developer would spend their time reading patents.
In online shopping alone, there are more than 4,000 patents. This leaves both developers and web portals and any company that implements online shopping liable for infringement. India gave the world the profound concept of zero and the decimal system, which forms the foundation of the digital revolution. Imagine what would have happened to the IT industry if India owned the patents for these ideas! Our knowledge traditions have always held that knowledge grows by sharing and diminishes when it is held secret. Therefore, it is distressing to see our policies being cut and paste from other societies that treat knowledge as something that can be commoditised. If we want a renaissance of the great knowledge traditions of India, we must stop aping the developed economies and their thought processes. Nixing software patents in the bud would be a pretty good start.
*/The writer is corporate affairs director with Red Hat /*
My article is reproduced in full below.
Patents are not neccessary for innovation
The objective of the patent system is to encourage innovation. Therefore, the question is whether patents are essential to promote innovation in the software industry? The fact is that most of the far-reaching innovations in the software industry happened well before software patents became common. Word processors, spreadsheets, databases, compilers, email, the world wide web, the fundamentals of modern operating systems, the graphical user interface were all developed before software became a patentable commodity in some countries.
Another example of innovation is the Linux operating system, which runs on almost everything, from the Mars Rover, to giant supercomputers to the tiniest embedded computers. This innovation has been powered by the open source model, based on collaboration, community and the shared ownership of knowledge. Thousands of volunteers and private enterprises like Red Hat, IBM and others have contributed source code to Linux under the general public license (GPL) that gives users the freedom to modify the source code and share the resulting improvements with others.
It is estimated that the Linux kernel now has around 10 million lines of source code (the instructions that make a software program work). The commercial value of the source code in an average Linux distribution is estimated at around $8 billion. This represents an enormous wealth of knowledge that is freely available to everyone. The success of open source is clear proof that patents are not necessary for innovation in the software industry and that profit motives are not the only spur for innovation.
Having established that, let us now look at the negative impact of software patents. To do that, we need to take a slight detour into the copyright law. Any person or organisation writing software automatically enjoys protection under the copyright law. If anybody steals source code, they are liable for prosecution under the copyright laws.
However, if anybody wrote source code that ends up being similar to another person's, they can defend themselves by proving that they wrote the code independently. If software patents are allowed, this 'independent invention' argument cannot be used as a legal defense. This is because the first person that obtains the patent then has exclusive rights over the idea. While copyright protects the expression of an idea, a patent is a state granted monopoly on the idea itself. We feel that copyrights are sufficient to protect software, while patents are a treacherous landmine that will increase litigation and hinder innovation in a rapidly growing industry.
It is estimated that around 2,00,000 software patents have been granted in the US and the task of sifting through these patents is so difficult that most companies don't even attempt this task. The language of software patents is so complex that only the most masochistic software developer would spend their time reading patents.
In online shopping alone, there are more than 4,000 patents. This leaves both developers and web portals and any company that implements online shopping liable for infringement. India gave the world the profound concept of zero and the decimal system, which forms the foundation of the digital revolution. Imagine what would have happened to the IT industry if India owned the patents for these ideas! Our knowledge traditions have always held that knowledge grows by sharing and diminishes when it is held secret. Therefore, it is distressing to see our policies being cut and paste from other societies that treat knowledge as something that can be commoditised. If we want a renaissance of the great knowledge traditions of India, we must stop aping the developed economies and their thought processes. Nixing software patents in the bud would be a pretty good start.
*/The writer is corporate affairs director with Red Hat /*
Thursday, May 08, 2008
The ghost of software patents is back!
Life is never easy for an open source evangelist. The OOXML drama came to a close on 2nd April 2008 and we were on to our next issue -- software patents. The Draft Patent Manual might end up bringing software patents through the back door. this would be surprising because the Indian parliament explicitly rejected software patents in the Patent Amendment Act 2005. In this blog, I am including extracts from a letter that I sent to the Patent Office on 11th April 2008. The deadline for comments was 15th April 2008.
Software patents in India as per Clause 3(k) of the Indian Patent Act
We find that the Draft Patent Manual seeks to introduce software patents and we believe that this is not in consonance with the current legal situation India where Clause 3(k) of the Indian Patent Act clearly says,
You may recall that the Patent Amendment Act 2005 sought to introduce software patents. The amendment proposed in the Patent Amendment Act 2005 for Clause 3(k) was,
However, this amendment was rejected by the Indian Parliament, which chose to retain Clause 3(k) as it is. On reviewing the Draft Patent Manual, we find that it seeks to make technical applications of software patentable. As you can see from the above, this approach was explicitly rejected by the Indian Parliament. The relevant section of the Draft says:
Open Source Software and software patents from a national perspective
We would also like to add that the Government of India has identified open source software as a strategic tool for e-governance and for bridging the digital divide in India. The Department of IT's 11th Five Year Plan (2007-2012) says,
The National Knowledge Commission, in a report submitted to the Prime Minister of India, says,
Open Source Software is built in a collaborative manner by developers spread across the world who share source code and build upon each other's works. In his book, “The Success of Open Source,” the noted political scientist, Prof. Steven Weber, Director of the Institute of International Studies, University of California, Berkeley, says,
The GNU General Public License, which is used by almost 60 percent of open source software explicitly states that if you modify and redistribute source code licensed under the GPL, you have to share the resultant changes with others. This legal framework has lead to enormous innovation and technology collaboration on a scale that's never been witnessed before. For example, the Linux operating system, which began life in September 1991 has now grown into more than 100 million lines of code.
The freedom to modify the source code and share the changes has benefited India immensely. Many linguistic groups have localized the Graphical User Interface of Linux into more than 11 Indian languages so that non-English speakers can also benefit from the power of digital technology. Open Source Software like Orca help the visually handicapped use computers with ease and skill. Many national mission-mode projects in e-governance make extensive use of open source software. In almost all fields of IT, open source software has emerged as a powerful alternative to expensive, proprietary software, which have restrictive licensing schemes. Developing countries, across the world have therefore embraced open source software with open arms in light of its strategic long-term benefits.
It is for these reasons that the respected technologist and past president of India, Dr. APJ Abdul Kalam, said,
Open source software is one of the most dynamic, innovative sectors of the global economy, but the patent system is a costly hindrance to open source innovation. We believe that although the patent system was created to foster innovation, it’s simply not an engine for innovation for open source. Software patents were barely recognized when open source began, and so the hope of obtaining a patent did not motivate the first developers. Those pioneers were generally opposed to software patents. The open, collaborative activity at the heart of open source is at odds with the patent system, which excludes the public from making, using or selling a patented invention. Open source developers seek to contribute code to the community – not to exclude others from using the code.
Today the patent system is, if anything, a hindrance to open source. Developers face the risk that the original code they have written in good faith could be deemed to infringe an existing software patent. Software patents are difficult to interpret, even for experts in computer science and software engineering. Experts often disagree as to whether a particular patent claim covers a particular program. Thus, a risk of litigation exist for every open source project, and the potential cost of patent litigation can be ruinous, especially for startup companies.
Given the litigation risk, some open source companies, including Red Hat, acquire patents for the sole purpose of asserting them defensively in the event they are faced with a future lawsuit. Despite the hindrances of the global patent system, open source continues to expand at an exponential rate. One can only imagine how that expansion would accelerate if the braking effect of the patent system were lifted.
Given the fact that (a) that Indian legislators have clearly chosen to exclude software from the list of patentable inventions (b) that open source software is important to India's long-term strategic interests, and (c) there is a growing global outcry against software patents, we hereby request you to ensure that the Draft Patent Manual reflects the will and intent of the Indian Parliament.
LETTER ENDS
We will keep track of the developments around the Draft Patent Manual. This might prove to be a challenging task because I hear that there is a powerful pro software patents lobby at work. Keep watching this blog.
Software patents in India as per Clause 3(k) of the Indian Patent Act
We find that the Draft Patent Manual seeks to introduce software patents and we believe that this is not in consonance with the current legal situation India where Clause 3(k) of the Indian Patent Act clearly says,
“A mathematical or business method or a computer programme per se or algorithms are not patentable”.
You may recall that the Patent Amendment Act 2005 sought to introduce software patents. The amendment proposed in the Patent Amendment Act 2005 for Clause 3(k) was,
“a computer programme per se other than its technical application to industry or a combination with hardware; a mathematical method or a business method or algorithms.”
However, this amendment was rejected by the Indian Parliament, which chose to retain Clause 3(k) as it is. On reviewing the Draft Patent Manual, we find that it seeks to make technical applications of software patentable. As you can see from the above, this approach was explicitly rejected by the Indian Parliament. The relevant section of the Draft says:
Draft Manual 4.11.7
4.A mathematical method is one which is carried out on numbers and provides a result in numerical form (the mathematical method or algorithm therefore being merely an
abstract concept prescribing how to operate on the numbers) and not patentable. However, its application may well be patentable, for example, in Vicom/Computer-related invention [1987] 1 OJEPO 14 (T208/84) the invention concerned a mathematical method for manipulating data representing an image, leading to an enhanced digital image. Claims to a method of digitally filtering data performed on a conventional general purpose computer were rejected, since those claims were held to define an abstract concept not distinguished from a mathematical method. However, claims to a method of image processing which used the mathematical method to operate on numbers representing an image can be allowed. The reasoning was that the image processing performed was a technical (i.e. non- excluded) process which related to technical quality of the image and that a claim directed to a technical process in which the method used does not seek protection for the mathematical method as such. Therefore the allowable claims as such went beyond a mathematical method.
Open Source Software and software patents from a national perspective
We would also like to add that the Government of India has identified open source software as a strategic tool for e-governance and for bridging the digital divide in India. The Department of IT's 11th Five Year Plan (2007-2012) says,
“If computer adoption has to reach from current 1% of population to say 5% in next five years, we have to seriously pursue some other route, viz., that of Free/Open Source Software (FOSS).”
The National Knowledge Commission, in a report submitted to the Prime Minister of India, says,
“Because of the enormous size and scope of the E-governance effort in India and because of the availability of globally recognized software talent of Indians, we must actively encourage open source software implementations and open standards wherever possible.”
Open Source Software is built in a collaborative manner by developers spread across the world who share source code and build upon each other's works. In his book, “The Success of Open Source,” the noted political scientist, Prof. Steven Weber, Director of the Institute of International Studies, University of California, Berkeley, says,
“The conventional notion of property is the right to exclude. Property in open source is configured fundamentally around the right to distribute, not to exclude.”
The GNU General Public License, which is used by almost 60 percent of open source software explicitly states that if you modify and redistribute source code licensed under the GPL, you have to share the resultant changes with others. This legal framework has lead to enormous innovation and technology collaboration on a scale that's never been witnessed before. For example, the Linux operating system, which began life in September 1991 has now grown into more than 100 million lines of code.
The freedom to modify the source code and share the changes has benefited India immensely. Many linguistic groups have localized the Graphical User Interface of Linux into more than 11 Indian languages so that non-English speakers can also benefit from the power of digital technology. Open Source Software like Orca help the visually handicapped use computers with ease and skill. Many national mission-mode projects in e-governance make extensive use of open source software. In almost all fields of IT, open source software has emerged as a powerful alternative to expensive, proprietary software, which have restrictive licensing schemes. Developing countries, across the world have therefore embraced open source software with open arms in light of its strategic long-term benefits.
It is for these reasons that the respected technologist and past president of India, Dr. APJ Abdul Kalam, said,
“In India, open source code software will have to come and stay in a big way for the benefit of our billion people."
Open source software is one of the most dynamic, innovative sectors of the global economy, but the patent system is a costly hindrance to open source innovation. We believe that although the patent system was created to foster innovation, it’s simply not an engine for innovation for open source. Software patents were barely recognized when open source began, and so the hope of obtaining a patent did not motivate the first developers. Those pioneers were generally opposed to software patents. The open, collaborative activity at the heart of open source is at odds with the patent system, which excludes the public from making, using or selling a patented invention. Open source developers seek to contribute code to the community – not to exclude others from using the code.
Today the patent system is, if anything, a hindrance to open source. Developers face the risk that the original code they have written in good faith could be deemed to infringe an existing software patent. Software patents are difficult to interpret, even for experts in computer science and software engineering. Experts often disagree as to whether a particular patent claim covers a particular program. Thus, a risk of litigation exist for every open source project, and the potential cost of patent litigation can be ruinous, especially for startup companies.
Given the litigation risk, some open source companies, including Red Hat, acquire patents for the sole purpose of asserting them defensively in the event they are faced with a future lawsuit. Despite the hindrances of the global patent system, open source continues to expand at an exponential rate. One can only imagine how that expansion would accelerate if the braking effect of the patent system were lifted.
Given the fact that (a) that Indian legislators have clearly chosen to exclude software from the list of patentable inventions (b) that open source software is important to India's long-term strategic interests, and (c) there is a growing global outcry against software patents, we hereby request you to ensure that the Draft Patent Manual reflects the will and intent of the Indian Parliament.
LETTER ENDS
We will keep track of the developments around the Draft Patent Manual. This might prove to be a challenging task because I hear that there is a powerful pro software patents lobby at work. Keep watching this blog.
Tuesday, December 18, 2007
Today's Economic Times poll on Free Software (Please Vote)
Today's Economic Times has an online poll that asks, "Should India support free software to take PC penetration to the next level?"
Please login to www.economictimes.com and scroll down to the voting section on the right hand side of the web page and vote "Yes."
This vote will be on only today, so please vote at the earliest.
Please login to www.economictimes.com and scroll down to the voting section on the right hand side of the web page and vote "Yes."
This vote will be on only today, so please vote at the earliest.
Monday, December 17, 2007
Open Source is Democratizing Knowledge
In September 1991, when Linux Torvalds, a student at the University of Helsinki in Finland, released 10,000 lines of code on the Internet, nobody could have believed that it would spark off a revolution. In the fifteen years since then, Linux has grown into an enormously capable operating system that contains more than 100 million lines of code that runs on tiny embedded computers to supercomputers and everything in-between. This has been made possible through the contribution of thousands of volunteers across the world working together over the Internet, in what is perhaps the largest collaborative projects in the history of mankind.
Linux is the leading example of the open source movement that is democratizing knowledge and the tools with which we access knowledge. The open source principles of community, collaboration and the shared ownership of knowledge have lead to a transformation in the way knowledge is created and distributed. This has profound implications for India and other developing countries.
Linux was released under the General Public License created by the Free Software Foundation which gives users four freedoms: The freedom to run the program, for any purpose; the freedom to study how the program works, and adapt it to your needs, the freedom to redistribute copies and share it with others and the freedom to improve the program, and release your improvements to the public, so that the whole community benefits. A precondition to these four freedoms is that the source code for the software is freely available.
For millions of software developers across the world, this access to source code and the ability to improve it to meet their needs has been enormously empowering. In the area of supercomputing, scientists have coupled together commodity hardware and open source software to build complex systems that have drastically reduced the cost per teraflop for supercomputers. For millions of users across the world, the ability to freely copy the operating system has meant that they can try it out on their computers for free and pay for value added services like support, customization and training, as and when they are ready. Across the world, governments like China, Brazil, Venezuela and others have been embracing open source because it reduces their dependence on monopolistic vendors and their monopoly pricing structures and restrictive licensing practices. In India, Kerala, West Bengal and Tamil Nadu have declared their intention to use open source software to make IT more widely accessible to their citizens.
Enterprises across India have also been quick to realise the benefits of open source despite the enourmous amounts of FUD (fear, uncertainity and doubt) that proprietary vendors have sought to create. Today, enterprises like LIC, IDBI, IRCTC, IndiaBulls, UTI Bank, Canara Bank, CESC and others use Red Hat Enterprise Linux and other open source software to run their mission critical applications. The SMS voting backbone for highly popular TV shows like Kaun Banega Crorepati and Indian Idol also run on Red Hat Enteprise Linux.
Linux is now well established as a reliable, stable and secure operating system on servers. According to IDC, Linux server sales grew from 4.3 billion in 2004 to 5.3 billion in 2005 as customers deployed it in a wider range of technical and commercial workloads. Over the last few years, Linux has also emerged as a capable desktop operating system with slick desktop user interfaces and an excellent, free office productivity suite in Open Office. Those who have used the Linux desktop have been pleasantly surprised by its capabilities. The Kerala government has decided to move around 12,500 schools to Linux after finding proprietary software to be unaffordable.
It is no surprise that Linux and open source software have caught on rapidly in India. Our traditions of knowledge like yoga and ayurveda have always been free and open to all. We have successfuly built commercial models on top of free knowledge as can be seen from the proliferation of Ayurvedic spas and the fact that yoga is a $30 billion industry in the US. Open source proves that the age old adage that we all grow richer by sharing knowledge still holds true in the Internet era. For decision makers who are implementing IT, it is time to take a long hard look at the long term benefits of open source and evaluate the value it provides on servers and desktops.
Linux is the leading example of the open source movement that is democratizing knowledge and the tools with which we access knowledge. The open source principles of community, collaboration and the shared ownership of knowledge have lead to a transformation in the way knowledge is created and distributed. This has profound implications for India and other developing countries.
Linux was released under the General Public License created by the Free Software Foundation which gives users four freedoms: The freedom to run the program, for any purpose; the freedom to study how the program works, and adapt it to your needs, the freedom to redistribute copies and share it with others and the freedom to improve the program, and release your improvements to the public, so that the whole community benefits. A precondition to these four freedoms is that the source code for the software is freely available.
For millions of software developers across the world, this access to source code and the ability to improve it to meet their needs has been enormously empowering. In the area of supercomputing, scientists have coupled together commodity hardware and open source software to build complex systems that have drastically reduced the cost per teraflop for supercomputers. For millions of users across the world, the ability to freely copy the operating system has meant that they can try it out on their computers for free and pay for value added services like support, customization and training, as and when they are ready. Across the world, governments like China, Brazil, Venezuela and others have been embracing open source because it reduces their dependence on monopolistic vendors and their monopoly pricing structures and restrictive licensing practices. In India, Kerala, West Bengal and Tamil Nadu have declared their intention to use open source software to make IT more widely accessible to their citizens.
Enterprises across India have also been quick to realise the benefits of open source despite the enourmous amounts of FUD (fear, uncertainity and doubt) that proprietary vendors have sought to create. Today, enterprises like LIC, IDBI, IRCTC, IndiaBulls, UTI Bank, Canara Bank, CESC and others use Red Hat Enterprise Linux and other open source software to run their mission critical applications. The SMS voting backbone for highly popular TV shows like Kaun Banega Crorepati and Indian Idol also run on Red Hat Enteprise Linux.
Linux is now well established as a reliable, stable and secure operating system on servers. According to IDC, Linux server sales grew from 4.3 billion in 2004 to 5.3 billion in 2005 as customers deployed it in a wider range of technical and commercial workloads. Over the last few years, Linux has also emerged as a capable desktop operating system with slick desktop user interfaces and an excellent, free office productivity suite in Open Office. Those who have used the Linux desktop have been pleasantly surprised by its capabilities. The Kerala government has decided to move around 12,500 schools to Linux after finding proprietary software to be unaffordable.
It is no surprise that Linux and open source software have caught on rapidly in India. Our traditions of knowledge like yoga and ayurveda have always been free and open to all. We have successfuly built commercial models on top of free knowledge as can be seen from the proliferation of Ayurvedic spas and the fact that yoga is a $30 billion industry in the US. Open source proves that the age old adage that we all grow richer by sharing knowledge still holds true in the Internet era. For decision makers who are implementing IT, it is time to take a long hard look at the long term benefits of open source and evaluate the value it provides on servers and desktops.
Monday, October 01, 2007
Policy recommendations on Open Source for India
These are some policy recommendations on Open Source for India. I look forward to your comments on these recommendations. This will be ciculated to e-government policy makers next week.
===============================================================================================
We, the members of the open source software (OSS) community in India, recommend that the Government of India should promote OSS in order to encourage competition and choice, make IT more affordable and bring the benefits of IT to the people of India.
We recommend that the Department of IT, Government of India adopt the following steps which will go a long way in promoting OSS in India.
1)Applications developed by the Government of India should be cross platform and not be locked in to a specific platform. Building cross-platform applications encourages choice and provides implementing agencies the freedom to select the platforms that suit them the best. Since applications have a long shelf-life, building cross-platform applications isolates the application from technological changes in the underlying platform.
2)Mandate that all documents and data created by government organizations follow open standards that are free from royalties, patents and other encumbrances.
3)Encourage the development and usage of Linux and open source desktop productivity applications in government. This move can reduce dependence on expensive proprietary software, encourage choice, promote healthy competition and save the country enormous amounts of foreign exchange. In areas like office productivity applications etc where open source tools match the functionality of proprietary software products, adequate justification must be provided for purchasing proprietary software.
4)Mandate that, by default, software development funded by the government should be available to the public under an open source license. This ensures that the code is available to government agencies for improvements and further enhancements. Since the code is available freely, this also provides an avenue for inputs and feedback from concerned citizens.
5)Create a central repository of open source e-government applications. This move can save India thousands of crores of rupees by facilitating reuse of applications, sharing of best practices, slashing implementation time and reducing risks of project failure. This can be on the lines of the Government Open Code Collaborative Repository (www.gocc.gov) established in the US as a, “collaboration between public sector entities and non-profit academic institutions created for the purpose of encouraging the sharing, at no cost, of computer code developed for and by government entities where the redistribution of this code is allowed.”
6) Create a collaborative community for open source in education. Enormous resources are needed for modernizing and IT-enabling the education system. An open source program for education can create a nationwide community of educators for creating software and content that can be freely shared across the system. This will help rapidly disseminate the latest educational pedagogy, software tools, content and best practices within the system. This can be organized around disciplines like mathematics, physics, chemistry etc. and involve the Indian academic community and software developers.
7) Encourage the use of the open source model which is based on collaboration, community and shared ownership of intellectual resources in scientific disciplines like agriculture, biotechnology, health care research, etc. so that the benefits of such research can reach the public faster.
8) Set up a high-powered think tank consisting of top-notch policy makers, academics and politicians under the auspices of a powerful policy making institution to provide leadership and direction on open source on a continuous basis.
The agenda for such an organization would be:
A)Identify and quantify the political, cultural and economic benefits for India as a result of open source. This would not just be restricted to software but also to issues like IP, content, scientific publishing etc. In other words, the focus of this body would be on how India can take full-advantage of the open source movement to benefit Indian society.1
B)Develop an action plan aimed at making India a global leader in the open source community. For example, India could take the lead in developing and customizing open source applications for developing countries or identify areas where it can make visible contributions to the global open source community. For example, Sri Lanka has made significant contributions to the Apache web server through the Lanka Software Foundation.
C)Leverage the open source development model based on community, collaboration and shared ownership of intellectual resources to bridge the digital divide. This forms part of point A, but is a large enough area to deserve special attention. For example, Indian language software development and localization of open source tools can be identified as a priority sector for funding. This will take IT beyond the five percent of India that speaks English and provide cost-effective software solutions to Indian users, thus bridging the digital divide. another area could be the development of applications and content that meets India's unique needs.
D)Create a road-map for open source software development for India's software export industry. In the long-term, software will be sold as a service. Open Source Software is accelerating this trend which plays to the advantage of India's vibrant software services industry.
===============================================================================================
We, the members of the open source software (OSS) community in India, recommend that the Government of India should promote OSS in order to encourage competition and choice, make IT more affordable and bring the benefits of IT to the people of India.
We recommend that the Department of IT, Government of India adopt the following steps which will go a long way in promoting OSS in India.
1)Applications developed by the Government of India should be cross platform and not be locked in to a specific platform. Building cross-platform applications encourages choice and provides implementing agencies the freedom to select the platforms that suit them the best. Since applications have a long shelf-life, building cross-platform applications isolates the application from technological changes in the underlying platform.
2)Mandate that all documents and data created by government organizations follow open standards that are free from royalties, patents and other encumbrances.
3)Encourage the development and usage of Linux and open source desktop productivity applications in government. This move can reduce dependence on expensive proprietary software, encourage choice, promote healthy competition and save the country enormous amounts of foreign exchange. In areas like office productivity applications etc where open source tools match the functionality of proprietary software products, adequate justification must be provided for purchasing proprietary software.
4)Mandate that, by default, software development funded by the government should be available to the public under an open source license. This ensures that the code is available to government agencies for improvements and further enhancements. Since the code is available freely, this also provides an avenue for inputs and feedback from concerned citizens.
5)Create a central repository of open source e-government applications. This move can save India thousands of crores of rupees by facilitating reuse of applications, sharing of best practices, slashing implementation time and reducing risks of project failure. This can be on the lines of the Government Open Code Collaborative Repository (www.gocc.gov) established in the US as a, “collaboration between public sector entities and non-profit academic institutions created for the purpose of encouraging the sharing, at no cost, of computer code developed for and by government entities where the redistribution of this code is allowed.”
6) Create a collaborative community for open source in education. Enormous resources are needed for modernizing and IT-enabling the education system. An open source program for education can create a nationwide community of educators for creating software and content that can be freely shared across the system. This will help rapidly disseminate the latest educational pedagogy, software tools, content and best practices within the system. This can be organized around disciplines like mathematics, physics, chemistry etc. and involve the Indian academic community and software developers.
7) Encourage the use of the open source model which is based on collaboration, community and shared ownership of intellectual resources in scientific disciplines like agriculture, biotechnology, health care research, etc. so that the benefits of such research can reach the public faster.
8) Set up a high-powered think tank consisting of top-notch policy makers, academics and politicians under the auspices of a powerful policy making institution to provide leadership and direction on open source on a continuous basis.
The agenda for such an organization would be:
A)Identify and quantify the political, cultural and economic benefits for India as a result of open source. This would not just be restricted to software but also to issues like IP, content, scientific publishing etc. In other words, the focus of this body would be on how India can take full-advantage of the open source movement to benefit Indian society.1
B)Develop an action plan aimed at making India a global leader in the open source community. For example, India could take the lead in developing and customizing open source applications for developing countries or identify areas where it can make visible contributions to the global open source community. For example, Sri Lanka has made significant contributions to the Apache web server through the Lanka Software Foundation.
C)Leverage the open source development model based on community, collaboration and shared ownership of intellectual resources to bridge the digital divide. This forms part of point A, but is a large enough area to deserve special attention. For example, Indian language software development and localization of open source tools can be identified as a priority sector for funding. This will take IT beyond the five percent of India that speaks English and provide cost-effective software solutions to Indian users, thus bridging the digital divide. another area could be the development of applications and content that meets India's unique needs.
D)Create a road-map for open source software development for India's software export industry. In the long-term, software will be sold as a service. Open Source Software is accelerating this trend which plays to the advantage of India's vibrant software services industry.
Saturday, September 15, 2007
Software Freedom Day
Today is Software Freedom Day. According to Wikipedia:
We don't usually link the two words "Software" and "freedom" together. After all, what does the high tech world of software have to do with freedom? However, freedom is basic to any human activity and software is no exception.
For example, the open standards movement is about your freedom to encode (create) and decode (retrieve) your own data. If you store data in proprietary formats, only the maker of that format knows how to unlock that data and you are now dependent on that vendor. This is like buying house but the keys to the house still remain with the builder. Why take the risk? Actively use open formats like ODF and OGG and avoid using proprietary formats like .doc and .mpeg which are proprietary formats.
The open source and free software movement is about your freedom to modify code and share it with others. It is for this reason that Linux can scale from tiny embedded systems to mighty supercomputers. Wikipedia is about your freedom to share knowledge and information with each other.
Over the next few years this movement will go from strength to strength because the open source and free software communities have shown that we can grow richer by sharing!
"Software Freedom Day (SFD) is an annual worldwide celebration of the free/open-source software. SFD is a public education effort, not only to celebrate the virtues of free and open source software, but also to encourage its use, to the benefit of the public."
We don't usually link the two words "Software" and "freedom" together. After all, what does the high tech world of software have to do with freedom? However, freedom is basic to any human activity and software is no exception.
For example, the open standards movement is about your freedom to encode (create) and decode (retrieve) your own data. If you store data in proprietary formats, only the maker of that format knows how to unlock that data and you are now dependent on that vendor. This is like buying house but the keys to the house still remain with the builder. Why take the risk? Actively use open formats like ODF and OGG and avoid using proprietary formats like .doc and .mpeg which are proprietary formats.
The open source and free software movement is about your freedom to modify code and share it with others. It is for this reason that Linux can scale from tiny embedded systems to mighty supercomputers. Wikipedia is about your freedom to share knowledge and information with each other.
Over the next few years this movement will go from strength to strength because the open source and free software communities have shown that we can grow richer by sharing!
Saturday, February 03, 2007
Linux Asia 2007 and Microsoft
I was incredibly disappointed to see that Microsoft was included as a sponsor of Linux Asia 2007. This completely shortsighted move on the part of the organizers made participating or sponsoring the event even less meaningful. Our feedback to the organizers has been that audience generation has not been up to expectations. My blunt feedback to the organizers was that when the platform is called Linux Asia, they should not have invited Microsoft. If it was IT Asia or some such title, inviting Microsoft would have been OK, but to invite a company that has done so much to damage the open source revolution was a sell-out.
The agenda was quite stale. For example, there was no presence from Kerala, which has done so much in the area of Free and Open Source Software or around the issue of software patents that has come up specially after the Microsoft Novell deal.
In future, I would rather support community events like FOSS.in.
The agenda was quite stale. For example, there was no presence from Kerala, which has done so much in the area of Free and Open Source Software or around the issue of software patents that has come up specially after the Microsoft Novell deal.
In future, I would rather support community events like FOSS.in.
Saturday, October 14, 2006
Mavericks at Work and Open Source
Am reading the book Mavericks at Work, a book on how innovative companies are creating businesses that break the mould and are creating value. Was surprised (pleasantly!) to see a whole chapter on open source. The chapter talks of how a giant company like Procter and Gamble is applying open source principles to open itself to innovations from across the world. If anyone needs proof that open source is becoming mainstram, this is it!
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