Open Source – New Horizons
By Tech News Staff Writer Jason Hutchins
In late March the Nonprofit Technology Enterprise Network (N-TEN) held its annual conference in Philadelphia. N-TEN is a membership association of nonprofits, technology support providers, consultants, and funders. The rapid growth of the group is certainly something to Google about - since the inception of N-TEN only a few years ago, the three-day event attracted over 600 participants.
The buzz at this year's conference was all things open source, where various topical break-out sessions produced standing room only attendance. Adding to the mix was Penguin Day, a post conference off-site event hosted at the United Way of Southeastern Pennsylvania. The event connected free and open source software (F/OSS) developers and nonprofit technology staff for sharing, debate, and conversation.
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"The end customer is more informed and less skeptical – the sector now has a distinct understanding that open source is usable and a growing sophistication to the benefits of using open source tools."
-Dirk Slater, Senior Circuit Rider
Welfare Law Center
Low-Income Networking and Communications (LINC) Project
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The promise of open source solutions has a natural appeal to the mass culture of the nonprofit sector. It relies on three basic fundamental concepts.
*Nobody owns it
*Everybody can use it
*Anybody can improve it
Opensource.org provides an often cited definition of open source.
Apache
Apache Foundation's Web-server powers 68% of active web sites and is the most successful piece of open source code ever developed. |
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The Nonprofit Open Source Initiative (NOSI) distributed a publication at the conference titled "Choosing & Using Open Source Software: A Primer for Nonprofits." The report is available online in PDF format and contains technology and community support models with five detailed case studies of open source solutions. Although written for a wide audience, the report has technical comparison charts for server and desktop software and links to additional resources for the IT enthusiast.
"NOSI is a collection of individuals who work with people on nonprofit technology initiatives where open source solutions are a preferred methodology."..."The publication describes open source in terms that community groups understand."
-Michelle Murrain, Vice President for Technology
Database Designs Associates, Inc.
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Reaching Critical Mass
Making the leap from potential to sector wide results is the part of the puzzle yet to be solved. Although conference participants used break-out sessions and met informally to connect organizational needs with available tools, scope, and follow up; is naturally limited to those enthusiasts in attendance.
Linking needs with solutions: The Need for Online Marketplace(s)
While being interviewed for this article many industry experts expressed that the 'wheels were in motion' for an online marketplace of open source tools that serves the nonprofit community. This fundamental leap would connect nonprofits in need of solutions with the programmers developing them. Currently, Source Forge is an industry example of this type of market place, the creation of which would raise the confidence of groups to utilize open source tools.
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Open Office
This freeware office suite with word processor, spreadsheet, and presentation tools is aimed to serve all operating systems, including; Windows, Linux, Mac OS X, and Sun Solaris.
In April, Eweek compared Open Office to Microsoft Office® 2003 and found that it met the needs of average users.
Support, as with most open source solutions, requires reading available publications and/or making connections with a consultant through various online user groups. |
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"It is the role of the consultant to inform nonprofit customers of the options – detailing the Pro's and Con's of each direction. At May First we work with small nonprofits, many have 10 or fewer staff with no full time IT person. A typical roll out has Windows desktop with an open source operating system for the File Server and Email Server."
-Jamie McClelland
May First Technology Collective (Formerly Media Jumpstart)
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Extending Server Life: Open Source Performance
Open source software such as Apache, and open source platforms such as Linux, can run on older hardware, without the speed penalties that Windows typically incurs. Often, Linux finds its way into an organization as a means of re-purposing "that old machine in the corner" into a web sniffer (using Nagios) or server (using Apache).
Challenges in Reaching Beyond the Tech Savvy
Emerging from Penguin Day is the start of interaction between the development community, technology assistance providers, and nonprofit staff. The challenge this group will face rests with average end-users, leaving the impression to some degree that the open source movement is a set of tools in search of an opportunity.
Applications such as Apache, MySQL, PHP, StarOffice, and GIMP have proven that you can write stable, useful apps with an open source methodology. Linux has found a real home on the server side and is making desktop inroads, with major vendors such as Dell offering Linux desktop machines.
To reach critical mass the open source software movement needs to reach beyond the technologically savvy users. Many of the products mentioned above are not end-user driven -- Apache, MySQL, and PHP are used primarily by developers.
Definitions Continue to Blurr
The open source software movement has sought to differentiate itself from commercial software in three key ways: price, performance, and extensibility. Yet each of these features has been encroached on by commercial software makers, resulting in blurred boundaries.
Historically, open source software differentiated itself by price. Commercial software tends to be expensive; whereas open source software is often given away or offered at very low cost. This is due in part to the ethos of most open source developers. However, Apple offers iLife, a fairly complete music/video/photo suite, for $50, and many common proprietary packages from Microsoft Office to SQL Server are available to nonprofits at TechSoup Stock for a small fraction of the retail cost.
As for extensibility? Commercial software allows end-users a great deal of customization (via internal macro/programming languages or commercial add-ons), though open source software is unparalleled for offering its users the ability to customize.
The solution? Perhaps a simple change in business strategy. The movement was started and is carried in many ways, by people who have a deep distrust of commercial software development and marketing. By adopting some of the aspects of commercial development -- paying developers, charging customers for significant upgrades, marketing other products to the same customers -- open source developers would have the opportunity to build products as quickly as commercial counterparts.
Reaching End-Users
Successful strategies like RedHat's approach of "shrink-wrapping" Linux into a user-friendly package, can't be overlooked. RedHat moved the product off the web and into retail stores creating a real "brand" that effectively challenged commercial operating systems on their own turf.
In summary, the open source movement has a hard road to take. Having convinced a very intelligent core contingent of the sector wide potential, open source developers may now need to find ways to reach out and win the hearts and minds of the larger group of end-users. Their success in reaching these mainstream consumers will determine how bright the horizon turns out to be.
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Linux
From 1991 to 1994, Linus Torvalds, a young Finish student developed the kernel for Linux and with help from other developers released an operating system with some tools under a General Public License. Over time, other organizations and individuals began distributing Linux with their own choice of tools developed around and tied to Linus' kernel.
Today you can download a version of Linux from many locations or purchase a boxed version of the operating system from distributors like Red Hat.
MySQL
The open source MySQL database server boasts over "Five million active installations."
PHP
PHP is an open source general-purpose scripting language especially suited for Web development.
Source Forge
With more than 850,000 registered users and over 81,000 hosted products, SourceForge.net serves as the largest web directory of open source code and applications. The site is a free service for open source developers.
Free Software Foundation
The Free Software Foundation is a good resource for open source licensing terminology.
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