INTENSITY²
Start here => What's your crime? Basic Discussion => Topic started by: odeon on February 28, 2014, 12:20:17 AM
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Consider this a sister thread to my Wikipedia one. :P
I like open source software and use it every day. Linux, of course, is a prime example. The mind map software Freeplane is another. And there are a number of tools I use at work, every day, that are open source, written by people who normally get paid to develop ridiculously expensive products for Fortune 500 companies. They are updated often by their creators, but also regularly patched by others who use them. Bugs are fixed very, very quickly, in most cases, and features are added if people want them and somebody has the time and know-how.
A case in point. I was presenting at a conference a year or two ago, showing stuff that I had developed, using a piece of open source software called Calabash. The author, Norm Walsh, was sitting in the auditorium, listening to my talk.
The W3C standard Calabash is based on, XProc, has some built-in problems. There are features it sorely needs that just aren't there yet. And one of these missing features had forced me to do a rather complicated workaround, which I was explaining to my audience, among them Norm, the author of Calabash.
I finished my talk to reasonably enthusiastic applause and sat down to listen to a colleague's talk, hooking up my laptop and checking my mail while listening.
One was from Norm. While listening to my talk, he had designed an extension to Calabash that fixed the very problem I had outlined to the audience, literally minutes before. He explained his basic idea and asked if that would fix my problem. It did.
More recently, I based my Prague talk on several open source technologies and worked with their authors to develop these technologies so they'd do what I needed them to.
My demo, of course, is now also open source, thanks to my boss who graciously agreed to release it as such.
Compare this kind of rapid development with proprietary software. I could pick a large one , like MS Word, but a better example is actually Microsoft's Solitaire Windows game.
It's been around since the 90s, at least, and certainly before Windows 95. It's not that complicated but there are bugs in it that have been around since I first used it on a Windows 3.1 computer. There are missing features and there is some built-in ugliness, and yet none of it will be fixed because it's proprietary and MS won't set aside the budget to do it.
There are some brilliant open source alternatives to it, though.
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I'm the only one here who cares about open source? :'(
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Maybe.
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I use Android. Have had several tablets, touch screens, phones etc.
The open source apps I use are awesome! I can print anything from my phone. There are several games that I enjoy but my favourite apps - my bubble spirit level and a 3D compass! Microsoft can just go and kiss my fat, clown ass now.
Yes I would be more inclined to donate because I actually use the things. I don't really use Wikipedia much.
I would be lost without Open Source and restricted to Microsoft.
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I don't even know what it is. If you explained it to me like a child I would still be giving you a blank look. I am not really that technical truth be told.
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I think that's an awesome story about the convention and so does WolFish. That's the best of conferences right there.
I use OpenOffice whenever I can. It still has some problems handling Word templates but for most text editing I've found it works just fine.
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I hate Word and use Open Office for everything. The whole idea of open source is very appealing to me as a tinkerer I wish I was more knowledgeable and skilled in computer stuff that I could use more such as Linux as I HATE windows 8 but am afraid of getting in over my head on things
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I got lucky when I got my computer a little while back, that they still had a few copies of Windows 7 in the back store room and they were willing to sell me one.
I would like to be at a Linux based office again. Might encourage me to use it at home because I'd get familiar enough with it to feel ok troubleshooting.
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I will be making the switch since I have a couple still running XP and Vista hanging around here.
The only thing that stopped me before was laziness and incompatible hardware, which is not the problem that it used to be back when I had a dual boot system and Mandrake 15+ years ago.
Windows 8 and their new office package IMO sucks. I'm already running a some things in VM ware now on the old laptop, but there are new and better things :drool:...time to get off my lazy ass and do it already.
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I don't even know what it is. If you explained it to me like a child I would still be giving you a blank look. I am not really that technical truth be told.
Tbh, I don't think you are that dense.
Open source software = you may not only use it, you may also modify it and sell it or give it away
Proprietary software = you may use it if you have a license but you don't have access to the source code, and even if you did, you are not allowed to modify it, sell it or even give it to someone else
In essence, open source is about sharing your work. When people talk about open source, they are usually talking about computer software, but the basic concepts can apply equally to any type of intellectual property.
So let's say I write a book. Most books are not only copyrighted but also proprietary, meaning that even if you hate the ending, you are not allowed to rewrite it to your liking and publish your version. You're actually not even allowed to do it at home.
But if the book is open source (and there are quite a few such books out there--see Wikbooks for a couple of examples), you can do just that. You can rewrite it any way you like and then *sell* your version, and it's all going to be perfectly legal.
The usual catch is that, depending on the open source license, you will usually have to include your source code and the license used. With a book, that's a given, really, since the source code is the same as the book reaching the reader, but as most software is compiled into an executable binary package, open source software is a little different.
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I hate Word and use Open Office for everything. The whole idea of open source is very appealing to me as a tinkerer I wish I was more knowledgeable and skilled in computer stuff that I could use more such as Linux as I HATE windows 8 but am afraid of getting in over my head on things
If you have a spare computer or some extra space on the one with Windows, you can easily try out Linux. The easiest way is to not install anything and instead use a live distro, running the whole thing from a CD or DVD.
Link. (http://www.knoppix.org/)
The above leads to a really rotten web page, but if you switch the language to English and download the disc image, you don't really have to read anything else. Just burn the disc image to a CD or DVD (depending on the size) and use it to boot up your computer.
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My ex used lots of open-source stuff, and put up things for free himself too.
He was liking a Swiss guy a lot, forgot his name.
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I hate Word and use Open Office for everything. The whole idea of open source is very appealing to me as a tinkerer I wish I was more knowledgeable and skilled in computer stuff that I could use more such as Linux as I HATE windows 8 but am afraid of getting in over my head on things
If you have a spare computer or some extra space on the one with Windows, you can easily try out Linux. The easiest way is to not install anything and instead use a live distro, running the whole thing from a CD or DVD.
Link. (http://www.knoppix.org/)
The above leads to a really rotten web page, but if you switch the language to English and download the disc image, you don't really have to read anything else. Just burn the disc image to a CD or DVD (depending on the size) and use it to boot up your computer.
I really do need to get on that. Just waiting, right now (optimistically) for shit to stop being ungodly stressful, so I'll have more patience and be less likely to defenestrate my laptop.
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defenestrate
Had to look that one up. Great word.
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I hate Word and use Open Office for everything. The whole idea of open source is very appealing to me as a tinkerer I wish I was more knowledgeable and skilled in computer stuff that I could use more such as Linux as I HATE windows 8 but am afraid of getting in over my head on things
If you have a spare computer or some extra space on the one with Windows, you can easily try out Linux. The easiest way is to not install anything and instead use a live distro, running the whole thing from a CD or DVD.
Link. (http://www.knoppix.org/)
The above leads to a really rotten web page, but if you switch the language to English and download the disc image, you don't really have to read anything else. Just burn the disc image to a CD or DVD (depending on the size) and use it to boot up your computer.
I really do need to get on that. Just waiting, right now (optimistically) for shit to stop being ungodly stressful, so I'll have more patience and be less likely to defenestrate my laptop.
Just download the image, burn it on disc and boot up your laptop with it. That's all it takes. You can be nasty to your laptop later.
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One loaded. Some tweaking to do...but so far so good. :thumbup:
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I'm the only one here who cares about open source? :'(
I use Apophysis, JWildfire, Fractal Explorer (fractal imagery tools), The Gimp and Open Office. I would be lost or have to spend thousands of dollars on commercial software without them.
Not sure how open Firefox is these days, but there are some functions my son uses (within Google FFS!) for online schoolwork where Chrome does NOT work. I keep Firefox up and running.
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Firefox is still open source. Enter about:license in the address field and hit return.
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Open source is :viking:
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Yes, it is. I am spending most of my time developing stuff for an open source database, right now, and it's pretty awesome. It's free but it's also robust and reliable, and if you find a bug, it gets fixed faster than it would on a commercial product.