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Open-Source Software

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The Innovation in Computing Companion
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Abstract

Open-source software (OSS) is a software that is freely available under an open-source license to study, change, and distribute to anyone for any purpose. Free and open-source licenses are often divided into two categories depending on the rights to be granted in the distribution of the modified software. The first category aims to give users unlimited freedom to use, study, and modify the software, and if the user adheres to the terms of an open-source license such as GNU General Public License (GPL), the freedom to distribute the software and any changes made to it. The second category of open-source licenses gives the user permission to use, study, and modify the software, but not the right to distribute it freely under an open-source license.

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References

  • O’Regan G (2013b) Giants of computing. Springer, Heidelberg

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  • Stallman RM (2002) Free software, free society, 2nd edn. Free Software Foundation, Inc, Boston

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O’Regan, G. (2018). Open-Source Software. In: The Innovation in Computing Companion. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-02619-6_44

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-02619-6_44

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  • Publisher Name: Springer, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-030-02618-9

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-030-02619-6

  • eBook Packages: Computer ScienceComputer Science (R0)

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