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Explore the practical process of moving part or all of your software usage towards open source software (OSS). The material in this video is divided into two parts, each offering a different perspective – one general, one specific.
The first part describes the general, practical considerations for a user who moves to OSS alternatives. The considerations include: obtaining the software, migrating your data, getting support and training, and arranging for ongoing support and maintenance. For each consideration, Free Alternatives to Everyday Software gives advice on how best to approach the task and any risks to watch out for.
The second part discusses prominent examples of OSS in a number of key categories (office software, browsers, email, and so on). Each segment identifies an OSS program and explains the challenges you will face when moving to that program (for example, ‘Where is feature X in the OSS version?’, ‘Will there be issue with driver support?’, and so on).
What You Will Learn
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Procure and install OSS programs
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Successfully migrate your data
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Obtain support and updates
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Overcome the challenges when moving to OSS in prominent software domains
Who This Video Is For
You will have experience using a range of mainly proprietary (and possibly some OSS) applications. You are aware of what OSS is, and are considering moving at least part of your toolset to open source solutions.
About The Author
Karl Beecher lives a double life as a writer and software specialist. When being a writer, he focuses on science and technology. He likes to take meaty, complex ideas and present them in ways that are easy to understand. As a software specialist, Karl has worked as a software engineer, earned a PhD in computer science (focusing on open source software), and co-founded a company specializing in open source software. You can find him on Twitter @karlbeecher.
About this video
- Author(s)
- Karl Beecher
- DOI
- https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4842-4377-0
- Online ISBN
- 978-1-4842-4377-0
- Total duration
- 54 min
- Publisher
- Apress
- Copyright information
- © Karl Beecher 2019
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Video Transcript
Karl Beecher: Hello and welcome to this video entitled Free Everyday Software Alternatives. My name’s Karl Beecher, and in this video, I’ll be taking you through what the open source world has to offer you. We’re going to look at what it’s like to move from proprietary to open source software. We’ll look at both the general issues that are involved as well as specific programs that can replace your lineup of proprietary software.
Accordingly, this video is split into two parts. In part one, we’ll cover the following. First, we’ll see what your various options are for obtaining opensource software. Of course, once you have the software, you’ll need to make sure all your existing data can be moved over, so we’ll learn about that too. Then we’ll look at what’s available in terms of support, things like training, documentation, installation, and et cetera. At the full and looking at how you keep your open source software up to date. Part two, we’ll look at several of the most common domains of software and turn and reveal which open source programs are available in that domain as well as the benefits you might derive or challenges you might face when switching to one of those programs. Specifically, the domain we’ll see are: internet browsing, email, messengers, office software, file sharing, multimedia and operating systems.
I’m going to assume that you’ve already seen in the previous video in this series called A Beginner’s Guide to Open Source, or you’re at least familiar with the basic terminology of software and open source. Otherwise, feel free to check out that video first, and so I look forward to seeing you in part one.