What's open source?

Meme_master235

So I just saw open source and I'm like “what does that mean?” can anyone tell me?

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-ComplexNumbers-

Open source is when the code of a program is readily available. All scratch programs are open source because you can simply click “see inside” and get the code. However, once you get into real world programming, you find that certain formats, most famously EXE files, cannot be viewed to get the code, so it is up to the developer to publish the code on a third party website. However, some corporations - most infamously Microsoft - find that it’s harder to monetize open source programs, so they refuse to publish their code. Advantages of open source software are that

You can know for sure what the program does
Other people are able to review your code for bugs and report them to you
People can learn from it

Disadvantages include:

Make piracy easier
Eliminate the ability to place ads on your software
Make it easier for others to hack your software

As such, open source software is often used when a person does not intend to make profit.

Last edited by -ComplexNumbers- (March 3, 2024 08:45:44)

caftingdead261

-ComplexNumbers- wrote:
Open source is when the code of a program is readily available. All scratch programs are open source because you can simply click “see inside” and get the code. However, once you get into real world programming, you find that certain formats, most famously EXE files, cannot be viewed to get the code, so it is up to the developer to publish the code on a third party website. However, some corporations - most infamously Microsoft - find that it’s harder to monetize open source programs, so they refuse to publish their code. Advantages of open source software are that
You can know for sure what the program does
Other people are able to review your code for bugs and report them to you
People can learn from it
Disadvantages include:
Make piracy easier
Eliminate the ability to place ads on your software
Make it easier for others to hack your software
As such, open source software is often used when a person does not intend to make profit.

mostly correct but you can see .exe files they are just encrypted.

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-ComplexNumbers- wrote:
Open source is when the code of a program is readily available. All scratch programs are open source because you can simply click “see inside” and get the code. However, once you get into real world programming, you find that certain formats, most famously EXE files, cannot be viewed to get the code, so it is up to the developer to publish the code on a third party website. However, some corporations - most infamously Microsoft - find that it’s harder to monetize open source programs, so they refuse to publish their code. Advantages of open source software are that
You can know for sure what the program does
Other people are able to review your code for bugs and report them to you
People can learn from it
Disadvantages include:
Make piracy easier
Eliminate the ability to place ads on your software
Make it easier for others to hack your software
As such, open source software is often used when a person does not intend to make profit.

Another example is Apple (you can't even get MacOS on anything other than a Mac)

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-ComplexNumbers-

caftingdead261 wrote:
-ComplexNumbers- wrote:
Open source is when the code of a program is readily available. All scratch programs are open source because you can simply click “see inside” and get the code. However, once you get into real world programming, you find that certain formats, most famously EXE files, cannot be viewed to get the code, so it is up to the developer to publish the code on a third party website. However, some corporations - most infamously Microsoft - find that it’s harder to monetize open source programs, so they refuse to publish their code. Advantages of open source software are that
You can know for sure what the program does
Other people are able to review your code for bugs and report them to you
People can learn from it
Disadvantages include:
Make piracy easier
Eliminate the ability to place ads on your software
Make it easier for others to hack your software
As such, open source software is often used when a person does not intend to make profit.
mostly correct but you can see .exe files they are just encrypted.

Technically yes, but if you wrote the source of an exe in C++ for example, all variable names would be gone, and you would only be able to see the assembly code or, if you use a decompiler, some very messy, hard to read C-like code. Also, some countries ban reverse engineering entirely, and many businesses classify it as a breach of their EULA.

Mr_rudy

there is also many different licenses for open source software which says what you can or cannot do

for example:

MIT License

Copyright ©

Permission is hereby granted, free of charge, to any person obtaining a copy
of this software and associated documentation files (the “Software”), to deal
in the Software without restriction, including without limitation the rights
to use, copy, modify, merge, publish, distribute, sublicense, and/or sell
copies of the Software, and to permit persons to whom the Software is
furnished to do so, subject to the following conditions:

The above copyright notice and this permission notice shall be included in all
copies or substantial portions of the Software.

THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED “AS IS”, WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR
IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO THE WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY,
FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE AND NONINFRINGEMENT. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE
AUTHORS OR COPYRIGHT HOLDERS BE LIABLE FOR ANY CLAIM, DAMAGES OR OTHER
LIABILITY, WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF CONTRACT, TORT OR OTHERWISE, ARISING FROM,
OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE SOFTWARE OR THE USE OR OTHER DEALINGS IN THE
SOFTWARE.

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Yoshiii999

SORRY NECROPOST IGNORE THIS PLEASE

Many people here are posting incorrect answers - they are referring to what's called “source available.”

Source available means “wow! I can see the code!”
For example, Unreal Engine is source available.

Open source, however, is much more than just “wow! I can see the code!”
Open source means you can see the code, AND you additionally have the ability to:
- Contribute back to the code
- Fork off the code (somewhat similar to a Scratch remix)
- Distribute a copy to your friend
- etc.

Open source projects are open source if they have an “open source license”, for example the MIT license.

Open source is also heavily related to a concept known as “free (as in freedom)”, pertaining to liberty, not price.
Free software and open source share many similarities, and open source started off as an alternative term to “free software”. However, they have both developed and are not exactly the same nowadays. If you want to learn about free software head to www.gnu.org.

Last edited by Yoshiii999 (July 4, 2024 00:22:44)

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caftingdead261 wrote:
-ComplexNumbers- wrote:
Open source is when the code of a program is readily available. All scratch programs are open source because you can simply click “see inside” and get the code. However, once you get into real world programming, you find that certain formats, most famously EXE files, cannot be viewed to get the code, so it is up to the developer to publish the code on a third party website. However, some corporations - most infamously Microsoft - find that it’s harder to monetize open source programs, so they refuse to publish their code. Advantages of open source software are that
You can know for sure what the program does
Other people are able to review your code for bugs and report them to you
People can learn from it
Disadvantages include:
Make piracy easier
Eliminate the ability to place ads on your software
Make it easier for others to hack your software
As such, open source software is often used when a person does not intend to make profit.
mostly correct but you can see .exe files they are just encrypted.

the when f5 is clicked part is just so relatable (what does f5 even do anyway)

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Henry_Stick

Since the last post was 2 days ago, I'll also comment on this

Open source is where you can not only see the code, but also modify and/or contribute to the software freely without restriction (of course one of the devs will have to approve your change when you're contributing). Additionally, you can “fork” the project, where you can change it on your own terms from there (Kind of like remixing, but some open source licenses don't require you to give credit)

Proprietary programs, in stark contrast to open source, usually don't allow you to distribute copies of it without authorization. Also, they're only available in their already-compiled state (compilation is where code is converted into actually executable machine code FYI), so they would have to be reverse-engineered, which in some cases isn't even allowed.

Source available is just proprietary but you can look at the source code (but doing anything with the code other than looking at it is typically not allowed)

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Saifan2014

Meme_master235 wrote:
So I just saw open source and I'm like “what does that mean?” can anyone tell me?

D

Steve0Greatness

A very common misconception is that open source simply means that the programs source code is able to be viewed, but this could not be further from the truth. To put it very simply: open source software is software that does not limit what you can do with it and does not limit your ability to distribute or modify it. In short: open source software not only lets you see the source code, but also do nearly anything with it.

/hj is the worst tone indicator. It's confusing and ambiguous. I hate it. The point of tone indicators is to indicate tone, or the way that a piece of text should be read, but what does “half joking” mean? Do you just wake up in the morning and think “wow, I really have something I want to talk about seriously but also kinda not, IDK you decide.” It's useless. I hate it. It just provokes a deep rooted anger within me whenever I see it. People just comment /hj as if it makes any sense. It doesn't. Oh wow, it's a tone indicator that's has a relative meaning, how useful, I'll use it in every comment I post. NO. STOP IT. You're a tone indicator, you have only one job, and yet you sit there doing nothing apart angering me.

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This one is useful because it tells you that this signature is fully 100% serious. (/srs) Who would've thought that tone indicators needed to tell you something about the piece of text they're attached to? /s

I'm serious, I'm not even going to put multiple (/hj)s a the end of my signature as to mock the previous paragraph for not getting the point of something(like previous version of my signature). /srs

50_scratch_tabs

Steve0Greatness wrote:
(#12)
A very common misconception is that open source simply means that the programs source code is able to be viewed, but this could not be further from the truth. To put it very simply: open source software is software that does not limit what you can do with it and does not limit your ability to distribute or modify it. In short: open source software not only lets you see the source code, but also do nearly anything with it.

Well put. For example, to bring it back to Scratch, @yippymishy, the creator of Blockbit, put the server source code on GitHub. That's open source, and I'm allowed to (and I did) download it and modify it a bit to see what it does.

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