Introduction of Free/Libre and Open Source Software (F/LOSS)
The term Free/Libre and Open
Source Software (F/LOSS) has evolved from two terminologies: Free/Libre
Software (FS) and Open Source Software (OSS) (Brock et al., 2009). The difference between these two kinds of software
is that Free Software focuses on moral and ethical issues and stresses on the
user rights toward a software whereas the Open Source goes for a corporate
approach (Tong, 2004; Brock et al.,
2009). F/LOSS is licensed differently than existing proprietary software license
and gives the users freedom under certain conditions so that everyone could
enjoy those rights and freedom as well (Brock et al., 2009). F/LOSS is developed and nurtured by the community of
hackers all over the world (Subramanyam
and Xia, 2008; Hauge at al., 2010). ‘Instead of viewing this community as a threat,
high-tech companies like IBM, Hewlett Packard, and Sun Microsystems have come
to rely upon it, selling software applications and services built to ride atop
the ever-growing free software infrastructure ‘(Williams, 2002).
In this digitalized world if an organisation does not use
the information and communication technology (ICT) or fails to make full utilisation
of ICT, then it falls behind its competitors (Lakhan and Jhunjhunwala,
2008). ICT plays an important role in education sector. It helps increase the quality
of the education provided and also facilitates the delivery of business
objectives. Education sectors are using interactive tools for the teaching
process. Not only has ICT produced an
interesting and interactive learning environment but it has also resulted in
higher administrative and management efficiencies (MCEETYA, 2003). Virtual Universities, online courses,
education portal and courseware are few examples of digitisation in education
sector (Lakhan and Jhunjhunwala, 2008).
With the price of implementing ICT infrastructure high, many of the
sectors lack sufficient financial resources to enjoy the benefits of it.
Free/Libre and Open Source Software (F/LOSS) has been playing a significant
role for the education sector to enjoy the benefits ICT has to offer, mostly in
the context of developing countries (Tong, 2004).
Millions of developer
worldwide who volunteer to contribute to a project over the internet is the
reason of existence and success of
F/LOSS projects (Subramanyam and Xia, 2008; Hauge at al., 2010). Because of the contributors spread worldwide, some
researcher have pointed out that for F/LOSS project more time and effort is
required to familiarise with each other’s work (Seaman and Basili, 1997; Damian
and Zowghi, 2003). Compared to Microsoft and other proprietary software
industry, distribution of work over geographical regions results delay in
F/LOSS project (Mockus et al., 2002)
and the process of reading, rereading, coding and recoding the program is
extremely labour-intensive (Crowston et
al., 2007).
Although the use of F/LOSS is
getting more market than the commercial proprietary software (Subramanyam and Xia, 2008), some
authors have criticized against F/LOSS due to security, licensing and quality
problems (Stamelos et al.,
2002; Kshetri, 2004; Scacchi, 2004; Ajila and Wu, 2007). Wang and Wang
(2001) argued that F/LOSS software packages leads to adoption a challenge. In
2003, from his research, Capiluppi
et al. found
that most of the F/LOSS projects found it hard to attract authors and
contributors. F/LOSS project also was
not able to find right people at the right time. After the implementation of
F/LOSS project, there is a possibility of lack of support for the F/LOSS users
because some projects contributors’ lose their enthusiasm (Lakhan and
Jhunjhunwala, 2008).
Most of the organisations are
willing to give back the modified code back to the community so that the
community benefits from it (Hauge
at al., 2010). But the organisation
should first know the community, and once they contribute to the community,
they have the responsibility to maintain it. This may be one of the obstacles
for an organisation to contribute to F/LOSS project (Ven and Mannaert,
2008). One of the other barriers for an organisation to contribute is because
of the difficulties
with licenses and patents (Iivari et al., 2008; Lakhan and
Jhunjhunwala, 2008).
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