5W1H talk about open source - what is open source?

American political communication scientist Lasswell put forward 5W Mode of communication , After the continuous use and development of posterity, it is summarized that , Formed a set of gradually mature “5W1H” system , namely ： For selected items 、 Process or operation , All from the reason （ Why Why）、 object （ what What）、 place （ And where Where）、 Time （ when When）、 personnel （ Who Who）、 Method （ What method How） And so on six aspects put forward questions to ponder .

This series of articles is based on 5W1H Let's talk about open source .

What—— What is open source ？

Open source is open source ,Open source code, Also known as source code disclosure , It refers to a software release model , One is based on decentralization 、 Self organizing software development mode, the way it works . In this mode , The basic meaning of open source software is ： The code is public , Anyone can check , Modify and use . The opposite of open source is closed source code , Closed source code is common commercial copyright software , The code is closed , Only the author can see , If something goes wrong, you can only modify it yourself .

Open source software is open source software . Open source software will be released with the source code of the software , And authorize users to change 、 Communication or secondary development .

misunderstand ： Open source is not

Let's clarify some common misconceptions about open source ：

Open source doesn't mean free

Open source software and free software are two concepts , Open source software, open source , Allow users to change 、 spread 、 Secondary development . Free software is provided to users for free , But not necessarily open source , And it's not allowed to be modified at will 、 Second release, etc . For example, we often use wechat 、QQ And most of the software , We can make the most of it , But if you add or remove some features 、 Even publish it on the Internet for people to download and use, so as to make a profit , That is to jump repeatedly on the edge of breaking the law .

Of course , Most open source projects are free , but “ free ” Not part of the definition of open source . There are ways to indirectly charge for open source projects through dual licensing or limited functionality , While still following the official definition of open source .

Open source does not resist commerce

Open source software is not against business , The purpose of open source is to share , But not charity . Open source is altruistic , Proprietary software or proprietary software is egoistic , And the open source business model is also egoistic . The combination of altruistic open source and egoistic business model , To really contribute to open source . The specific profit model has technical support 、 train 、 Advanced features 、 Cloud services, etc . Different software 、 Different areas have different profit models , But all patterns are based on the number of users . Only when the number of users reaches a certain scale , Only in this way can it become a commercial model .

Commercial open source is through more people's participation , Reduce software defects , Enrich the functions of software , At the same time, it also avoids a few people leaving some improper backdoors in the software . Open source software will eventually feed back the business , Let commercial companies provide users with better products . relatively speaking , Back end open source projects are the easiest to commercialize , And the closer the software is to the underlying facilities, the easier it is to be commercialized and open source .

Open source projects don't represent the highest quality of code

Open joint development , Its essence is to ensure that other participants cannot hide low-quality code 、 Loopholes and other problems , All code will be analyzed and judged . But there are also some developers who are inexperienced and Code reviewer Some bad code will be submitted due to the negligence of . And the open source community will talk about inefficiency , Under different needs , Sometimes making the final decision is the result of compromise .

Empathy , Anyone can provide code for open source projects , It doesn't mean that the quality of open source code is poor , Because after all, most of them have passed the threshold and screening .

So in general , The code quality of open source projects is not the best , But it's also pretty good , And because the open source community is made up of people , So good projects live longer , Under the survival of the fittest , The code quality of the project that can be concerned by most people also increases .