[OT] What is Open Source? (was Re: ANN: Twisted 0.16.0...)

[Huaiyu Zhu]

Brad Bollenbach <bbollenbach at shaw.ca> wrote:
>
>This is a semantic debate. I know that Stallman chose the term "Free
>Software" because he felt it was the best (and most concise) way to
>express what he was thinking of.

There is real difference between Open Source and Free Software.  Microsoft
would be happy to use some OSS such as BSD (as they have done in their
network codes), but it would recoil at any mention of Free (as in speech).

>As it turns out, *lots* of hackers talk about "Open Source" when they
>often mean exactly the same thing as what Stallman calls "Free
>Software". 

That's right.  A large portion of OSS is FS.  But another large portion is
not.  FS is a proper subset of OSS.

In concrete terms, OSS is anything with an OSI approved licence.  FS is
anything with an FSF approved licence.  My impression is all FSF licences
are OSI approved, but many OSI approved licences are opposed by FSF.

BTW, Python is OSS but not FS.

Huaiyu