What is open source software


Interoperability Nerdvana

Interoperability is one of the sacred goalsSourceForge Enterprise), EnterpriseDB,
of IT, and even consumer computing. IfHyperic, JasperSoft, SourceForge.net,
operating systems, utilities, andSpikeSource, and Unisys ... well, you have a
applications do not work together, userbit  of  muscle  to  get  things  done.
productivity matches the low level I achieve
on Friday around cocktail hour ... which isWhat OSA initiated is an interoperability
"none  at  all."roadmap -- an attempt to specify some
well-defined interoperability standards in
Open Source is ripping profitability out ofthe business software space. That's right,
the IT software market in part do to growinginterop in applications. The objective is to
interoperability. Unlike traditionaldocument standards and best practices for
technology vendors, Open Source benefits fromOpen Source developers to use when building
creating the greatest amount oftheir software. The OSA will help by
interoperability possible. More commercialprototyping working code to demonstrate the
vendors keep margins high by locking inprinciples of the standards. The initial
customers to their suite of products. Thisprototype will be the Common Customer View.
is partially achieved by minimizingThis standard joins information held in
interoperability with competing anddifferent applications (CRM, ERP, etc.),
non-partner solutions, and thus raisingbusiness intelligence software, and for demo
switching costs should a customer considersake,  a  legacy  point-of-sale  application.
"dumping  and  jumping" to a different stack.
This presents new issues for software
Linux/GNU and their compatriots have been amarketing professionals. If you are a
model for interoperability. Theytraditional application vendor, you will
collectively seek to create as much of theeventually encounter new competitive threats.
stuff as possible, assuring most of theAll other things being equal,
components of the Linux stack work extremelyinteroperability between Open Source
well together. Without traditional profitapplications would be a deal-making
motives, the only barriers todifferentiator. Your products will either
interoperability were time and complexityhave to interoperate with best-of-breed
(the time it takes to code interoperations,commercial applications, interoperate with
and the complexity of supporting multipleOpen Source applications using OSA standards,
points  of  interoperation).or  both.
But this interoperability has been done on aIf you are a dual-source vendor, these
handshake when developers from differentstandards will become part of your value
projects found need and motivation. This hasproposition. This is a boon to dual-source
led to odd partnerships, some necessaryvendors, creating an advantage over
exclusivity, and a bit of weariness by IT inbest-of-breed commercial applications while
adopting Open Source solutions for fear thatadhering to the Open Source promise of lower
necessary interoperability that exists todaycost and greater flexibility. I can foresee
might not exist in the future. Open Sourcea time when the old networking-centric
has now grown to a point where consumersInterop trade show could become the
desire  a  bit  more  structure.application-centric Interop event, where all
the application software vendors demonstrate
The Open Solutions Alliance (OSA) has startedlive how they work with all the other vendors
adding structure. This happened prettyin the building. Interop launched
quickly for an organization that didn't existstandards-based networking, and OSA may
three months ago. But when you have foundinglaunch standards-based applications.
members like CollabNet (who now owns



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