Professional open-source
Encyclopedia
Professional open-source is an open source software business model
where an open source software vendor generates revenue from paid professional services, maintenance and support provided along with the software. Some open source software vendors also provide commercial licenses of open source software or customer specific versions of open source software to customers
.
began to become popular in the 1990s with the introduction of Linux
, there was a growing stigma that such a package could not be trusted as stable or supported. As a consequence, larger businesses would often choose commercially distributed software over a product that was released under an open-source license
. However, there has been the growth in the number of professional open-source companies - made popular by companies like Liferay, Inc., OpenSearchServer
Red Hat
, MySQL AB
, and JBoss
. The business model of these companies tries "to offer open-source software with a free license, while using professional services, maintenance and support for these products to derive revenue."
Business models for open source software
There are several different types of business models for making profit using open source software .- Introduction :Open source software can be sold and used commercially. It is a part of the software industry. The financial return on open source software can also come from selling services, such...
where an open source software vendor generates revenue from paid professional services, maintenance and support provided along with the software. Some open source software vendors also provide commercial licenses of open source software or customer specific versions of open source software to customers
.
History
As open-source softwareOpen-source software
Open-source software is computer software that is available in source code form: the source code and certain other rights normally reserved for copyright holders are provided under a software license that permits users to study, change, improve and at times also to distribute the software.Open...
began to become popular in the 1990s with the introduction of Linux
Linux
Linux is a Unix-like computer operating system assembled under the model of free and open source software development and distribution. The defining component of any Linux system is the Linux kernel, an operating system kernel first released October 5, 1991 by Linus Torvalds...
, there was a growing stigma that such a package could not be trusted as stable or supported. As a consequence, larger businesses would often choose commercially distributed software over a product that was released under an open-source license
Open-source license
An open-source license is a copyright license for computer software that makes the source code available for everyone to use. This allows end users to review and modify the source code for their own customization and/or troubleshooting needs...
. However, there has been the growth in the number of professional open-source companies - made popular by companies like Liferay, Inc., OpenSearchServer
OpenSearchServer
OpenSearchServer is an open source application server allowing development of index-based applications like search engines. Available since April 2009 on SourceForge for download, OpenSearchServer was developed under the GPL v3 license and offers a series of full text lexical analyzers and can be...
Red Hat
Red Hat
Red Hat, Inc. is an S&P 500 company in the free and open source software sector, and a major Linux distribution vendor. Founded in 1993, Red Hat has its corporate headquarters in Raleigh, North Carolina with satellite offices worldwide....
, MySQL AB
MySQL AB
MySQL AB was a software company. MySQL AB is the creator of MySQL, a relational database management system, as well as related products such as MySQL Cluster...
, and JBoss
JBoss (company)
JBoss is a division of Red Hat, Inc.. It specializes in open-source middleware software.The company profits from a service-based business model. JBoss employ a Professional Open Source business model where the core developers of projects make a living and offer their services...
. The business model of these companies tries "to offer open-source software with a free license, while using professional services, maintenance and support for these products to derive revenue."