Interview of Sonali Minocha in Chip Plus, Nov 2010 - Open Source: Look beyond the FREE Tag

1. 10 TALKTIME FEATURE
Open Source: Look
Beyond The ‘Free’ Tag
It’s a general misconception that open source means free. Yes, open
source software is free, but these applications are much more than just
free alternatives.
BY PR I YA N K A T I LV E
What is the idea behind having open
Q source software?
The idea behind open source software is to
A make software source code open and
accessible in a platform and technology-neutral
way. For computing and information technology to
make healthy progress, it is essential that software
be developed with the open source methodology.
Open source, ideologically, creates a perfect market,
with zero barriers to entry and exit, and 100 percent
awareness in the market participants.
What are the challenges faced by the open
Q source movement in India?
The challenges are many. The biggest
A challenge is the lack of awareness, and
decentralization. There is a lack of awareness of the
potential of open source, both technologically and
for businesses. There is no restrictive ownership of
open source, as the ownership is shared by the
SONALI MINOCHA
Conference Content Head for OSI Days contributors to the project as dictated by the open
source license of choice. This decentralization of
T
he essence of open source is that it ownership creates a lot of confusion amongst new
encourages developers and gives them a entrants in the domain.
platform to showcase their skills. It is truly Another set of challenges is at the policy level.
democratic in nature. When a developer starts Proprietary tools and technologies, sadly, form a
developing software, anybody from the community considerable part of our educational curriculum.
can contribute to it, perfect it by ironing out flaws, There is no solid government policy about
and keep adding new features. As a result, this proprietary and open source software. However, the
software is extremely popular amongst end users good news is that things are slowly changing, but
not only because it’s free, but also because of its the rate of change right now is unsatisfactorily slow.
functionality.
Though it is popular worldwide, the open source Do you think it is financially viable for
movement is slowly picking up momentum in India,
Q developers?
as was evident at the recently concluded Open Open source is financially viable. It has been
Source India (OSI) Days event in Chennai. We spoke
A proven time and again by many open source
with Sonali Minocha, Director (Databases), OSSCube, projects. Redhat Linux, Apache Webserver, Mozilla
who was also the conference content head for OSI Firefox, SugarCRM, and MySQL Database are some
Days, about the nature and scope of open source examples of open source projects that are not only
software in India. financially viable, but also leaders of their domains.
INTELLIGENT COMPUTING CHIP PLUS SUPPLEMENT | NOVEMBER 2010

2. FEATURE TALKTIME 11
It is a misconception that by opening up your code,
you lose your economic potential. Open source
software is more economically efficient than
proprietary software. It is the lack of awareness that is
the deterrent and not the lack of financial viability.
What is the nature of software that is
Q popular in open source?
Open source is omnipotent. It is present in all
A categories of software. If you look at Wikipedia’s
compilation of open source software, or at the
Sourceforge Directory, you will find there is no
shortage of popular open source software in any
field. Blender is a popular 3D modeling and animation
tool, Firefox is a popular web browser, LibreOffice is a
Drupal is the most favored open source software that allows you to easily publish, manage and
popular productivity suite, Apache runs almost 70 organize content on a website.
percent of all websites, VLC is one of the most popular
media players, Wordpress is the blogging platform of
choice, Drupal runs millions of websites, and there are
many more tools like these.
How popular are these open source software
Q amongst the general users?
It is a misconception that open source is a geek’s
A toy. Open source software is being written with
the end user in mind. Wordpress is being used to run
over 200 million blogs. Firefox holds the Guinness
world record for the most downloaded software in a
single day. Almost all of the most used projects of all
time on Sourceforge are end-user applications. Open
source software is very popular amongst general
users. There is a substantial number of end users who
do not realize they are using an open source
Mozilla Firefox is a free and open source web browser that has gained popularity because of its
application or don’t understand open source in its
speed and efficiency.
totality, but they still use it.
What kind of support can a developer
Q expect?
The best thing about being an open source
A developer or end user is that you are never
alone. You are part of a community. Help is always
available. Unlike proprietary software, where you
either risk license violation by getting third-party
support or wait for official help, with open source, you
just have to ask the right questions. There are
numerous community forums, IRC channels, and
knowledge bases available.
How safe is open source software
Q to use?
Way safer than any proprietary software. During
A the development of any popular open source Blender which was developed as an in-house application is today a popular open source 3D Modelling
and animation program with advanced features.
software, every line of code is peer-reviewed and
NOVEMBER 2010 | INTELLIGENT COMPUTING CHIP PLUS SUPPLEMENT

3. 12 TALKTIME FEATURE
passes through the eyes of the community before
becoming a part of the final software. Bugs occur;
they are a part of software development, but the
turnaround time from bug identification to bug
resolution is extremely fast in open source software.
There is a misconception that since the source is
open, anyone can see the code and create a hack to
exploit it. The truth is that the process of developing
open source software is so robust that a public
exhibition only showcases zero fault tolerance and
does not expose vulnerabilities. Any vulnerability that
may exist is highlighted easily due to open access to
code and rapidly fixed.
How popular is the development of open
LibreOffice is a popular open source program that is compatible with other major office suites, and is Q source software in India?
available on a variety of platforms.
Indian developers and organizations extensively
A use open source tools and technologies to solve
business problems. However, there is a growing niche
of open source developers. Plus, the increasing
awareness for open source and the increasing positive
outlook of the industry towards open source are
encouraging symptoms.
What is the future of open source software in
Q India?
India is the global hub of development and a
A large number of developers are working with
open source tools and technologies. With increasing
community awareness and with community initiatives
like OSScamps, PHPCamps, DrupalCamp India, and
industry initiatives like OSI Days, FOSS.in, and Freed.
in, there is a growing buzz for open source in India,
Red Hat is a leading name in the development of free and open source software. Its applications are
greater adoption of open source software, and a
mostly developed for the Linux platform.
higher inclination towards developing and
contributing to open source software. The future is
promising.
ABOUT OPEN SOURCE INDIA
Open Source India (formerly LinuxAsia) was
started in 2003 with the mission to accelerate
the growth of adoption of open source in Asia.
Today, the overall mission of Open Source
India remains the same. A key attribute of
Open Source India is that it tries to bridge the
gap between the community and the industry.
While OSI provides a platform for advocacy of
principles powering open source, majority of
its content is focused on topics that are related
to the industry.
Open Source India strives to popularize and accelerate the growth of Open Source software in Asia. It www.osidays.com
tries to bridge gap between community and industry.
INTELLIGENT COMPUTING CHIP PLUS SUPPLEMENT | NOVEMBER 2010