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Thursday, February 11, 2010

Tips For Selecting Open Source Software

The main criteria for selecting open source software are reliability, performance and total cost of ownership (TCO). The total cost of ownership includes the purchase price and ongoing costs for support such as license renewal.

Tips for selecting open source software are:

  • Reputation: Any type of software needs to be having good reputation and reliability. Open source software has a very good reputation in the industry such as Apache web browser, GNU compiler collection, and Linux. It is better to discuss with the persons who are experienced in using open source software.
  • Standards and interoperability: Use the software that implements open standards. The good software is also having the ability to work with other software and does not force you to learn new languages and complex data formats.
  • Support: The good software requires commercial and community support. The commercial support is available from a diversity of companies.
  • Documentation: The open source software is good at development documentation. You can also trace the clear history of bug fixes, features, and changes in the open source software.
  • License: It is better to examine the open source license before you are selecting. Make clear about usage of conditions and incorporation of code into other packages.

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