The Basics of Open Source

I've been interviewing Open Source leaders and Maintainers over the last 6 months, both to help Maintainers get more help, and also to bring newcomers to Open Source projects to help the project, learn software development techniques (working on a different methodology than you use at work is, IMO, a great way to better understand both methods), and advance their careers.

Here is how I would explain Open Source to newcomers– I would welcome your feedback or questions.

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1. What is Open Source?

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[Note that this is a summarized definition of Open Source, intended for Beginner and Intermediate Audiences. For Advanced and Expert audiences we recommend you review the definitions at the Open Source Initiative.]

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Open Source code is code that is accessible to everyone, and (almost always) is created and maintained at least in part by members of the public.

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“Accessible to everyone” means a viewer only needs to create a user account on a version control system like GitHub, Once they do that, they can see Open Source projects.

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“Created and maintained at least in part by members of the public” means that not only can viewers view the code, but they can also make suggested changes such as features or bug fixes, and can review others’ code.

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The Maintainers of the Open Source project– the leadership of one or more repositories– set out guidelines for Contributors of the code on how to write, propose and review code. There are almost always fewer Maintainers than Contributors.

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The opposite of Open Source code is private code. To access private code, not only do you need a version control system account, but you also need an invitation to that private repository (code is stored in repositories, one or more repositories make up an application).

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2. Say more about what Open Source Maintainers do.

Open Source Maintainers are responsible for organizing Open Source projects.

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This includes organizing the work of Contributors, including the processes for recommending improvements, adding proposed code, and approving that code. Maintainers can approve code (in GitHub, via reviewing pull requests), and Contributors can too, depending on the project’s guidelines.

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But Maintainers do a lot more than that, too. To quote one of the Maintainers I interviewed:

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“Being a Maintainer is not just about coding, it’s about finding issues that are really good, especially for first-time contributors to the repository. I try to sit down and go through the code and see if I can find good first issues on a fairly regular basis, so that I can help new people to get involved with our code.”

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3. What are examples of Open Source?

A neat example of Open Source code comes from NASA- at github dot com slash nasa [I hope this is ok– I'm not affiliated, just a fan]

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NASA has published 413 Open Source projects, some of which are combined to create applications.

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One of the applications is Cumulus, which is used to collect information about the Earth’s atmosphere.

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You can that Cumulus is actively under development — there are changes made within minutes of this screenshot.

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From here you can dig in and see that one repository within Cumulus, also named Cumulus, has 2810 finalized or rejected changes (closed Pull Requests) and 10 changes that haven’t been accepted yet (open Pull Requests).

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4. How big is Open Source?

It’s huge, and it’s growing every day.

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One estimate is that there are 180,000 Open Source projects.

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And Open Source code is incorporated into many other projects. One recent estimate found that 96% of all applications included some Open Source code.

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GitHub estimates that 19% of code contributions went to Open Source projects:

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Open Source contributors and maintainers can come from all walks of life and are around the globe. 80% of Open Source contributors in 2019 came from outside the US.

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5. Can anyone use Open Source code once it’s created?

Sort of.

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It is technically possible to take any Open Source project and make a copy of it– that’s part of what it means to be Open Source.

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However, there are also important legal– and in my view, ethical– considerations.

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First, the legal ones.

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All Open Source code comes with a license, which lays out how you are allowed to that code. Private code has licenses too.

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These licenses vary substantially.

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Some licenses are quite permissive– you can do whatever you want with the code.

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Some licenses have very particular requirements: if you use the code and share it, you are required to give away any code you create for free as well. This is called a “CopyLeft” license. Violations of CopyLeft can be a big deal for companies– such as lawsuits.

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What does that mean for you?

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First, know that there is no way to tell what kind of license it is just based on having access to it– you have to read the license.

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Good news, if you are exploring the code to learn from it, there’s nothing to worry about.

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If you are using the code personally– not just exploring it, but putting the code to work– then you need to read the license file. If it’s a commercial license, do the right thing and pay for it.

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Those are the legal issues. Let’s talk about the ethical issues.

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Open Source code is only based on the community of millions of coders who make it possible.

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Even if the license type is permissive, I believe all Open Source users, whether individuals or teams, have an obligation to give back to the communities who’ve created the code.

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From my Scouting days there is an expression– leave a campfire better than you found it. This can apply to codebases generally, but it also applies to Open Source: if you use Open Source code, you should help make that Open Source code or other Open Source code better.

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Thankfully there are many ways to give back to Open Source, and not just by coding.

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• As an individual, become a Contributor or a Maintainer to the code
• As an individual, become a Contributor or a Maintainer for the community
• As an organization, donate to Open Source projects that your company uses
• As an organization, donate goods or services (such as your company’s software) to Open Source projects