Open Source

Open Source generally refers to software that is licensed under one (or several) open source licenses such as the GNU or BSD licenses. These licenses have a few differences, but generally allow you to use the software without paying for it AND to modify it. You may NOT claim the software as your own work and you are expected to contribute changes back to the community so that others may benefit from it as well. Most users don't have to worry about that because they don't change the software - they just use it. The "community" is the developer community that wrote the software and which continues to update it and make improvements to it.

 

Open source software is not dangerous and changes are tested by the community before they are permanently incorporated into a public release. In fact, open source software may be better than commercial software because you may have hundreds or even thousands of developers writing, testing and debugging the software rather than just a few - or a few dozen if the software is from a large company.