Why Open Source?

Open Source software differs from “closed source” or “proprietary” software in several ways.

Collaborative Development

An Open Source project’s source code is freely distributed for developers anywhere to review, debug, and suggest modifications. Its development activities are performed not only by employees of a project’s “parent company” but by many (sometimes hundreds) of outsiders.

This approach has led to more rapid development timeframes and significantly lower cost structures than proprietary approaches.

Examples

We use and benefit from Open Source software every day:

  • Most mobile phones run on the open-source Android operating system.
  • Most websites run on the open-source Apache web server.
  • Many huge websites run on the open-source PHP platform, including Facebook.
  • Most Internet webservers, including Google, run on the open-source Linux operating system.

License Freedom

With a typical proprietary software license, use is granted based on specific conditions. Per-seat or per-port license fee structures are common. With open source, use cannot be prevented.

If the primary developer of a particular application decides to discontinue it or otherwise impose fees, end-users cannot be forced to participate.

Commercial Support

Support for Asterisk is provided by a worldwide network of resellers and partners, as well as by Digium itself. Voneto provides incidental as well as managed support solutions for its customers

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