Linux Solutions

On the fertile battlefield of open source vs. closed source, Nepal has signalled a change as free and open source software such as Linux has been adopted as a serious contender to commercial software, a la Microsoft.

Most people enjoy free things, the word is used by many a retailer to entice customers in to the shops - “buy one, get one free” and the like. However, free and open source software (FOSS) has struggled to make a serious impact when in the ring with commercial heavyweights like Microsoft, because there were so many pirated versions of Windows operating systems, they were cheap and often come free with hardware which making it difficult for FOSS to gain a foothold.

FOSS’s ethos was always one of freedom of use, modification and the ability to share ideas and code. If you look at examples of how well this works you need look no further than Firefox or OpenOffice, which are both community contributed entities that have made that biggest impact on the mainstream computer user.

Closed-source programs can cost and arm and a leg too. A copy of Photoshop for example will cost you a couple of hundred bucks, and as well as being un-modifiable, can only be used on one computer.

Subir Pradhananga, president of FOSS Nepal says that the rights of the software are restricted to the company and the user must comply with their policies.

However, regardless of the cost an limitations of closed software, it is still used worldwide. Pradhananga says this is due to a lack of awareness, and says that there are FOSS alternatives for almost every type of software imaginable.

In Nepal Pradhananga wants to show people the benefits of open source, free software by setting up public programs and recruiting young engineers into backing FOSS.

In southern Asia, Nepal is it the forefront of promoting FOSS. In 2005 a Nepali OS called NepaLinux was created and is currently available ion four versions. This development allowed non-English speaking people in Nepal to use computers.

Nepal has issued FOSS to several rural schools and have had enthusiasts lobby government to adopt free software in to the country’s IT set-up, and in the education curriculum.

Making a switch to FOSS would not be very hard as many of the free applications are compatible with the Windows operating system, and they could install a dual booting system on a computer.

The idea of using open source software is such an easy sell: Developers and users can share ideas across the world to find ways of modifying and improving the software, ensuring ease of use and working out problems together. Ok so open source software won’t give us world peace, but it’s a start.