What Is Open Source? A Simple Definition (With Examples)

What is open-source software? Or open source code? The term shows up more and more in the digital age. What does it actually mean? Let’s walk through a simple definition together.

Where did open source come from?

Open-source was born out of the computing revolution of the 1980s. Back then, a group of programmers, aware of the limits that intellectual property placed on software, began experimenting with ideas of sharing and collaboration. And it was in 1998 that the concept was formally christened “open source.” That year, a set of developers established the Open Source Initiative (OSI), an organization dedicated to promoting and protecting the free software movement. The OSI was founded on the belief that sharing source code would fuel innovation and lead to higher-quality software. And so the term “open source” became the symbol of a collaborative, transparent approach to software development, turning a simple idea into a worldwide computing revolution.

But why was open source such a revolution? (especially for WordPress!)

People happily call open-source a game-changer, but why exactly? For several reasons, and notably:

1. It democratized technology: open source opened up access to technology by letting anyone, anywhere, freely access the source code of software. That gave rise to a worldwide community of developers, breaking down the industry’s traditional barriers and giving everyone the chance to contribute to innovative projects. WordPress is of course a perfect example, with its community improving the core code just as much as building plugins and themes, and answering every question along the way.
2. Stability and reliability: open source software is often praised for its stability and reliability, thanks to a diverse community of developers paying close attention to spotting and fixing bugs. Countless operating systems, web servers, databases and other critical infrastructure rely on open source software to keep running smoothly. Here too, WordPress illustrates the point perfectly: security fixes are regular, and bug fixes arrive very quickly through those recurring updates.
3. Flexibility and customization: open source offers unmatched flexibility and adaptability, letting users tailor software to their specific needs. That freedom to modify has led to bespoke solutions for a huge range of applications, from websites to embedded systems to supercomputers. There’s no counting the number of themes and extensions built by WordPress developers around the world.
4. And real savings: adopting open source code has let businesses and organizations make significant savings, cutting licensing costs and offering a viable alternative to often-expensive proprietary solutions. It has also fostered a thriving commercial ecosystem around open-source services and support. In fact, I explain the difference between the paid WordPress.com service and the open source CMS available on WordPress.org: because WordPress is open source, it is and always will be free for life. And the whole idea behind Wooordpress.com is to help you build your site while learning how WordPress works, so you can keep the cost down!

And besides WordPress… any other famous open source projects?

Among the crown jewels of open source, you’ll find iconic projects that have reshaped the tech industry, such as:

• Linux, the flagship operating system, rival to macOS and Windows
• The web browser Mozilla Firefox, rival to Google Chrome, Safari, Edge, Arc, and many others
• Apache HTTP Server, renowned for its reliability, security and performance, powering web hosting for sites of every size on most of the world’s servers
• Bitcoin, the cryptocurrency aiming to offer an alternative to state currencies, whose managed inflation is borne by ordinary people, and which is finding its way into more and more households

The list could go on and on, but we can still mention Git, Apache Hadoop, Docker, TensorFlow, Kubernetes, and more, so many projects and technologies that have governed the infrastructure behind computing and the internet for decades.

In short…

… open-source has profoundly transformed the computing industry and the internet by nurturing a culture of collaboration, open innovation and technological accessibility. Its impact continues to be felt across a multitude of sectors, offering a promising future where sharing and cooperation are the pillars of a constantly evolving digital society. Wonderful values, born from computing!