Tutorial

What is Open Source?

Published on December 8, 2020

    Senior Developer Educator

    What is Open Source?

    Open source software (OSS) is software that’s freely available to use, redistribute, and modify, typically shared via a public code repository hosting service.

    Projects that are open source encourage a transparent process that is advanced through distributed peer review. Open source projects can be updated quickly and as needed, and offer reliable and flexible software that is not built on locked proprietary systems.

    Visit An Introduction to Open Source to learn about contributing and maintaining open source projects, or our complete list of open source topics and tools.

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    About the authors
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    Senior Developer Educator

    Software engineer, writer, and speaker who loves solving problems and educating the next generation.

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