Software Freedom and freedom..

Images from OpenClipart library


"What is this about Sir" the first year Computer Science student asked. The event was the Software Freedom Day event organised by the University of Guyana Free and Open Source Software Club on 14 September, 2018. 

"Software freedom"  is a movement around the Free Software Philosophy .
Free software refers to software with licenses which allow users to run the software for any purpose, to study the software , to share the software to help others, and to modify the software and share the modifications to help others. Free software can be free of cost, or come at a price.  Open Source Software has to satisfy an extended set of criteria, but also gives users access to the source code.

I left the event before the presentations started. However, I understand that Samuel Reid talked about his experiences with postgreSQL  and  QGIS (Geographic Information Systems), and his use of free and open source software (FOSS) as a network administrator at the Bertram Collins College of the Public Service.  Sekhar Mallampati from UG's Software Services Department talked about using Koha for the Library. Jumal Sam talked about his use of Blender in his work as an Animator/Illustrator at Intellect Storm. I learned that I missed some of the active tdiscussions about use of FOSS by software developers and others. The event was facilitated by Dept of Computer Science lecturer Lenandlar Singh.


Here is a presentation from Jumal Sam in August 2017



'Free' as in free speech..
Software freedom sounds ideal.. developing, sharing, open collaboration, no restrictions.
The zero freedom principle - the freedom to run the software for any purpose - was recently tested.  The developers of Lerna , a software tool, tried to restrict the use of the software so that companies (like Microsoft, Linkedin, etc) which work with the US Immigration department could not use it because of the US immigration policies.

The discussions continued to explain that this software freedom was akin to free speech., and that there should be no restrictions.

In other parts of the world, there are projects to develop FOSS tools for various professions and sectors such as  journalism, the health sector, disaster management, governance, etc.  Software freedom is very much linked to the use of open standards, to the availability and sharing of open data and of improving democracy and citizens' access to services.

There are campaigns such as "Public Money? Public Code" which advocate that software which has been developed using public funds should be made available to the public.

I used the Ubuntu (Linux) desktop for about 10 years until I bought a laptop with problematic warranty support.  I use LibreOffice  for word processing and other 'office' tasks, GIMP for image processing, Mozilla for browsing. I have used successfully used other FOSS tools from time to time. I use Drupal and more recently Wordpress to build content management systems.

The Trinidad and Tobago Computer Society maintains an 'OSSWIN' project to share a set of useful OSS software which can be downloaded for free (of cost).

The Ministry of Public Telecommunications had commissioned a draft policy on the use of Free and Open Source Software in the public sector in Guyana..The draft policy document discusses the advantages and disadvantages of adoption of FOSS in Guyana.


Janedd Taylor, President of the UG FOSS Club reported that the Girls in ICT Club had talked about FOSS with some school students.

The question asked by the first year student shows that that the IT curricula in schools should include discussions about the use of Free and open source software.

The use of free and open source software helps to reduce piracy.




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