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Computer software which is made
available for use free of charge, for an unlimited time,
as opposed to shareware where the user is required to
pay .
Authors of freeware often want to give
something to the community, but also want credit for
their software and to retain control of its future
development.
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Commercial software is most often proprietary software,
but free software is also used as commercial software.
All or parts of software packages and services that
support commerce are increasingly made available as free
software.
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In the software industry;
those developing proprietary software such as Microsoft,
and those developing open source software. Developing
proprietary software is costly and involves software
licensing and the need to protect the software from
cracking and piracy.
The main financial return on open source comes from
selling services, such as training and support, rather
than the software itself. Many contributors to open
source software especially those developing software
tools also feel that there is a significant long-term
return in the form of improved resources and
capabilities within the software industry. |
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A final aspect of software
innovation is its evaluation. The benefits of software
innovation, and its effects often lie many years in the
future, dependent on commercial exploitation and diffusion,
whereas software developers need ways of understanding
whether they are working
innovatively at the time of working, or shortly
afterwards. Bad projects need to be closed down and bad
development practices improved.
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