The raw materials needed to produce computer software are human imagination and industry. The essential ingredient is thus cooperation.

Forged in a strongly Capitalist society, software production had become dominated by oligopolies. Human cooperation was defined in terms of the profit motive.

As in any oligopoly, the character of its output had become one of poor quality, with scant choice, few freedoms, and high costs. The potential benefit for people (programmers) cooperating freely to produce their own software thus increased correspondingly.

The OpenSource movement provides an intellectual and practical framework for expressing that potential. As in the case of any revolution, it has happened because oligopolist practices ironically provide the pressure to make it inevitable. Its roots are not haphazard but deliberate, emerging from the philosophical, political and legal manifestos of a handful of fiery individuals.

The product is still software, but also a culturally different process for creating it. It has given birth to the antithesis of that which spawned it : a great mass of software variety, generally of high quality, and of low (often no) cost.

This course will discuss the origins of OpenSource, its practices, and its ramifications, but not to excess.

Having elaborated the paradigm, the aim of this course is to provide practical examples of high quality software which you can use. In doing so, it is possible to save money and improve the quality and range of the software you use.



An introduction to Open Source software

* Software production paradigms
* The History of opensource.
* The Mechanics of opensource software production.


OpenSource software running on the Microsoft Windows Operating System

* Introducing some key applications
* Demonstrations of their use


Switching from Windows to an OpenSource operating system

* An introduction to Linux
* Installing Linux alongside Windows
* Using Linux
* Conclusions


* A free version of Linux on a CD will be provided. This enables you try Linux in your own time without having to install anything onto your hard-disk.