The Benefits of Open Source Software Solutions

When it comes to enterprise software solutions, businesses may end up shelling out hundreds of thousands of dollars in licensing fees alone. Popular platforms, like big-brand customer relationship management (CRM) tools, are not only pricey but lack the freedom otherwise found in open source software solutions and hardware options available in creative commons.

Open source products can transform your infrastructure, reducing costs and streamlining upgrades, making it a reliable, agile setup for your organization.

While the cost-effective advantages of open source solutions are huge, the benefits extend far beyond the savings. Other open-source perks, for example, include Agile improvements via upgrades and development.

Readily available hardware plans, and community software vetting, are also a few major key takeaways when considering the proactive impact open-source software could deliver. In enterprise use cases, open-source infrastructure has a wealth of features that closed-source options can just not compete with.

Flexibility

Perhaps one of the most notable characteristics of open source software is its flexible nature. Like clay, open source infrastructure can be molded – shaped and reshaped, over time, to adjust to varying business needs. This is especially useful when considering changing priorities and business objectives, and the technology corresponding to these priorities.

Developers can make huge changes to their operating systems, without the need for third party interference, because the source code is readily available for both software and hardware.

When solving a problem, open-source options allow for numerous paths to reach a solution. What’s more, you can collaborate with the open-source community every step of the way. By reviewing code and adding various features without having to rely on a third-party, developers are able to rework the software to adapt to your department’s needs.

The adaptable, agile nature of open source software simply doesn’t exist elsewhere – and if it does, you’re likely paying the price with costly proprietary software.

Speed-to-Market

Ultimately, we have an overwhelming dependence on technological deployment cycles for patches, upgrades, and new features. With closed source, proprietary software, you are at the mercy of another company’s development, vetting and release cycle.

By switching in your cap for a red hat, you’ll find a lot less time is spent on the preamble associated with each and every roll-out of a new patch or upgrade.

With open source software, however, you own your timeline, meaning you can have and implement those patches and upgrades much faster.

Think about it this way: There is no board of directors or corporate lawyers to hold you back from immediately releasing an upgrade, patch or feature once its development is complete.

Cost-Effectiveness

Software expenses can eat through your budget very quickly, rapidly depleting your resources in accordance with the terms of the contractual agreement issued by the proprietor, or a “vendor lock.”

While switching to a more open infrastructure may not be absolutely free, you can expect to significantly reduce operating costs when following through with your open source project.

A wealth of information exists to support your open source code endeavors. The Open Compute Project, or the Open19 specification, for example, can help in supporting sustainable infrastructure with respect to the redesign of hardware technology.

These initiatives enable streamlined, modular hardware configurations allowing you to inexpensively scale data center racks to meet growing data processing demands for both on-premises and edge deployments.

Open source infrastructure initiatives make all of their documentation available online. As such, your department can download specs, setup instructions, and tutorials directly, without the need for a service contract to keep systems running in an on-site data center post-installation.

Peer-to-peer support is overwhelmingly prominent in various forums and online communities, again easily accessible by users looking for specific information and answers to their queries.