biggest drawbacks or problems of open source applications?

Share your views, news, tips and articles about VoIP
Post Reply
gbonnet
Site Admin
Posts: 680
Joined: Wed Jul 11, 2007 2:58 pm
Location: Bologna
Contact:

biggest drawbacks or problems of open source applications?

Post by gbonnet » Wed Jan 16, 2008 11:21 am

Hi

I was wondering what were your ideas about that ?
I was being asked this question by a journalist.

Here are some bits of my answer:

Security would be one. Since the source code is available to anyone, hackers can find potential threats easier.
That's not really the case with My SIP Switch though since our only interactions with the outside are via our web server and web site. These are not open source and are heavily protected. My SIP Switch is running with the same level of security as Blueface's servers.
Blueface [url=http://www.blueface.ie/]Phone[/url] Service

Aaron
Site Admin
Posts: 4652
Joined: Thu Jul 12, 2007 12:13 am

Post by Aaron » Fri Jan 18, 2008 9:00 pm

After spending a weak doing some training with one of the main Asterisk developers the prevalent theme about the problem with open source projects is manageability and feature strategy. Often it seems once projects get to a certain size they can become victims of their own success and too many people all with their own ideas result in a fragmented or even worse stalled approach. When this happens the dreaded project fork often happens. It doesn't always happen: postgresql, Linux, firefox, mysql etc; however they'd be the exception rather than the rule.

Regards,

Aaron

User avatar
TheFug
Posts: 914
Joined: Sat Oct 06, 2007 8:23 am
Location: The Netherlands, North-Holland

Re: biggest drawbacks or problems of open source application

Post by TheFug » Fri Jan 25, 2008 11:39 pm

gbonnet wrote:Hi

I was wondering what were your ideas about that ?
I was being asked this question by a journalist.

Here are some bits of my answer:

Security would be one. Since the source code is available to anyone, hackers can find potential threats easier.
That's not really the case with My SIP Switch though since our only interactions with the outside are via our web server and web site. These are not open source and are heavily protected. My SIP Switch is running with the same level of security as Blueface's servers.
But the threat is found (for free) and can be corrected by anyone..
open is a benefit ...like PGP.

Personaly, i like open source, most of the time you can personaly ask the maker for info, or report bugs, closed source is log...
Thanks, The Fug.

gear: my ISP's Zyxel Modem/Router in bridge, Sitecom WL309 Router, Siemens Gigaset 301D

Post Reply