Template talk:FOSS

This Template

I created this template as a result of a request at Template talk:Linux.

I consider that it needs a lot of development and also that it needs to be put on a lot of pages. Please feel free to do both and let's see how we can evolve it! - Ahunt (talk) 17:13, 24 March 2008 (UTC)

Would it be appropriate to add the portal links to the nav template? I see no reason to clutter articles with both.

Also: I think that the 'applications' row should be removed (unless someone can provide an objective means for deciding which applications to include--the scope is just too large). --Karnesky (talk) 18:13, 24 March 2008 (UTC)

The idea of merging the portal into the nav template sounds great, if you know how to make that work, please do.

I agree that the app list will get too long. Perhaps it should just link o List of open source software packages instead as that page seems to serve much the same idea? - Ahunt (talk) 18:31, 24 March 2008 (UTC)

Good move. I see plenty of space for some "open source software packages" templates - the list is just ridiculous.--Kozuch (talk) 23:00, 24 March 2008 (UTC)

I think that doing away with the list was a good idea. It would have got very long very quickly. The page linked to is the most complete list of open source applications on Wikipedia. - Ahunt (talk) 23:56, 24 March 2008 (UTC)

What else do we need on this template for categories? - Ahunt (talk) 23:58, 24 March 2008 (UTC)

I have added the Free Software portal to the nav template, so this nav box can probably now replace the same small portal boxes on those pages, just to reduce clutter. Please do add any other applicable portal links to this nav box!- Ahunt (talk) 12:00, 25 March 2008 (UTC)

Portal:Free software is the only portal about free software on WP. Portal links have a standard appearance (the small box with logo on left). If a mention of the portal in this box is to replace those portal links, it should be linked by it's small box rather than by a simple text link. --Gronky (talk) 12:24, 25 March 2008 (UTC)

Actually, I just realised that replacing the portal link with this template is a bad idea. On many of Wikipedia's best articles, there are multiple templates at the bottom and the contents get hidden. Portals are normally linked outside of template boxes, so Wikipedia readers would not know to look in the template for the free software portal. --Gronky (talk) 12:30, 25 March 2008 (UTC)

Okay - makes sense. I'll leave the portal links on the nav template for convenience, but leave the portal box on the pages, too. I did think it reduced clutter! - Ahunt (talk) 13:16, 25 March 2008 (UTC)

PS - Thanks for putting the portal box into the template. That makes it a bit more obvious! I reverted the removal of the portal box on the Mozilla Firefox page, but have left it removed on some of the shorter pages, where it was close to the nav box. We'll see what other editors think. - Ahunt (talk) 13:45, 25 March 2008 (UTC)

New group for compilers & interpreters?

I would be tempted to add GCC and some other open source compilers, but it probably doesn't make sense to include it with the other applications. Perhaps we need a new group for Computer Languages? -- Schapel (talk) 18:35, 24 March 2008 (UTC)

Sounds good as long as they are free/open source - feel, free to edit the template. - Ahunt (talk) 19:10, 24 March 2008 (UTC)

Well, I would try to keep some _basic programming and development_ links in this template, because as soon as we start to list more projects, there will be no end...--Kozuch (talk) 12:44, 26 March 2008 (UTC)

Template placements

I think we should stick to one rule - place the template on pages only that the template lists. I think this should actually apply for all templates ever.--Kozuch (talk) 18:35, 25 March 2008 (UTC)

In general I agree, but I do think that this template is also useful on open source application article pages. In general most of these have no nav boxes to link them to other subjects and in particular the master list at List of open source software packages. I think this list is the most useful link we have as it helps users locate articles on free software applications. - Ahunt (talk) 19:16, 25 March 2008 (UTC)

While creating "FOSS packages" template will be truly complex task, using FOSS template temporarily on the applications pages might be an accepbable solution.--Kozuch (talk) 20:17, 25 March 2008 (UTC)

I don't think it would be possible to create an applications (packages) nav template. There are just too many open source apps available. The List of open source software packages is as close as we will get, I think! - Ahunt (talk) 21:20, 25 March 2008 (UTC)

I think there could be maybe more templated for some sections of the list... probably the most complete sections. I will try to have a look at it.--Kozuch (talk) 10:54, 26 March 2008 (UTC)

It may be possible to use the headings from List of open source software packages to create something manageable. The key thing is whether it will help readers! Are you thinking of adding that to this template? That might be a good place to start, this template could be a bit bigger than it is without getting unwieldy. For an example of how big a nav box can get without too many complaints see Template:USN_scout_aircraft - Ahunt (talk) 11:32, 26 March 2008 (UTC)

Linux Foudation

I am not sure Linux Foundation should be here, as it is mostly Linux-only oriented and is in Linux template already.--Kozuch (talk) 12:32, 26 March 2008 (UTC)

Why are we linking to individual projects.

While CUPS is very important, there are thousands of other *nix components and applications that are also important. Why should this template have any links to projects at all? Instead there should be one link to "important projects". Based on feedback, or lack of it. I will make the template project neutral in the future. (Ftrotter (talk) 17:24, 6 May 2008 (UTC))

You make a good point. Early in the history of this template we had a list of applications, but it was obvious that it was going to get pretty large pretty fast, so we opted to go with a link labeled " List of applications" that leads to List of open source software packages. CUPS is linked from that list indirectly, it is under "Category:Free PDF software", linked from "PDF Main article: Category:Free PDF software". Based on that it could be argued that this template altready links through indirectly to CUPS. I think it is really an issue of how large we want this template to get. Some like Template:USN scout aircraft are considerably bigger than this one is.- Ahunt (talk) 20:16, 6 May 2008 (UTC)

I agree - while I guess CUPS is a notable open-source package, there are plenty others at least as notable that aren't on this template, and if we included them all, we'd have a much bigger template. IMHO, this navbox should stay close to the "Topics" box on Portal:Free software. Letdorf (talk) 11:44, 17 November 2008 (UTC).

bsd

should this template truly link "bsd?" Noone uses bsd, they use openbsd, freebsd, or netbsd. 74.13.56.168 (talk) 14:44, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

Well no one uses "Linux" either - they use the distros based on it. The BSD article gives the basic background on BSD and then links people to the BSD distos. - Ahunt (talk) 16:00, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

Uh, hate to be a prick and all, well, no, that's not accurate, I actually enjoy it, but anyways... The three BSDs are not distributions, they're full fledged operating systems, unlike the Linux operating systems, which are all redistributions of the same basic set of software. Each bit of the systems are different, even if they implement the same functionality - FreeBSD's and OpenBSD's tail are not the same piece of software, they're not even made by the same people. 74.13.56.168 (talk) 20:30, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

So what are you suggesting? - Ahunt (talk) 20:35, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

Maybe call it operating system families, instead of operating systems? 74.13.56.168 (talk) 20:37, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

Sounds logical to me - Ahunt (talk) 22:26, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

M'kay. 74.13.37.109 (talk) 15:09, 2 August 2008 (UTC)

Programming languages?

Hi, I am puzzled with linking to some programming languages in the development section of this navbox. Even if, for example in the case of Java, the Sun's JVM is free software there are a lot of other compilers and virtual machines that aren't. And in any case, even if it has some sense linking to a particular implementation of a compilation toolchain for given programming language, the language per se cannot be considered free software or not. From my POV, it would be more interesting in that section to link to development tools like binutils, gdb, autotools, qemu... but IMO it doesn't have any sense to link to a programming language. Opinions? —surueña 16:38, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

Power.org

Is Power.org a FOSS Foundation, or is it just IBM related vendors and common competitors such as Sun Microsystems supporting it. Because if you look at the official site, some documents are not free to everyone, looks a bit similar to IEEE. --Ramu50 (talk) 03:56, 10 November 2008 (UTC)

Their mission statement says "Mission - Power.org's mission is to develop, enable and promote Power Architecture technology as the preferred open standard hardware development platform for the electronics industry and to administer qualification programs that optimize interoperability and accelerate innovation for a positive user experience."

I am not sure that qualifies them to be on this template. - Ahunt (talk) 11:20, 10 November 2008 (UTC)

"FOSS" is an abbreviation for "Free and Open Source Software" whereas Power.org is about promoting a hardware platform. It absolutely does not qualify. The presence of free documents is irrelevant. Rilak (talk) 05:47, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

Sentence case for the title

The example given on template:navbox/doc for the title field is given in sentence case, and this appears to be the predominant form used on other templates. It also conveniently allows us to bypass a redirect without having to pipe the link. Therefore, the title of this template should be in sentence case and not title case. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 09:29, 13 November 2008 (UTC)

The Wikipedia Manual of Style supports this, saying: "The initial letter of a title is capitalized (except in very rare cases, such as eBay). Otherwise, capital letters are used only where implied by normal capitalization rules (Funding of UNESCO projects, not Funding of UNESCO Projects)." - Ahunt (talk) 12:02, 13 November 2008 (UTC)

Object Management Group

Is Object Management Group open source? --Ramu50 (talk) 23:43, 13 November 2008 (UTC)

It doesn't sound like it to me: www.omg.org: " The Object Management Group (OMG) - OMG™ is an international, open membership, not-for-profit computer industry consortium. OMG Task Forces develop enterprise integration standards for a wide range of technologies, and an even wider range of industries. OMG’s modeling standards enable powerful visual design, execution and maintenance of software and other processes. OMG’s middleware standards and profiles are based on the Common Object Request Broker Architecture (CORBA®) and support a wide variety of industries. All of our specifications may be downloaded without charge from our website." - Ahunt (talk) 00:13, 14 November 2008 (UTC)

APEX

APEX stand for AGEIA Adaptive Physics EXtensions (APEX) Development Platform, I believe this is a physics library for Aegia platform. This is probably similar to a lot of the Flash Engine that is trying to accomplish physics implementations. --Ramu50 (talk) 22:45, 13 November 2008 (UTC)

Inappropriate links

There seems to be a number of inappropriate links appearing in this navbox recently, for instance, Template:Web browsers, ECMAScript and Template:Layout engines - none of these topics are intrinsically related to free/open-source software. Also, I'm dubious about the practice of linking to (as opposed to transcluding) navbox templates. Letdorf (talk) 11:36, 17 November 2008 (UTC).

This has been brought up many times with the user responsible for the recent additions - indiscriminate additions for the sake of attempting to turn project navboxen into directories rather than simple navigation tools. I'd recommend a full review of the template and a moratorium on adding more links until complete. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 11:46, 17 November 2008 (UTC)

Far too many times, I would say. The links in question are placed in the history section too, which if I am not mistaken, previously contained only "History of" type articles, as it should. Sigh. Rilak (talk) 11:56, 17 November 2008 (UTC)

"X Window System" and "Common Unix Printing System" are in the "General" section even though they are very specific "things". It should be noted that most other links in the section are to articles that do not go into specifics when compared with the two links in question. Rilak (talk) 12:25, 17 November 2008 (UTC)

I've now added a "Notable packages" section and moved X and CUPS there, along with a few other packages that spring to mind. Also pruned some questionable links in other sections. Letdorf (talk) 11:49, 24 November 2008 (UTC).

I am reverting the browser section, only Mozilla is part of the History is entirely WP:OR, KDE involement in its own engines, browsers are also part of the FOSS history. Just because Mozilla own majority of the market, that doesn't make other browsers non-notable. Not reverting the Unix printing. --Ramu50 (talk) 01:32, 25 November 2008 (UTC)

The history section should only contain articles that mostly deal with history, hence the section title. Simply because you think an article's subject is part of history is irrelevant. Rilak (talk) 05:37, 25 November 2008 (UTC)

But not all web browsers are/were FOSS! Mozilla/Firefox is undoubtedly the most notable FOSS browser to date. Letdorf (talk) 09:40, 25 November 2008 (UTC).

But for the least ECMAScript should be included, it is an important history of FOSS. I will see if there are better article to represent Open Source Browser History. --Ramu50 (talk) 01:03, 26 November 2008 (UTC)

OpenGL and Y!OS

Isn't OpenGL open source. Only The Khronous Group is non-FOSS organization. Because it wasn't I don't think Xgl architecture would be allowed in all Linux OS.

I really don't see why Y!OS can't be there if Google Code is allowed.

ACML is open source for sure. AMD allows users contributions to develop on the library and a forum even exists.

Sorry about SVG, didn't know it was developed by W3C before. By the way does anyone how what license is Atom and RSS registered as? --Ramu50 (talk) 01:04, 26 November 2008 (UTC)

Google Code is only open source, whereas the Yahoo! Developer Network doesn't indicate that it is. OpenGL is a specification and it indicates that the licences are "various", but not what they are. - Ahunt (talk) 01:11, 26 November 2008 (UTC)

Interesting This site says http://www.sgi.com/products/software/opengl/license.html

Application developers do not need to license the OpenGL API. Generally, hardware vendors that are 
creating binaries to ship with their hardware are the only developers that need to have a license. 
If an application developer wants to use the OpenGL API, the developer needs to obtain copies of a 
linkable OpenGL library for a particular hardware device or machine. Those OpenGL libraries may be 
bundled with the development and/or run-time options or may be purchased from a third-party 
software vendor without licensing the source code or use of the OpenGL trademark.

even though money is involved, but I think OpenGL is probably registered as an NPO. --Ramu50 (talk) 01:15, 26 November 2008 (UTC)

I think we need more information on that one and the Wikipedia article needs to explain that better before it is included. - Ahunt (talk) 01:26, 26 November 2008 (UTC)

Software which is available for free may not necessarily be free in the sense of this template because it is free as in beer (in other words, it is free in price, not in the right to modify, fork, etc.). What is quoted is that the OpenGL API is free to use in certain situations (Application developers do not need to license the OpenGL API.), and it needs to be licensed in others ("Generally, hardware vendors that are creating binaries to ship with their hardware are the only developers that need to have a license.). If we read the GPL and other compatible or similar licenses, this kind of restriction is present, so no, with the information presented, OpenGL is not FOSS and is therefore out of the scope of this template. It should be noted that it is called "OpenGL", it does not mean "open" in the context of FOSS. Every company or organisation has their own idea of what "open" means, and in many cases "open" simply meant, "Well documented, open to use by others", as OpenGL is. Rilak (talk) 05:16, 26 November 2008 (UTC)

OpenGL (like ECMAscript) is an open standard, not open source. These are not the same thing! Open standards can be implemented in closed source software, just as closed standards can be implemented in open source software (through reverse engineering). The ACML license doesn't look like an open source license to me. Y!OS seems to be about opening-up Yahoo!'s web service APIs, not FOSS. Letdorf (talk) 10:44, 26 November 2008 (UTC).

Thanks for the explanations there. Based on that, I think we have the exclusion of those two links right in the template at present. - Ahunt (talk) 11:38, 26 November 2008 (UTC)

The ACML you provided is just a EULA. All software installations whether open source, proprietary or non-profit must have one. However, Section 2 does state the software is free, its just AMD doesn't allow tampering with the source code. You can't modify the source is mentioned in Section 2b, i and ii.

Some of the forum suggest it is dual-license GNU GPL and BSD license.

Subject to the terms of this Agreement, AMD hereby grants to USER a limited, nonexclusive,
non-transferable, royalty-free copyright license to use the Licensed Materials
only for the purpose of executing and evaluating the performance of software. Other
than the limited license granted in this Section 2.a., USER shall have no other rights in
the Licensed Materials or Software, whether express, implied, arising by estoppel or
otherwise. If USER desires to distribute any of the Licensed Materials or Software, USER
shall enter into a separate written agreement with AMD.

--Ramu50 (talk) 20:23, 27 November 2008 (UTC)

One questions should NPO be allowed on this template? --Ramu50 (talk) 20:38, 27 November 2008 (UTC)

the software is free, its just AMD doesn't allow tampering with the source code. In that case it's obviously not FOSS! Have you even read the FOSS article? Letdorf (talk) 20:53, 27 November 2008 (UTC).

Software License Recognition Guide:

BSD licenses have the following as the first line: "This program is distributed under the terms of the BSD License." (Emphasis mine)

GPL licenses have the following as the first line: "This program is distributed under the terms of the GPL vn." (Emphasis mine, n = version number)

I hope this clears any further confusion. Rilak (talk) 07:39, 28 November 2008 (UTC)

ACML is Free Software, but not Open Source true, but the template is called "FOSS," Free AND Open Source.

I think your thoughts (or confusion) are as follows

• The utilities is free, but must require a hardware (a common strategy similar to Freeware)

OR

• Packaged product.

Buy a graphic card and get ACML for free or buy a barebone computer and get OpenOffice.org for free.

However, ACML is neither. --Ramu50 (talk) 21:41, 28 November 2008 (UTC)

Okay so it's now obvious that Ramu50 hasn't even read the first paragraph of the FOSS article. The first sentence in that article reads Free and open source software, also F/OSS, FOSS, or FLOSS (for Free/Libre/Open Source Software) is software which is liberally licensed to grant the right of users to study, change, and improve its design through the availability of its source code. That is the subject of this navbox. "Free" in this context does not refer to price. This is one of the fundamental concepts of the FOSS movement. [1] Please try reading more Wikipedia before you try writing it. Letdorf (talk) 22:55, 28 November 2008 (UTC).

Do you even know how to read the FOSS abbreviations said Free / Open Source. Are you illiterate or what, not knowing the slash means "or", NOT the word "AND." Load of bullshit Original Research claims. User can choose between "Free" and "Open Source." If you guys think this article should ONLY include items that are BOTH "Free" AND "Open Source," then why didn't you think submit a consensus when I submit the numerous Organizations. I even ask for NPO and you guys didn't even said anything. --Ramu50 (talk) 00:44, 30 November 2008 (UTC)

XNU?

It's redundant to list both Darwin (operating system) and XNU here - the latter is the kernel component of the former. Anybody disagree? Letdorf (talk) 11:46, 29 November 2008 (UTC)

I agree, and I reverted the addition again. --Enric Naval (talk) 12:07, 29 November 2008 (UTC)

Initially I was wondering should the father of a family of Distributions should be on there like Ubuntu. Because unlike other distributions Ubuntu distributions does have a project, not just targeting at the mainstream entertainment. The majority of the mainstream distributions have no specific kernel architecture changes, thus placing them would be useless. My idea was the Mach kernel itself is a family, but in comparison to other OS I don't think any other OS family besides BSD, have so many foundations supporting them. Thus I think they are XNU OS Project out there its just we don't know about them. The reason why I pointed out XNU, because it is a successful hybrid kernel that Adobe, Eclipse. Likewise with other projects e.g. scripting languages of Pascal, Delphi, SmallTalk are all equivalent notable as Perl, Python...etc. Most of them have web application framework, virtual machine, compliers...etc supporting them but if a template doesn't exist who will ever understand them. For the same reason if the XNU was not being place who will ever know their project. --Ramu50 (talk) 21:28, 29 November 2008 (UTC)

Speaking of Distributions I think OpenSolaris needs to be removed. The distributions of OpenSolaris are just a random offering, they are no specific project development. --Ramu50 (talk) 21:40, 29 November 2008 (UTC)

I changed OpenSolaris to illumos which is effectively the new name of the OS. Uzume (talk) 20:27, 16 October 2015 (UTC)

I put OpenSolaris back in while we dscuss this. I am not convinced that either OpenSolaris or illumos should be in this box, these are supposed to be OS families, not individual distros and neither is a family. - Ahunt (talk) 20:57, 16 October 2015 (UTC)

Illumos is definitely not the new name as Illumos is a fork from OpenSolaris while OpenSolaris is a generic appellation. Schily (talk) 10:56, 19 October 2015 (UTC)

Okay I have removed it. Should we leave in OpenSolaris? Is it really considered an OS family?- Ahunt (talk) 23:06, 20 October 2015 (UTC)

Changes

I remove Mozilla Thunderbird, because it is not a package. I think you guys should of choose the article Mozilla Software Rebranding to be link with, it has more relationship with Linux, since it encompass Mozilla internet suite, e-mail clients and fork software altogether.

Also the template needs to focus on Guiding the FOSS topics, not directing them to each individual software and advertising them. For now I am still trying to find a Office Suite template to replace Openoffice.org.

Problems Software Packages are things like Google Desktop and GNU. Office suites are not packages, the basis of Office does encompass Word Processing, Presentations (e.g. PowerPoint), Spreadsheets, Publication (and that is why I added DTP template). If people want to know more about each types of software, the related template section is there to guide them and thus each of those template have further studies to guide them, if the viewer wish to learn about it.

Currently trying to sort out the following

• Notable Packages
• Organizations
• License

I think I might need to place GNU license back on there, since I think it is a father of all FOSS license. All other license I think will be better off if we directed to a "list" article of a "comparison article."

Section History KDE was place there, because Template:KDE show a strong evidence, that it is a major role in the Browser history, as it has its own DOM (KDOM), COM (KCOM), SVG development and therefore is equally notable as other browsers. --Ramu50 (talk) 22:07, 29 November 2008 (UTC)

Okay in accordance with WP:BRD, you made your bold changes, you have been reverted several times, now you must discuss, explain yourself and gain consensus before plowing ahead again. The words you have entered above are not comprehensible to me at all.

Perhaps it would help if you can explain what you are trying to overall accomplish with this template since you seem determined to take it in a very different direction than the other editors working on it, regardless of the lack of consensus for your changes. - Ahunt (talk) 00:36, 30 November 2008 (UTC)

Choosing not to discuss with consensus is your own problem. If you choose to be bias and insist on claiming "incomprehensible" as your reply. Then your contributions won't be counted as part of consensus. --Ramu50 (talk) 00:41, 30 November 2008 (UTC)

Please read WP:Civil. Threatening to ignore people who do not agree with you will not result in you getting your own way. Read WP:Consensus. You want to make sweeping changes to this template, but have been reverted on it, that now requires you to get consensus to do so. Try explaining what you are trying to accomplish instead, as you are going to have to convince the other editors working on this template that your direction is a good way to proceed. - Ahunt (talk) 00:47, 30 November 2008 (UTC)

Mono/C#/GTK#

Shouldn't Mono be included under 'development'? Floker (talk) 08:43, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

FOSS Logo

I would like to replace the current unofficial FOSS Logo (left)

with another unofficial logo which better describes "Free and Open Source Software". The logo I wish to replace it with is this one (right)

This logo is created from the GNU logo and the Open Source Logo. The objection by User:Ahunt was the following:

disagree - there is a lot more to free software than Gnu

While I agree that there are many organizations that contribute to free software (as there are many organizations which contribute to open source) it Richard Stallman who started the Free Software movement. The following paragraph comes from the Free Software page

The free software movement was conceived in 1983 by Richard Stallman to satisfy the need for and to give the benefit of "software freedom" to computer users. The Free Software Foundation was founded in 1985 to provide the organizational structure which Stallman correctly foresaw would be necessary to advance his Free Software ideas.

The use of the GNU logo is not attempting to say that GNU is the ONLY free software project. The logo is not attempting to be a measure of software that organizations have written. It IS attempting to describe the thinking behind FOSS which comes from both the GNU project and OSI.

Perhaps you can think of a better logo than the current one and better than the one I proposed. And if so, that would be great because the current logo needs to be replaced. The current logo which is simply an the acronym for Free and Open Source Software written on a green square with curved edges is only relevant from the text on it. By that I mean, for example, if a company made a device which was a combination of a Stapler and Three Hole Puncher and the device was commonly called STHP, writing "STHP" on a green background hardly makes it a "logo" for the Stapler and Three Hole Puncher device. A logo should convey the subject it is representing. Going back to the example, unless the company had a color scheme that EVERYBODY would recognize and it used a very unique font, then a logo with the background and color scheme of the company which "STHP" written in the font would be appropriate but if not, it really doesn't have anything to do with the STHP besides the fact it says on on the logo.

Ahunt - Knowing that the logo represents the thinking behind Free Software and Open Source Software and not the number of commits to any source tree, do you still have a problem with it?

Harrisonmetz (talk) 14:57, 4 April 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for your comment, I do understand where you are coming from on this. However putting a GNU emblem on this free software nav box would be like putting a "Ford" emblem on the automobile nav box, just because Ford first mass-produced cars. There are many more types of cars than Ford and there is much more to free software than GNU. The fact that Richard Stallman is such a controversial person and that many people in the free software movement disagree with him on many issues is a good reason not to use a GNU here.

The original symbol that I put in this nav box was a combined Tux/BSD Beastie/GNU one, but that was deleted at the image source, because the BSD deamon is copyrighted. The source was changed to the current green FOSS box. I agree with you that it is not a very good symbol, although relatively inoffensive.

Since there is no requirement anywhere for nav boxes to have symbols in them, and in fact the vast majority on Wikipedia have none at all, I think that the best solution for this nav box is to have none at all.

There have been a number of people watching this nav box in the past, let's see if we can come up with a consensus on what would be best:

• the Free_Software_Portal_Logo.svg (first one above)
• the Free_Software_and_Open_Source_Software_Composite_Logo.svg (second one above)
• no symbol at all
• something else

- Ahunt (talk) 15:18, 4 April 2009 (UTC)

Alright, I see what you are saying. It would be great to reach a consensus of what people would prefer (does wikipedia have some sort of voting mechanism :P). When it comes to Free Software and Open Source Software it is a very touchy issue. Everyone is satisfied with the end product but the means to which it was reached, the motivations, and the ethics are different.

Harrisonmetz (talk) 15:51, 4 April 2009 (UTC)

We don't "vote" on these sort of issues, but work on reaching consensus of those who are interested enough to participate in the discussion. There is a backgrounder on it at WP:Consensus. Basically we'll wait and see what others say here and then see if there is a solution that everyone can live with. Mostly it prevents WP:Edit Wars. Basically we'll give it, say, a week and see what is said. - Ahunt (talk) 15:59, 4 April 2009 (UTC)

(OK, it's obvious where I stand on this, but I'll put in my 2 cents anyway). RMS is controversial to some people (although your implication that that's a reason not to use this logo implies that RMS wrote the entirety of GNU by hand, which is pretty damn impressive but not even remotely true ... well, either that or it implies that RMS looks an awful lot like a Gnu), the OSI is controversial to some people, both are controversial to people both within and without their respective communities. But that's the whole idea behind the term F/OSS and this logo ... it's saying "I don't care which of these camps things come from, I like the software." The FSF's logo would be an obvious choice, but the FSF use the Gnu as their logo more often than not, and the other logo is just really difficult to mix into the OSI logo in a pretty way :), so the Gnu was chosen instead to represent that group. If your complaint is that FSF != GNU, that's a totally different argument, but if the FSF and OSI can't collectively represent the term F/OSS, what can? Your other logo "Tux+Gnu+BSD" is an admiral attempt to represent major software projects in F/OSS-land, but this logo represents the meaning of the term F/OSS better. GregorR (talk) 16:40, 4 April 2009 (UTC)

Do we really need a logo for this navbox anyway? If there isn't an obviously appropriate existing one to use here (and there doesn't appear to be), WP:MOSICON states that inventing new icons counts as OR and should be avoided. Letdorf (talk) 09:55, 6 April 2009 (UTC).

User:Letdorf: Thanks for pointing out that policy, I had missed that. I think that rules out both these logos. Furthermore WP:ICONDECORATION says: "Icons should not be added for exclusively decorative purposes". I think that has to end this debate with consensus overruled by policy, so I will clean up the nav box. - Ahunt (talk) 11:22, 6 April 2009 (UTC)

If you go to the main Free Software page the logo still exists on the link to the portal (near the bottom of the page just up from the template box). Can that be removed as well. Harrisonmetz (talk) 02:26, 7 April 2009 (UTC)

I've corrected {{fossportal}}, which should have fixed most prominent free software articles. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 10:07, 7 April 2009 (UTC)

Thanks Chris! - Ahunt (talk) 12:58, 7 April 2009 (UTC)

Important clarification for anybody following this discussion: the proposed logo would violate the OSI trademark, which they strongly police (see http://opensource.org/trademark) 81.102.83.190 (talk) 21:35, 7 April 2015 (UTC)

Notable packages

Why does "Notable packages" include only a single example of server stuff, browser, email client, windowing system, graphical UI, and office only? Why not graphics editors (3D and 2D: raster (Gimp), vector (Inkscape), movie/animation (Blender), other), text editors (most notable and the ones of the most sophisticated: Emacs and Vim), mathematical software (Maxima, R, Sage, Scilab, GNU Octave, SymPy, NumPy, other), some other types of software? Maybe it'd be better to link to other templates and note that one should look at the row labeled "Open Source": Template:Computer algebra systems Template:Numerical analysis software Template:Raster graphics editors Template:Vector graphics editors Template:Animation editors Template:Text editor

Kazkaskazkasako (talk) 16:39, 10 October 2009 (UTC)

I agree that, given that there tens of thousands of applications, that the list if pretty token. It may be better to just remove them entirely and link to List of open source software packages. - Ahunt (talk) 16:42, 10 October 2009 (UTC)

Sounds reasonable. Letdorf (talk) 13:31, 12 October 2009 (UTC).

Okay - done. - Ahunt (talk) 14:16, 12 October 2009 (UTC)

I don't really agree with this change. It seems like the point of the "Notable packages" section was to quickly note some extremely widely used packages that most people would be familiar with. Right now it kind of just seems to be wasting space, List of open source software packages is not a very good or useful article. Sure there might be some debate about what items to list, but is that the only reason to remove the section? Cheers, — sligocki (talk) 19:59, 12 October 2009 (UTC)

The problem is finding agreement on what to list and there have been a number of packages added and removed over time. What would you suggest? - Ahunt (talk) 20:08, 12 October 2009 (UTC)

Yeah, I understand that dilemma. A section like notable software cannot be completely objective, but neither can the WP:Notability of an article be completely objective. It would be great if this navbox could have sections which were smaller so that they were easier to parse. For example: "History" is great, I immediately see what it covers, but "Organizations" is rather daunting, there are three lines of links. Similarly, it's annoying that it takes a while to find Linux in the list of OSes. I guess, what I'm saying is that these could all be expanded until they were unreasonably huge as well and then deleted and replaced by some "List of .." article that wouldn't really help anyone. However I think that there is an alternative, which is to be more selective, to list "Notable packages", but allow some packages to be added or deleted over time. For example, we could get a more representative set of packages, I don't think that Thunderbird needs to be there because Firefox already is, etc. Well that's my 2 cents. Cheers — sligocki (talk) 02:13, 13 October 2009 (UTC)

Makes sense to me. As you identified, the main danger with nav boxes like this is that they get so big that it becomes hard to find anything in them. Let's see what the reaction to your edits are. - Ahunt (talk) 12:11, 13 October 2009 (UTC)

The trouble with notable FOSS packages is that there are so many. To give a representative sample of the whole gamut would involve dozens of packages, but on the other hand, to be selective results in a meaninglessly arbitrary sampling, as Ahunt pointed out previously. Letdorf (talk) 12:36, 13 October 2009 (UTC).

Building on what User talk:Letdorf has said, if you check the history of this template you will find that a number of "fans of certain applications" have wanted to include their favourites, which makes the list doubly hard to manage. - Ahunt (talk) 12:58, 13 October 2009 (UTC)

Lacking any further discussion on this I have re added List of open source software packages to the "general" list. I just think that this nav box on Free Software seems incomplete without any link to free software applications, which is what many readers will be looking for. See what you think. - Ahunt (talk) 13:18, 20 October 2009 (UTC)

Semi-protection

User:HJ Mitchell semi-protected this template with the summary "Protected Template:Linux: requested at RfPP, high visibility template using TW ([edit=autoconfirmed] (indefinite) [move=sysop] (indefinite))" but I am not seeing a history of vandalism in the edit summary. Is this really justified? - Ahunt (talk) 12:07, 5 June 2010 (UTC)

Discussed at User_talk:HJ_Mitchell#Template_semi-protection. - Ahunt (talk) 12:49, 5 June 2010 (UTC)

Adding Software Freedom Conservancy under FOSS Organizations

I would like to request to add Software Freedom Conservancy in the list of FOSS Organization template.

• It "provides a non-profit home and infrastructure for FLOSS projects" (http://sfconservancy.org/overview/)
• Most of it's member FOSS projects are well known (http://sfconservancy.org/members/current/)

OnesimusUnbound (talk) 04:45, 21 February 2011 (UTC)

Looks reasonable - done! - Ahunt (talk) 17:45, 21 February 2011 (UTC)

Spelling convention for prompts

Is there supposed to be one?
Right now it's kind of Canadian, with "organization" and "licence".
But there's also a "license" mixed in, US style. Varlaam (talk) 19:19, 27 May 2011 (UTC)

FOSS is an international subject so WP:ENGVAR applies. The links should use direct unpiped links or, where pipes are required to shorten the links, then the same spelling as the article title, even if it is inconsistent within the template. As far as the titles go "Licence" links to Free software licence, so that is correct. "License standards" could be changed to "Licence standards" just to be consistent. "Organizations" could go either way. As explained in WP:ENGVAR to some degree we just have to live with variations in the language. - Ahunt (talk) 19:51, 27 May 2011 (UTC)

As WP:ENGVAR says, it should be consistent within an article.

I'm Canadian, so Canadian it shall be. Varlaam (talk) 23:26, 28 May 2011 (UTC)

You won't get any arguments from me - I'm Canadian too. - Ahunt (talk) 00:14, 29 May 2011 (UTC)

Beerware License

Suggest adding Beerware as a license, as it is used in FreeBSD. I can't edit semi-protected pages yet. --Silentquasar (talk) 20:03, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

Symbian

Symbian is not a FOSS operating system. I request that it be removed from the list. 16:00, 25 April 2012 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by NuclearWizard (talk • contribs)

 Done - Ahunt (talk) 16:15, 25 April 2012 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 3 September 2014

I'd like to add Ethereum to the list of organizations in the Free and open-sourced software template.

Anyone can work on its codebase, it's competely open source and can be forked at any point - https://github.com/ethereum

86.153.226.156 (talk) 20:05, 3 September 2014 (UTC)

Ethereum seems to be mostly a currency rather than a free software organization. Not sure it fits this template. - Ahunt (talk) 13:19, 5 September 2014 (UTC)

Add Sleepycat License to list of licenses

Sleepycat License is a copyleft free software license recognized by OSI, FSF and DFSG (apparently). 2001:2003:54FA:D2:0:0:0:1 (talk) 19:07, 17 July 2017 (UTC)

Not done: please provide reliable sources that support the change you want to be made. jd22292 (Jalen D. Folf) (talk) 19:31, 17 July 2017 (UTC)

It is in the article itself, so  Done. Although the article itself needs sourcing, putting in this template may just speed that process up. - Ahunt (talk) 19:34, 17 July 2017 (UTC)

Add Python licenses to list of licenses

The following articles cover free software licenses with recognition from the Free Software Foundation et al.:

• Python License
• Python Software Foundation License

The articles have references for inclusion and verifying the free license status. 2001:2003:54FA:D2:0:0:0:1 (talk) 16:06, 20 July 2017 (UTC)

Done jd22292 (Jalen D. Folf) (talk) 17:05, 20 July 2017 (UTC)

Add Free genealogy software

Please add a link to the Category:Free genealogy software all eight entries appear on this template Template:Genealogy_software in the Open source section at top.

.Kickermoth (talk) 21:54, 12 October 2019 (UTC)

The template links articles, not categories. - Ahunt (talk) 23:11, 12 October 2019 (UTC)

Ok, and the two[2][3] comparison pages mix the different types!! Thanks Kickermoth (talk) 23:22, 12 October 2019 (UTC)

That probably needs fixing too. - Ahunt (talk) 23:24, 12 October 2019 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 3 July 2023

@@ -68,6 +68,7 @@
 *[[Eclipse Public License|EPL]]
 *[[Free Software Foundation]]
 **[[GNU General Public License|GNU GPL]]
+**[[GNU Affero General Public License|GNU AGPL]]
 **[[GNU Lesser General Public License|GNU LGPL]]
 *[[ISC license|ISC]]
 *[[MIT License|MIT]]

37.99.39.44 (talk) 12:51, 3 July 2023 (UTC)

Thanks,  Done - Ahunt (talk) 13:32, 3 July 2023 (UTC)