Over time, the term free software has been mostly replaced by the term open source software. As a
nod to both the two camps, however, some people use the term Free and Open Source Software
(FOSS) instead. An underlying principle of FOSS, however, is that, while you are free to use the
software as you like, you have some responsibility to make your improvements to the code available
to others. In that way, everyone in the community can benefit from your work as you have
benefited from the work of others.
To clearly define how open source software should be handled, the GNU software project created
the GNU Public License (you can read the GPL in its entirety at the end of this book). While many
other software licenses cover slightly different approaches to protecting free software, the GPL is
perhaps the most well known??”and it??™s the one that covers the Linux kernel itself. Basic features
of the GNU Public License include:
Author rights??”The original author retains the rights to his or her software.
Free distribution??”People can use the GNU software in their own software, changing
and redistributing it as they please. They do, however, have to include the source code
with their distribution (or make it easily available).
Copyright maintained??”Even if you were to repackage and resell the software, the original
GNU agreement must be maintained with the software, which means all future recipients
of the software have the opportunity to change the source code, just as you did.
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