Open source software is a growing part of the computing environment. It is software whose source code is available to its users. When source code is available, programmers can extend, fix, and modify the software to fit a local situation, often doing so in consultation with a user group. There may not be licensing fees, but open source is not cost-free.
[Note: We are also learning about open source, so this page is little more than a whiteboard ... unless someone far more knowledgeable steps in to provide context and judgment to our set of references. Meanwhile, these references serve as a useful starting point.]
Boss, Richard W. "Open Source" Software. PLA TechNote, May 2008. (Word, 64KB)
Breeding, Marshall. "Open Source Integrated Library Systems." Library Technology Reports, November/December 2008, V. 44, no. 8.
Chudnov, D. 2009. "What Librarians Still Don't Know About Free Software". Computers in Libraries. 29, no. 2: 22-24.
Dorman, David. "The Case for Open Source Software in the Library Market." Ubiquity, Volume 4, Issue 47, Jan. 28 - Feb. 3, 2004.
Open Annotation Collaboration (OAC), a project to build new digital annotation tools and define and demonstrate a framework for sharing annotations of digital content across the web.
Schneider, Karen G. "Free for All." School Library Journal, August 2008, p. 44-46. Open source software has become a catchword in libraryland. Yet many remain unclear about open source’s benefits—or even what it is.