Monday, June 4, 2012
3:16 AM

Open Source Languages - Pros and Cons

Many developers love to use open source software for the variety of benefits that come along with it. Some of the most popular open source languages used include C, PHP, Javascript, and C++. Although many people code using these languages, are there any major reasons not to use them? Let’s take a look and find out.

Pros

Many programmers utilized open source languages for a variety of reasons that closed source just doesn’t provide. The main reason programmers love using open source is because of what can be accomplished in terms of customization. Any piece of open source software can be customized to fit your needs as the source code is readily available. Have an idea in mind of a function that you would like to implement? You can add it yourself easily and efficiently. Closed source applications, on the other hand, can only be customized within the scope that the company provides, and no further editing can be done outside of that scope.

Going along with customization, programmers love open source because bugs can be fixed just as quick and as easy as they are spotted. When a bug is discovered, a variety of users can collaborate together and change the code. This is entirely different with closed source, as only the developers of the original piece of software can actually change it.

Open source language also allows translation from one language to another to be quite seamless. Larger software projects owned by large companies, on the other hand, are normally closed source and don’t normally allow the translation of their source code into other languages.

Learning an open source language can also be quite fun and much easier than trying to work with closed source. For instance, by working with a piece of open source software, you can work together with a community that is trying to accomplish what you may be trying to as well, and you can ask them any questions that you may have. Also, if you feel as if you have written some code that is worthy enough to be added to an open source project, expert coders can look at, evaluate your code, and possibly give you some pointers on how to improve.

Cons

Although there are a significant amount of benefits to using an open source language, there are some additional negatives to consider. The one major disadvantage that many people don’t like about open source software is that it may be confusing to use. With so many people working to improve or add their own bits of code to a piece of software, you may never know what version of software that you’re working with.

Also, certain open source software is not compatible with all applications, which may cause limited access in terms of what you can do with it. This can be a serious drawback depending on what you are doing with the code.

Open source software can also be tough to take on if you are much newer to a certain programming language. If a certain individual that worked on the previous code didn’t comment it well enough or wrote a bunch of messy lines of code, it can be extremely confusing to understand.

Concluding Thoughts

Despite a few negatives associated with open source language, there really is no reason not to use it. Open source allows for complete customization in whatever task you’re trying to accomplish and the best part is that you have access to all the source code! Languages can be translated back and forth and if you ever have any questions, there are plenty of places on the internet to get answers. Open source language is the way to go.

Written by David Nance for the team at www.technology-colleges.info, who believe in selecting the right language for the job.

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