The US military bets big on open source
While some in private-sector industry drag their feet on open source, it's instructive that arguably the most mission-critical systems in the world are being migrated to open source, namely, the US military's systems.
It's not just a question of cost that drives the US military to buy open source. Indeed, the biggest benefits come down to innovation and flexibility:
...[T]he increasing scope and complexity of military software requirements encourages the use of open source. "If the project is of a sufficient scale, you cannot get there without an open source approach," said Dewey Houck, a senior engineer at Boeing, the lead systems integrator for the Army's FCS.That is a massively important statement. We may be rapidly approaching the point when it will make little sense to buy proprietary software at all, given the tremendous benefits of open source.
Other benefits? The military cites several:… Read more