Why is source code important

It can help them to establish reputation and respect, and gain valuable experience. Many open source programs can be obtained at no cost or at a very low cost.

This is often an important issue for individuals and in many cases this has been the main reason for an individual adopting a particular open source solution over a closed source alternative. However, other costs may arise: training, consulting, maintenance, etc. As a result, the total cost of ownership may not differ greatly between a closed source solution and an open source alternative for institutions.

However, in some markets the difference in price between a closed source solution and an open source solution can be significant. The openness of open source code will be of the least importance to the individual non-technical software user. Such a user will have no wish to study or edit the source code. This user will, however, still benefit from rapid bug-fixing, and, possibly, from improved security. Software developers may find open source code extremely useful for a number of reasons.

Open source is invaluable for learning, as it reveals the workings of real large-scale software programmes. They may also adapt existing software to meet their personal needs, or find employment customizing the software for a third party. Organisations that engage with open source software can customize it to attain efficiency benefits or to better suit their own working practices, either via in-house development or by paying external developers.

They can also protect themselves to some extent from vendor lock-in, or the possible obsolescence of the software they use. Finally, governments or international institutions can additionally provide better accessibility than may be possible with closed source software, as they are not at the mercy of the commercial requirements of traditional software vendors.

Opinions differ on whether software should play a role in the debate around liberty and human rights. Richard Stallman , the father of the Free Software movement, believes that it does and that free software brings extra benefits in terms of freedom. Skip to Navigation Skip to Content. The OSS Watch website uses cookies to help us understand how our site is used and improve our service.

Find out more about cookies. This is OK, don't tell me again. Toggle navigation. Benefits of open source code by James A. Wilson on 20 February , last updated 9 May Introduction This document outlines some of the advantages derived from having software source code that is open to all to inspect and edit.

What is source code? Why is open source code useful? Bug-fixing All software releases contain bugs. Customization Closed source applications can only be customized or adapted within the scope provided by the original vendor but never outside its boundaries. Translation With access to the source code it is easy to translate the language of the software interface. Mitigation of vendor collapse or product discontinuation Commercial software vendors go bust or get bought up from time to time.

As I said earlier, this adds double the return for the time I invest. I tend to start work in GitHub. This strips me of my usual tools and centres my attention on truly understanding what is happening in the code.

I try to find a high-level abstraction as a starting point and then gradually dig deeper into the internals. I like to make notes in OneNote as I study the code, describing the flow and how the code works. These are short-form notes. This process is less about having a reference, although that can be useful, than it is about embedding the knowledge into my memory.

By describing it in writing, I find that it sticks with me much longer. Navigating code and forming a mental picture of the logical flow is a handy skill.

Once I have an overview formed the next step is to go deeper. There I can use the code navigation features to move around more swiftly and really delve into the behaviour of the code. Should I file it away for when I next face a similar requirement? These may not be the best methods to call or classes to rely upon, but as I know no alternative, I keep using them.

This extends my code vocabulary. This second stage also improves my skills of working with tools such as my IDE. I find tricks and shortcuts to save time when navigating the code. Something I do often is to pull out a class into a window on my second monitor so I can follow code flows more quickly. I quickly learn about the features of the latest version of C by seeing them used in the wild, so to speak. You want to expose yourself to new APIs or new syntax in the code which you read so that you further your own code vocabulary.

Reading code you understand easily, much like reading a simple book, is not going to expand your writing skills. Try to break things down into smaller chunks to work through in your head.

What is the code doing and also why has it been written that way? Has the author used an approach to solving something you had not previously considered? Armed with an actual use case, often the documentation will make sense in the context you are approaching it from.

Similarly, when you encounter framework APIs which you have never used before, visit the code documentation if there is any. For the Microsoft libraries, all public methods include XML comments. You can either read these directly or visit the. Contrast this to when you are in a codebase, up against a deadline, trying to finish a bug fix or feature.

You will rarely have the time to extend beyond the boundaries of the code you are directly working with. That situation is much less conducive to learning. Modern-day craftspeople will often study the work of masters of their craft.

By doing so, they hope to one day attain their level of skill. Developers too can advance their skills by studying from the experts in their field. For me personally, as a C ,. NET developer, I find a lot of value in studying the Microsoft source code for the. NET Core. There are many great developers at Microsoft who have comprehensive expertise of specific elements of the language or runtime. Just as scholars study great works of literature, there are many secrets to be unlocked by reading great code.

One related resource I recommend for those who are intrigued by software design and want to better their appreciation of the. NET team publish most of their weekly. These are meetings where the team review proposals for API changes to. By listening to them discuss the proposed APIs you get a genuine appreciation for the considerations that have to be made on such a broad and widely used framework.

There are often little gems of insight I gather just by watching these streams. My goal for this post was to inspire a few readers to consider some more conscious study and reading of code. I honestly believe this has helped me to become a better developer and to learn more about the C language and the.

NET Core Framework. Investing a few hours regularly will pay off for you in the future. Buy me a coffee. You can unsubscribe anytime. For more details, review our Privacy Policy. He works for Elastic. A defective source code can result in reduced functionality of a website and therefore a downgrade in ranking. The text-to-code ratio is also useful for on-page optimization. Source code optimization is also important for reducing the loading time of a website.

Since the loading time is regarded as a ranking factor, the optimization of the source code is necessary for this reason. A lean source code also enables crawlers to find and index content more quickly. Thus, they require less time to crawl a single page and crawl depth can be increased. In general, the simpler the source code of a website, the faster bots like Googlebot can crawl the page. Source code for web pages [ edit ] While the source code is the backbone of a computer program for programmers, it is an important area for online marketers which is not visible to regular users.

Relevance to SEO [ edit ] Correct execution of the source code of a web page can be counted among the ranking factors of search engines like Google.