Software Freedom Day
We have heard of freedom to animals, human being , countries etc. But have any one of you heard of Software Freedom Day. This year September 19th is celebrated across the world as Software Freedom Day or SFD.
This day is meant to spread awareness of independent software and also prompt people to use independent software. This task has been done under the initiative of American based Software Freedom International . Every year the third Saturday in September is celebrated as
SFD.
The SFI was formed under the leadership of renowned software programmer Richard Stallman. They believed that for social development, awareness of computers should be spread to all people.
Ken Thompson, Dennis Ritchie etc of Bell Laboratory the research division of American telephone and Telegraph company (AT & T) developed Unix operating system. In 1973 Unix re launched with ‘C’ programming became very popular in business organizations , Universities etc.
But in 1980s Unix stopped giving source code to its customers. Also copyright rule was followed very strictly. This created uneasiness among software programmers and they decided to fight against the commercialization of software. In 1983 September 27th GNU project started. The meaning of GNU is “GNU is Not Unix”
In 1984 Stallman started the programming of GNU Operating system. In 1985 March GNU Manifesto was published. In 1985 October 4th Free Software Foundation was formed.
In 1992 GNU completed almost the work of its operating system. But could not able to complete its central body or kernel. In 1991 Linus Torwalds of Helsinki University has programmed a kernel called Linux. In 1991 itself he published its source code in internet. He was a post graduate in computer science. He developed this kernel at the age of 21 years.
Many programmers did so many additions and deletions and made Linux a high class kernel.
In 1992 Linux kernel accepted GNU General Public License. This helped GNU to complete its operating system, ie. Linux.
There is a story behind the Free software foundation. When Stallman was working in MIT, that time most softwares are available with their source codes. Everybody in his office were using printer that is network connected. This printer frequently shows problems like the paper getting jammed etc. Stallman made some changes in the driver of the printer. As per this one will get a message in his system if the print job given by him is completed. Also a message will be sent to all systems if paper gets jammed. This was very helpful for all. That time a new printer was installed in their office. Stallman liked to make similar changes in its driver also. But its source code was not available. Stallman approached the people who prepared the source code. But they didn’t give. He was very angry and decided to fight for independent softwares.
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