Who develops open source software?
Open source software, as with the GNU/Linux operating system, was first viewed as a hobby niche for basement-dwelling computer-loving hobbyists. Of course, it has grown from that stage. Many times non-profit software foundations like Mozilla, Apache, or the Sakai Foundation will facilitate the development of open source software. Smaller projects can be headed up by a single person such as with pGina. Sometimes it is a conglomeration of people from a diverse set of backgrounds such as with Sakai. Or sometimes the development is incorporated such as with computing mega-giants Sun Microsystems who have lead projects like openSolaris and NetGrid. GNU/Linux has a number of flavors, some like Slackware are packaged and supported by a very small number of people, others like Red-Hat and SuSe are backed by large corporations centered around the open source product. Such companies often offer support and installation services for their otherwise free products. A company may also release a prod
