Software Networks, 2nd Edition

4Open Source Software for Networks

One of the major developments expected in the 2020s is operating open source software. If many open source software are already being used, they are only operating through companies that take care of their maintenance and developments. These companies can come from the world of open source software, but they can also be integrators or manufacturers that have part of their architecture integrated in open source software. In the beginning, the difficulty will be that there are many developments, often competitors, and they end up joining each other. In this chapter, we will examine the main open source software in the field of networks.

4.1. Open source software

The Linux Foundation is one of the main organizations collecting developments in the network world. More generally, it takes the open source software of the computing world into its care. Figure 4.1 shows the main ongoing projects.

Figure 4.1. Linux Foundation’s projects. For a color version of the figure, see www.iste.co.uk/pujolle/software2.zip

However, the Linux Foundation is not the only organization to focus on these developments. For the network part, Figure 4.2 shows a wider and more exhaustive range of major projects regarding networks.

Figure 4.2. Range of open source software ...