A medium sized photographic and printing business currently uses commercial software. Commercial software is preferable for this business because it provides better technical support, integration between products from the same company which helps work flow, and staff already have experience with commercial software. While open source software has benefits like accessibility of source code and potential for customization, it may not be as secure, integrated, or familiar for the needs of this particular business. Therefore, the business should continue using commercial software.

1. Scenario 2: A
medium sized
photographic and
printing business
By: Nurul Hanim Hussein
Shah

2. Difference between FOSS and
commercial software
Commercial Software FOSS
• Licensed/sold for profit by the
companies that create it
• Strict license; preventing you from
making copies of the software for
other users
• Has better technical support
• Designed to be integrated with
other products from the same
software company
• Commonly used in many industries
• Staff with relevant experience and
training may be more readily
available
When you buy this software, you are
buying the license to use the software.
• Free and Open Source Software
does not always cost nothing
• Difficult to find support
• The users have freedom to use
the software as they please
• The source code of FOSS is
always available for anyone
• Users who makes changes to
open source software must
publish their changes under the
same license: to allow everyone
to benefit from the
improvements.
This makes it possible for users with
programming experience to alter
the software, adding features, fixing
bugs, and customizing the software
to suit themselves.

3. Freedoms and Restrictions
License Price
Redistribution
allowed
Re-selling
allowed
Modifications
allowed
Commercial Not free X X X
FOS Free or sold / / /
Why use commercial software?
• It has a better technical support than an FOS software.
• Can be integrated with other products from the same software company
(for example Microsoft’s Internet, Office, and database products integrate
very well).
• For a company, this can help improve work flow and helps provide a
consistent user interface.
• If a problem occurs, there is no need to contact multiple companies to
establish where the fault lies
• Commonly used in many industries, therefore staff with relevant experience
and training may be more readily available.
When you buy this software, you are buying the license to use the software.

4. Is Open Source more secure?
Security is a big topic in IT, and especially in open source software. Proponents
of OSS often use the argument that because many people have examined
the source code (because it is freely available), the is a higher chance of
security problems being spotted – and therefore a higher chance that
somebody will fix them. They also argue that because security problem can
be spotted, users are aware of their security situation and can make informed
decisions about what products to use and which to avoid. They argue that
security bugs in commercial software may only be known to developers,
leaving users to make uninformed decisions.
Moreover, the availability of the source code means that any vulnerabilities or
weaknesses are more likely to be rapidly spotted and mended by the
development community, perhaps before the hackers have found them.
On the other hand, some argue that OSS is less secure, precisely because the
source code is available. They argue that malicious users can use the source
code to spot security problems and, instead of reporting or fixing them, they
exploit them.
Therefore, FOSS is no more and no less susceptible to security weaknesses than
any other

5. What software should this specific
scenario needs to use?
This business should still continue to use commercial software.
This is because the staffs of this business are already used to using commercial
software in their daily so going with open source, most of the people would
not know that much about the FOSS since the way they work is different.
Moreover, as it has been written in the previous slides, it tells that commercial
software is more better in terms of security rather than FOSS, they are not that
secure since hackers can easily search for vulnerability or weakness.
Furthermore, the other reason is because commercial software can be
integrated with other products from the same software company since this
business needs to use other software that is useful to them so they can do their
job easily for example like Microsoft can integrate from Office to Internet since
they are from the same software company. Therefore, it may be easy for them
to exchange emails and files with clients since that is their a part of job in the
business.
Besides that, commercial software has a better technical support and for a
company, it can help improve work flow and helps provide a consistent user
interface.