Software wars
Encyclopedia
Software wars describes a state where software authors and users argue over which software is best for a purpose and should thus be used by everyone for that task.
In March 1998, Li-Cheng Tai created a map, a general overview of the world of software as a computer graphic and titled it Software Wars. Li-Cheng Tai stopped updating it in 2003. It was updated by Steven Hilton in 2006. The detailed graphical index of market history shows past and ongoing market competitions between free software
and proprietary software
, including Microsoft
and Apple Inc.. It is an example of the Evil Empire
genre of humor that is endemic in hacker culture
where Bill Gates
, the founder of Microsoft
, is represented as the ruler
of the Galactic Empire
of the Star Wars
movies or, as in this case, as one of the Borg
of the Star Trek: The Next Generation
television series. Despite the obviously humouristic purpose of the maps, it does have a remarkably well-researched and accurate portrayal of real and complex economic and market battles emerging since the Internet made globally distributed free and open source software development strategies economically feasible. The newest version of the map lacks hyperlinks, but its keywords and their relationships to each other provide a rich starting point for anyone interest in researching the history and economics of information technology.
Similar "wars" also take place between the proponents of various hardware
platforms
such as the PC
and the Macintosh.
In March 1998, Li-Cheng Tai created a map, a general overview of the world of software as a computer graphic and titled it Software Wars. Li-Cheng Tai stopped updating it in 2003. It was updated by Steven Hilton in 2006. The detailed graphical index of market history shows past and ongoing market competitions between free software
Free software
Free software, software libre or libre software is software that can be used, studied, and modified without restriction, and which can be copied and redistributed in modified or unmodified form either without restriction, or with restrictions that only ensure that further recipients can also do...
and proprietary software
Proprietary software
Proprietary software is computer software licensed under exclusive legal right of the copyright holder. The licensee is given the right to use the software under certain conditions, while restricted from other uses, such as modification, further distribution, or reverse engineering.Complementary...
, including Microsoft
Microsoft
Microsoft Corporation is an American public multinational corporation headquartered in Redmond, Washington, USA that develops, manufactures, licenses, and supports a wide range of products and services predominantly related to computing through its various product divisions...
and Apple Inc.. It is an example of the Evil Empire
Evil empire
The phrase evil empire was applied to the Soviet Union especially by U.S. President Ronald Reagan, who took an aggressive, hard-line stance that favored matching and exceeding the Soviet Union's strategic and global military capabilities, in calling for a rollback strategy that would, in his words,...
genre of humor that is endemic in hacker culture
Hacker culture
A hacker is a member of the computer programmer subculture originated in the 1960s in the United States academia, in particular around the Massachusetts Institute of Technology 's Tech Model Railroad Club and MIT Artificial Intelligence Laboratory...
where Bill Gates
Bill Gates
William Henry "Bill" Gates III is an American business magnate, investor, philanthropist, and author. Gates is the former CEO and current chairman of Microsoft, the software company he founded with Paul Allen...
, the founder of Microsoft
Microsoft
Microsoft Corporation is an American public multinational corporation headquartered in Redmond, Washington, USA that develops, manufactures, licenses, and supports a wide range of products and services predominantly related to computing through its various product divisions...
, is represented as the ruler
Palpatine
Palpatine is a fictional character and the main antagonist of the Star Wars saga, portrayed by Ian McDiarmid in the feature films.Palpatine first appeared as the unnamed Emperor of the Galactic Empire in the 1980 film Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back...
of the Galactic Empire
Galactic Empire (Star Wars)
The Galactic Empire is one of the main factions in the fictional universe of Star Wars. It is a galaxy-spanning regime established by the series' lead villain, Palpatine, to replace the Galactic Republic in Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith. The Galactic Empire is introduced in Star Wars...
of the Star Wars
Star Wars
Star Wars is an American epic space opera film series created by George Lucas. The first film in the series was originally released on May 25, 1977, under the title Star Wars, by 20th Century Fox, and became a worldwide pop culture phenomenon, followed by two sequels, released at three-year...
movies or, as in this case, as one of the Borg
Borg (Star Trek)
The Borg are a fictional pseudo-race of cybernetic organisms depicted in the Star Trek universe associated with Star Trek.Whereas cybernetics are used by other races in the science fiction world to repair bodily damage and birth defects, the Borg use enforced cybernetic enhancement as a means of...
of the Star Trek: The Next Generation
Star Trek: The Next Generation
Star Trek: The Next Generation is an American science fiction television series created by Gene Roddenberry as part of the Star Trek franchise. Roddenberry, Rick Berman, and Michael Piller served as executive producers at different times throughout the production...
television series. Despite the obviously humouristic purpose of the maps, it does have a remarkably well-researched and accurate portrayal of real and complex economic and market battles emerging since the Internet made globally distributed free and open source software development strategies economically feasible. The newest version of the map lacks hyperlinks, but its keywords and their relationships to each other provide a rich starting point for anyone interest in researching the history and economics of information technology.
Similar "wars" also take place between the proponents of various hardware
Computer hardware
Personal computer hardware are component devices which are typically installed into or peripheral to a computer case to create a personal computer upon which system software is installed including a firmware interface such as a BIOS and an operating system which supports application software that...
platforms
Platform (computing)
A computing platform includes some sort of hardware architecture and a software framework , where the combination allows software, particularly application software, to run...
such as the PC
IBM PC compatible
IBM PC compatible computers are those generally similar to the original IBM PC, XT, and AT. Such computers used to be referred to as PC clones, or IBM clones since they almost exactly duplicated all the significant features of the PC architecture, facilitated by various manufacturers' ability to...
and the Macintosh.
Specific software wars
- Browser warsBrowser warsBrowser wars is a metaphorical term that refers to competitions for dominance in usage share in the web browser marketplace. The term is often used to denote two specific rivalries: the competition that saw Microsoft's Internet Explorer replace Netscape's Navigator as the dominant browser during...
: Describes the actions of MicrosoftMicrosoftMicrosoft Corporation is an American public multinational corporation headquartered in Redmond, Washington, USA that develops, manufactures, licenses, and supports a wide range of products and services predominantly related to computing through its various product divisions...
, GoogleGoogleGoogle Inc. is an American multinational public corporation invested in Internet search, cloud computing, and advertising technologies. Google hosts and develops a number of Internet-based services and products, and generates profit primarily from advertising through its AdWords program...
, MozillaMozillaMozilla is a term used in a number of ways in relation to the Mozilla.org project and the Mozilla Foundation, their defunct commercial predecessor Netscape Communications Corporation, and their related application software....
, Apple Inc., and OperaOpera (web browser)Opera is a web browser and Internet suite developed by Opera Software with over 200 million users worldwide. The browser handles common Internet-related tasks such as displaying web sites, sending and receiving e-mail messages, managing contacts, chatting on IRC, downloading files via BitTorrent,...
continuing to have a rearmament cycle of trying to create the authoritative web browserWeb browserA web browser is a software application for retrieving, presenting, and traversing information resources on the World Wide Web. An information resource is identified by a Uniform Resource Identifier and may be a web page, image, video, or other piece of content...
. - Editor warEditor warEditor war is the common name for the rivalry between users of the vi and Emacs text editors. The rivalry has become a lasting part of hacker culture and the free software community....
, unixUnixUnix is a multitasking, multi-user computer operating system originally developed in 1969 by a group of AT&T employees at Bell Labs, including Ken Thompson, Dennis Ritchie, Brian Kernighan, Douglas McIlroy, and Joe Ossanna...
editor users are divided into two big groups. The users of viVivi is a screen-oriented text editor originally created for the Unix operating system. The portable subset of the behavior of vi and programs based on it, and the ex editor language supported within these programs, is described by the Single Unix Specification and POSIX.The original code for vi...
and the users of emacsEmacsEmacs is a class of text editors, usually characterized by their extensibility. GNU Emacs has over 1,000 commands. It also allows the user to combine these commands into macros to automate work.Development began in the mid-1970s and continues actively...
. - Desktop warsDesktop warsDesktop wars may refer to:* The struggle for dominance of the desktop computer market from the mid-1980s to mid-1990s between Apple's Mac OS , Microsoft's Windows and IBM's OS/2....
, KDEKDEKDE is an international free software community producing an integrated set of cross-platform applications designed to run on Linux, FreeBSD, Microsoft Windows, Solaris and Mac OS X systems...
and GNOMEGNOMEGNOME is a desktop environment and graphical user interface that runs on top of a computer operating system. It is composed entirely of free and open source software...
desktop environments has the same effect. - Operating system advocacyOperating system advocacyOperating system advocacy is the practice of attempting to increase the awareness and improve the perception of a computer operating system. The motivation behind this may be to increase the number of users of a system, to assert the superiority of one choice over another or out of brand loyalty,...
- Unix warsUnix warsThe Unix wars were the struggles between vendors of the Unix computer operating system in the late 1980s and early 1990s to set the standard for Unix thenceforth.- Origins :...
See also
- Format warFormat warA format war describes competition between mutually incompatible proprietary formats that compete for the same market, typically for data storage devices and recording formats for electronic media. It is often characterized by political and financial influence on content publishers by the...
- Wars of indent styleIndent styleIn computer programming, an indent style is a convention governing the indentation of blocks of code to convey the program's structure. This article largely addresses the C programming language and its descendants, but can be applied to most other programming languages...
- Wars of programming languageProgramming languageA programming language is an artificial language designed to communicate instructions to a machine, particularly a computer. Programming languages can be used to create programs that control the behavior of a machine and/or to express algorithms precisely....
- After the Software WarsAfter the Software WarsAfter the Software Wars is a book by Keith Curtis about free software and its importance in the computing industry, specifically about its impact on Microsoft and the proprietary software development model....
- Programming paradigmProgramming paradigmA programming paradigm is a fundamental style of computer programming. Paradigms differ in the concepts and abstractions used to represent the elements of a program and the steps that compose a computation A programming paradigm is a fundamental style of computer programming. (Compare with a...
