Open Source FMIS: Can it Work?

This week in a Linkedin post, Nathan Faleide announced the launch of an open source farm management information systems (FMIS) that can be freely accessed and built upon.

What is Open Source?

Open source software is like a recipe that's shared indiscriminately — anyone can see how it's made, use it, tweak it, or even improve it. Open source projects make their code public, so anyone with the skills can contribute, fix bugs, or build something new from it.

The key is that as an open-source product, it provides a baseline system, allowing effort to be focused on creating unique features, rather than reinventing the functionality that is common to all systems.

Some well-known examples of open-source projects are the Linux operating system and the Firefox web browser. Open-source projects often have a community of people working together to improve them, and anyone can join in if they want to contribute. Nathan is trying to catalyze this type of collaboration with his announcement.

Skepticism and Opportunities

I remain curious, open and interested, yet skeptical of open-source for FMIS.

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