Commercial software

Not to be confused with Business software.

Commercial software, or less commonly, payware, is computer software that is produced for sale^[1] or that serves commercial purposes.

Commercial software is most often proprietary software, but free software packages may also be commercial software.^[2][3][4]

All or parts of software packages and services that support commerce are increasingly made available as free software^{[citation needed]}. This includes products from Red Hat, Apple Computer, Sun Microsystems, Google, and Microsoft Corporation. Microsoft Corporation uses "commercial software", to describe their business model.^[5]

Free and open-source software

While less common than commercial proprietary software, free and open-source software may also be commercial software. This is a fact that the Free Software Foundation emphasizes,^[6] and is the basis of the Open Source Initiative.^{[citation needed]}

Under the free software business model, free software vendors may charge a fee for distribution and offer pay support and software customization services. Proprietary software uses a different business model, where a customer of the proprietary software pays a fee for a license to use the software. This license may grant the customer the ability to configure some or no parts of the software themselves. Often some level of support is included in the purchase of proprietary software, but additional support services (especially for enterprise applications) are usually available for an additional fee. Some proprietary software vendors will also customize software for a fee.^[7]

Free software is generally available at no cost and can result in permanently lower costs compared to proprietary software. With free software, businesses can fit software to their specific needs by changing the software themselves or by hiring programmers to modify it for them. Free software often has no warranty, and more importantly, generally does not assign legal liability to anyone. However, warranties are permitted between any two parties upon the condition of the software and its usage. Such an agreement is made separately from the free software license.

A report by Standish Group says that adoption of open source has caused a drop in revenue to the proprietary software industry by about $60 billion per year.^[8]

See also

• Commercial off-the-shelf
• Retail software

• Proprietary software
• Gratis versus Libre
• Shareware

References

1. ^ commercial software - Definitions from Dictionary.com
2. ^ David A. Wheeler (2009-02-03). "Free-Libre / Open Source Software (FLOSS) is Commercial Software". http://www.dwheeler.com/essays/commercial-floss.html. Retrieved 2009-06-29. 
3. ^ "Categories of Free and Non-Free Software". Free Software Foundation. http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/categories.html#commercialSoftware. 
4. ^ "Selling Free Software". Free Software Foundation. http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/selling.html. 
5. ^ Craig Mundie (2001-05-03). "The Commercial Software Model". Microsoft. http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/exec/craig/05-03sharedsource.mspx. 
6. ^ http://www.fsf.org/licensing/essays/words-to-avoid.html#Commercial
7. ^ Andy Dornan. "The Five Open Source Business Models". http://www.informationweek.com/blog/main/archives/2008/01/the_five_open_s.html. 
8. ^ http://standishgroup.com/newsroom/open_source.php

This article related to a type of software is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it.v · Categories: Software distribution Software type stubs Wikimedia Foundation. 2010. Игры ⚽ Поможем написать курсовую Commercial Slip Commercial Solvents Corporation Look at other dictionaries: commercial software — komercinė programinė įranga statusas T sritis informatika apibrėžtis Komercinių programų visuma. atitikmenys: angl. commercial software ryšiai: palygink – atviroji programinė įranga palygink – nuosavybinė programinė įranga …   Enciklopedinis kompiuterijos žodynas commercial software — Software that is copyrighted and may not legally be distributed by BBS s or copied and given to other users …   Dictionary of telecommunications Commercial Software — …   Википедия Software versioning — is the process of assigning either unique version names or unique version numbers to unique states of computer software. Within a given version number category (major, minor), these numbers are generally assigned in increasing order and… …   Wikipedia Software manufacturing — is the process of producing software in ways similar to the manufacturing of tangible goods. In this way of conducting business, each copy of the software is priced and sold as though it was a tangible product. The sales process usually is… …   Wikipedia Commercial — may refer to: Advertising, commercial messages Radio advertisement, via the medium of radio Television advertisement, via the medium of television Commerce, the voluntary exchange of goods, services, or both Trade, the trading of something of… …   Wikipedia Software Magazine — is a software and IT magazine.oftware 500 survey Software 500 survey can be used to gauge the value of the commercial software industry. The Software 500 survey consists of data of the top 500 software companies, as ranked by Software Magazine.… …   Wikipedia Software law — refers the to legal remedies available to protect software based assets. Software may, under various circumstances and in various countries, be restricted by patent or copyright or both. Most commercial software is sold under some kind of… …   Wikipedia Software Patent Institute — (established 1992 in Ann Arbor) [Bernard Galler, [http://www.uspto.gov/go/com/hearings/software/arlington/va galler.html University of Michigan Software Patent Institute] ] is an American non profit corporation established to assist in the… …   Wikipedia Commercial open source applications — Open source software is widely used for private and non commercial applications. In addition, many independent software vendors (ISVs), value added resellers (VARs), and hardware vendors (OEMs or ODMs) use open source frameworks, modules, and… …   Wikipedia 18+ © Academic, 2000-2024 Contact us: Technical Support, Advertising Dictionaries export, created on PHP, Joomla, Drupal, WordPress, MODx. Mark and share Search through all dictionaries Translate… Search Internet Share the article and excerpts Direct link … Do a right-click on the link above and select “Copy Link”