There are currently more than 200 000 software programs released as Free/Libre Open Source Software (FLOSS). We help our clients utilise the largest platform in the world. Since we selectively use publicly tested, mature and audited components in our projects, we are able to offer high quality information systems with fast delivery times at minimal costs.
How Open Source works
See video below for more information on free and open software development.
Why choose Open Source?
Thanks to the vast amount of Open Source software, there are also many reasons to choose specific ones from the lot. When comparing two pieces of software, one being open and the other being commercially licensed, we end up in favour of open source software for the following reasons.
- No license fees. Open software can be freely copied and distributed.
- Minimal cost. No company can maintain a monopoly on support for any Open Source software. Seravo offers services for companies that utilise free software in their business. There’s nothing in place to stop us from expanding on, or creating a bespoke version of a piece of software originally developed by someone else. In many cases, the original developer will actually utilise parts of the new version in their code so that everyone benefits from our work.
- Users as a driving force for development. It’s nearly impossible for the developers to weaken the user experience with ads or any other poor design choices. There’s just nothing to stop users from sticking with the better previous versions. Besides, anyone can take things into their own hands and publish an improved version of the software.
- Freedom. Users of Open Source are not subject to arbitrary decisions of a publisher. Instead, thanks to Open Source licensing, users get to enjoy a community that’s the equivalent of a democratic society in technology.
- No viruses. There are significantly less security vulnerabilities in open source software than there are in their closed source counterparts, such as Windows, Adobe Reader, Flash or Oracle Java. There have never been problems with viruses on Linux thanks to its superior security implementations.
- Increased security. When the source is openly available, it’s impossible to hide backdoors or vulnerabilities in it. Anyone can go ahead and verify the security of a program simply by looking at the source. If a vulnerability is found, it can be easily patched right away.
- Increased quality. Openness encourages a culture where anyone can submit fixes, improvements or suggestions to the software. Top quality isn’t a guarantee, but is always a key force in the development of open source software.
- FLOSS drives evolution of software. Open source software gets incrementally better day by day. No license fees discourage users from updating to the newest available version. Among developers the codebase is openly shared, so the wheel doesn’t get reinvented every time a solution is needed. This progresses all software at an increasing rate.
Seravo & Open Source
In addition to a strong background in Linux, Seravo also has experience in the use of FLOSS in a Windows environment, an example of which it the marketing project VALO-CD that is supported by Seravo, and which is a collection of best FLOSS programs for Windows.
Our personnel includes the country coordinator of Finland for the Free Software Foundation Europe and we have implemented the web pages for COSS.fi, which is the Finnish Centre For Open Source Sofware.
Our personnel has also taken part in several open data projects, and we have participated in the HS Open events arranged by the largest national newspaper Helsingin Sanomat as well as the Apps4Finland contest. Open data and open source are strongly connected, since both of them are based on the basic idea, that sharing does not reduce value but instead multiplies it.
Everyone can utilise open software
Contact us and we will let you know how we can help your organisation to utilise open technologies.
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