Free Software
I link che seguono contengono informazioni essenziali per poter comprendere il concetto di free software. Quanto segue è scritto in inglese: la lingua ufficiale del web!
- Free Software Foundation : the Free Software Foundation (FSF), established in 1985, is dedicated to promoting computer users' rights to use, study, copy, modify, and redistribute computer programs. The FSF promotes the development and use of free software, particularly the GNU operating system, used widely in its GNU/Linux variant.
- Gnu Project : the GNU Project was launched in 1984 to develop a complete UNIX-like operating system which is free software: the GNU system. Variants of the GNU operating system, which use the kernel called Linux, are now widely used; though these systems are often referred to as Linux, they are more accurately called GNU/Linux systems.
- Open Source Iniziative : Open Source Initiative (OSI) is a non-profit corporation dedicated to managing and promoting the Open Source Definition for the good of the community, specifically through the OSI Certified Open Source Software certification mark and program. You can read about successful software products that have these properties, and about our certification mark and program, which allow you to be confident that software really is "Open Source".
Projects for Mathematicians
Many interesting free software projects are devoted to Mathematics :
- TeX : is a computer language designed for use in typesetting; in particular, for typesetting math and other technical material. For more informations please refer to Guit.
- TeXmacs : GNU TeXmacs is a free wysiwyw (what you see is what you want) editing platform with special features for scientists. For more informations please refer to TeXmacs Site.
- Maxima : Maxima is a system for the manipulation of symbolic and numerical expressions. Maxima can also plot functions and data in two and three dimensions. For more informations please refer to Maxima Sourceforge Site.
- Gnu Octave : GNU Octave is a high-level language, primarily intended for numerical computations. For more informations please refer to Octave Official Site.
- Kig : is a dynamic mathematics software for geometry. It is aimed at secondary schools and it is developed by Markus Hohenwarter, at the University of Salzburg. For more informations please refer to Kdeedu Project.
- GeoGebra : GeoGebra is a dynamic mathematics software that joins geometry, algebra and calculus. It is aimed at secondary schools and it is developed by Markus Hohenwarter. For more informations please refer to GeoGebra Site.
- Pari GP : is a free software for Number Theory applications. For more informations please refer to Pari GP Site.
Documents
- Formati aperti per la Matematica: in this very short paper (in Italian) we review the more important open formats for math.
Further readings
- M. Stutz, Linux Guida Pratica. Edizioni Mondadori, 2003.
- G. Moody, Codice ribelle. La vera storia di Linux e della rivoluzione Open Source. Edizioni Hops, 2002.
