Having the right type of software is essential for running a business as efficiently as possible in the global marketplace. When it comes to choosing software for business purposes, or even creating a website, you generally have one of two choices when it comes to choosing a software platform. You can choose to use proprietary software that is trademarked and likely requires you to obtain or purchase a license, or you can use open-source software, which is free software that you can download and pay no licensing fees to use. Advantages and disadvantages exist to using both. Proprietary Advantages One advantage to using a proprietary-software system is that you will generally be able to take advantage of the software company's customer service department for troubleshooting and setup purposes. Proprietary software may have more features that appeal to the business owner.
This type of software needs to be installed separately on a device, and it regularly has interfaces that enables communication between the machine and the user, hence giving rise to many different advantages and disadvantages.
For example, some word processing programs may integrate website-development features or features compatible with other proprietary software made by the same manufacturer. Additionally, proprietary software is generally tailored to meet a market need, whereas this is not always the case with open-source software. Open Source Advantages Open-source software is often cheaper, if not free.
Although the customer support may not be available with open-source software, its wide distribution means that you may be able to gain help from a large number of users on the Internet via forums or other information sources. As problems arise, fast bug and security fixes are often available for open-source software.
Expense Drawbacks Expense is one of the major drawbacks of a proprietary-software package. Because the software company needs to sell its product to survive, it will generally charge a licensing fee to the company that needs to utilize its product. Depending upon the nature of the software, this licensing fee can be fairly expensive, especially in comparison to open-source software.
If any fees are required for open-source software, they are usually required for the software itself, but not necessarily for ongoing licensing maintenance. Finding Developers Another disadvantage to proprietary software in comparison to open-source software is that the software makes the business owner too heavily dependent upon the developer. The company that develops the product can create the product in such a way that only its own programmers and developers understand the code that makes the software work. This means that the licensee will generally not be able to turn to other business owners and users for help with the product. Ability to Adapt Proprietary software products are not usually as adaptable to the constantly changing needs of the business owner. The complicated coding of proprietary software often makes it difficult to adapt to changes in the marketplace. Open-source software, however, tends to be much quicker to adapt to these types of changes and often provides the business owner with more flexibility to adapt it to his own situation.
Proprietary developers are sometimes slow to provide fixes for any bugs that their software may have.